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> I remember the arguments I hear here on HN these days "No company can be that big and still grow. Also competition will catch up!" from the early 2000's when

> I remember the arguments I hear here on HN these days "No company can be that big and still grow. Also competition will catch up!" from the early 2000's when Apple's market cap crossed $100B. Early 2000s the iPhone hadn’t been invented. Apple’s market cap would be a tiny fraction of what it is today if they had remained a Mac + iPod + software company. Apple’s genius has been their ability to enter and dominate (and sometimes create) completely new markets. Since the early 2000s, the following new markets have all eclipsed the Mac or the iPod in annual revenues for Apple: iPhone iPad Services Accessories Basically, whatever company Apple was in the early to late 2000s, is the least financially significant bit for Apple today.

ArtTimeInvestor 2y ago
> Early 2000s the iPhone hadn’t been invented That was my point. Companies - especially tech companies - go through phases. Apple is now a phone company, Microsoft a cloud computing company, Tesla an AI company ... The value of a tech company is not in their current product line. It is in the product lines they will build in the future.
- acchow 2y ago
  iPhone sales make up 46% of Apple's revenue, so it has expanded beyond just being "a phone company". They offer an integrated experience across their products.
  - ArtTimeInvestor 2y ago
    Another 28% is services, a good chunk of it is probably fees charged for the Appstore which is part of the phone? The growth of the Appstore business is another example of what I am trying to convey here. That companies are moving targets. When the iPhone came out, people were estimating how fast the competition could catch up with the hard- and software. AFAIR appstore fees were not a part of the discussion back then.
- Jlagreen 2y ago
  And what many don't understand Nvidia is an accelerated computing company today which is something which will benefit almost any industry. Compute power from Nvidia's ecosystem can benefit everything and Nvidia is working on growing the ecosystem with HW + Networking + SW. Nvidia's data centers as ecosystem will become as flexible in doing whatever you need as the PC and Smartphone became that way. And that is their real moat. They will have competition in many specific areas but no one will compete with Nvidia solutions on a global scale of applications.

ArtTimeInvestor 2y ago

> Early 2000s the iPhone hadn’t been invented That was my point. Companies - especially tech companies - go through phases. Apple is now a phone company, Microsoft a cloud computing company, Tesla an AI company ... The value of a tech company is not in their current product line. It is in the product lines they will build in the future.

acchow 2y ago
iPhone sales make up 46% of Apple's revenue, so it has expanded beyond just being "a phone company". They offer an integrated experience across their products.
- ArtTimeInvestor 2y ago
  Another 28% is services, a good chunk of it is probably fees charged for the Appstore which is part of the phone? The growth of the Appstore business is another example of what I am trying to convey here. That companies are moving targets. When the iPhone came out, people were estimating how fast the competition could catch up with the hard- and software. AFAIR appstore fees were not a part of the discussion back then.
Jlagreen 2y ago
And what many don't understand Nvidia is an accelerated computing company today which is something which will benefit almost any industry. Compute power from Nvidia's ecosystem can benefit everything and Nvidia is working on growing the ecosystem with HW + Networking + SW. Nvidia's data centers as ecosystem will become as flexible in doing whatever you need as the PC and Smartphone became that way. And that is their real moat. They will have competition in many specific areas but no one will compete with Nvidia solutions on a global scale of applications.