3 ms·
This wasn't a smart thing to say. Apple's growth is real. While it may not be a threat to Microsoft's profits, calling it a rounding error just seems out of t
by mdasen 17y ago
This wasn't a smart thing to say. Apple's growth is real. While it may not be a threat to Microsoft's profits, calling it a rounding error just seems out of touch with reality.
If anything, Microsoft should play up two things. First, that they believe their products offer a superior value, choice, and flexibility when compared with Apple's as their "laptop hunters" commercials portray. That counts for a lot. Second, that Apple's health shows that competition is alive and well in the computing market which will drive all parties to produce the best products they can.
Saying that Apple's growth isn't real simply comes off as out of touch with reality. It makes it seem like you don't know the market well enough to see the obvious and, if that's true, how can you steer your company to success? Similarly, if Apple were to simply dismiss Microsoft's "laptop hunter" commercials as not connecting with people, they'd similarly be out of touch.
Both offerings have strengths and weaknesses. Pretending that isn't true might win you points with fanboys, but makes you seem out of touch to the 90% who aren't die-hards on either side and try to buy what's best for them.
The key is getting across the point that your product has continued value, not that someone else's product doesn't have value. Windows is powering more computers than ever today as the market expands. Windows provides a low-cost (compared to Apple) operating system that maintains a high level of compatibility that businesses demand. Similarly Apple should stress that they offer an elegant, integrated experience with greater interoperability than ever.
Fanning flame wars as an executive just seems immature.
- grellas 17y agoUltimate in hubris: IBM regarding Wintel [Edit: PC] offering as a "toy" circa 1984. This seems to be in that same spirit. Apple's Standard Oil model of business (fanatical control of every aspect of its products) has given it certain major engineering advantages but has limited its desktop share to that of a strong high-end niche - great for connoisseurs and for those on the cutting edge, less appealing to those who need to solve immediate business problems with cost-effective solutions. It was a seismic shift ala first-time-ever mass computing that blind-sided IBM and caused it to lose hegemony in the enterprise market. That could happen today as well (though not from the Mac itself, which will remain a high-end niche product), and I would suspect that Microsoft is not nearly as sanguine in the back room about the threats to its dominance as it lets on. Agreed it is not wise to put on an arrogant face about it.
- scythe 17y agoHm? Windows was first released in November of '85, and the first release that achieved significant popularity was released in '87. Do you mean to say IBM regarded the Apple Macintosh as a toy?
- grellas 17y agoI really messed that one up. IBM senior management regarded the desktop PC manufactured by its own Boca Raton division as a toy. What IBM missed (with all its big-systems hubris) was the competitive threat that arose when it gave Intel and Microsoft a vehicle by which to seize the future of mass computing when they got to supply the key inner parts for the PC. "Wintel" was intended as a shorthand reference to the Intel/Microsoft teaming but it was obviously a poorly chosen term to refer to the early 1980s era, when Windows didn't even exist.
- olefoo 17y agoYou will notice that it is difficult to buy at retail a netbook/laptop with a functional and friendly linux installation. And yet many people do run functinal and friendly linux based operating systems on the same hardware that is currently only available w/ Windows XP. Microsoft OEM contracts and market power have nothing to do with this.
- barrkel 17y agoA problem: Apple targets the high, expensive-end of computing, while PCs, when they were introduced, ate away at the low end of computing. Apple cannot reproduce the same success of the PC in a similar fashion with the same kind of strategy, because skimming off the top of the value chain doesn't naturally scale, as most people aren't income-insensitive, and Apple's brand cachet depends on being classy, not cheap. In reality, it's web apps that are the "inferior" thing that is killing desktop software, which in turn reduces platform stickiness and frees the high end of the market to move to Apple. That's where MS is worried, and why they invest so much in .NET, Silverlight, etc.