>Microsoft is playing an entirely different game than selling loss leader hardware. Same can be said for Google, right? Google is playing an entirely different

>Microsoft is playing an entirely different game than selling loss leader hardware. Same can be said for Google, right? Google is playing an entirely different game than having paid-for-products but instead funneling products into the money-printing Ads machine. >But how many acquisitions has Google screwed up completely? I actually don't know and am very curious, how many? More or less than other similar companies? From my memory it's not many but I could be very wrong. Firebase for example, is alive and strong and rarely gets mentioned. I don't think every company needs to have the same type of business model. Google became popular because it made really great products that were all free* which increased adoption. Maybe some of them (like say, Search) would have never gotten popular if they had charged for it right away. I'm not convinced there's a single right path. >it was revealed in the Oracle trial how relatively little Android makes in profit It makes sense though, right? I don't even know how Android would make money directly (ok, I do know of ways, not sure if that's how it is) but it's a precursor for making money from the Play Store.