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This is Apple making an attack at Google. Microsoft is a gonner in a few years. Google was ready to take charge of their market with Google apps and cloud servi

This is Apple making an attack at Google. Microsoft is a gonner in a few years. Google was ready to take charge of their market with Google apps and cloud services. Apple is gonna make IBM build a cloud base infrastructure with Apple User interface and QA. We are talking very high end costumers, not the typical small or medium corp. No one will be fired for buying Apple and IBM. Google, maybe. Enterprise Cloud was one Horse race for Microsoft market. Now there are two.

pilsetnieks 12y ago
> Microsoft is a gonner in a few years. A bit more than a few years. They still have pretty good profits (Windows and Office are still quite popular,) and even if that dried up suddenly and they had zero revenue, they could quite literally live on their cash reserves for a decade.
- gress 12y ago
  If Microsoft goes to zero revenue, their shareholders will have different uses for the cash. Long before that point it will be dismantled. [edit: downvotes, seriously? I'm just pointing out that Microsoft is not a private company that can do whatever it likes with its cash pile if it is not performing. I guess that is uncomfortable for some reason.]
  - jchendy 12y ago
    Can you ELI5 what would be the actual impact of a huge selloff of Microsoft shares?
    - gress 12y ago
      Who is talking about a selloff of shares?
brudgers 12y ago
IBM was already going head to head with Microsoft. Has been for about twenty years. Their quality was already enterprise grade, it's Apple that is trying to make a critical transition - out of the cyclic commodity consumer hardware business and into the more stable B2B markets. The problem for Apple is their secrecy and planned three year obsolescence is unattractive at scale for large businesses. A large part of IBM's continued relevance has been from their shift toward solutions leveraging open source as well as providing customers with clear roadmaps.
blazespin 12y ago
Yes, hn, downvote the only savvy post here. HN has no enterprise depth.
philwelch 12y ago
If the only thing Microsoft did was sell Excel, they would be a billion dollar enterprise software company for years.
72deluxe 12y ago
Do you really believe that Google was ready to take charge of the market? Many people have a Gmail account and a YouTube account, but do you see many people using their Docs offering instead of Microsoft Office? Without trying to sound too harsh, the problem with Google is that they have a faddish focus, and don't appear to maintain some product offerings once they are past the "look! It's NEW!" phase. If you made the recommendation to switch to Google's systems, would your manager be asking "How long is it going to be there for?". It's a pity. Do you see "enterprise" switching to systems like that? Do you see loads of Chromebooks and Chromeboxes (do they even still make them?) on desks instead of PCs? Honestly? This is different to Microsoft's strategy where you can still run software from 20 years ago, and some businesses like only investing in software once, instead of an ongoing licensing fee. I do not see Microsoft disappearing quickly, despite how popular web apps are in startup circles; Windows still rules the enterprise desktop. I myself write software on a Mac but everybody else here has never used a Mac and are flummoxed if presented with its desktop, and typically see Apple products are overpriced. High end customers would involve large corporations where there would be a need for many PCs traditionally. Although iPads have become popular with BYOD, do most people just accept that it's a great consumer (consuming) device and not marvellous for creation of content? If large corporations were to switch their desktops to Apple machines, do you think the profit margin would increase or decrease? It just isn't going to happen.

pilsetnieks 12y ago

> Microsoft is a gonner in a few years. A bit more than a few years. They still have pretty good profits (Windows and Office are still quite popular,) and even if that dried up suddenly and they had zero revenue, they could quite literally live on their cash reserves for a decade.

gress 12y ago
If Microsoft goes to zero revenue, their shareholders will have different uses for the cash. Long before that point it will be dismantled. [edit: downvotes, seriously? I'm just pointing out that Microsoft is not a private company that can do whatever it likes with its cash pile if it is not performing. I guess that is uncomfortable for some reason.]
- jchendy 12y ago
  Can you ELI5 what would be the actual impact of a huge selloff of Microsoft shares?
  - gress 12y ago
    Who is talking about a selloff of shares?

brudgers 12y ago

IBM was already going head to head with Microsoft. Has been for about twenty years. Their quality was already enterprise grade, it's Apple that is trying to make a critical transition - out of the cyclic commodity consumer hardware business and into the more stable B2B markets. The problem for Apple is their secrecy and planned three year obsolescence is unattractive at scale for large businesses. A large part of IBM's continued relevance has been from their shift toward solutions leveraging open source as well as providing customers with clear roadmaps.

blazespin 12y ago

Yes, hn, downvote the only savvy post here. HN has no enterprise depth.

philwelch 12y ago

If the only thing Microsoft did was sell Excel, they would be a billion dollar enterprise software company for years.

72deluxe 12y ago

Do you really believe that Google was ready to take charge of the market? Many people have a Gmail account and a YouTube account, but do you see many people using their Docs offering instead of Microsoft Office? Without trying to sound too harsh, the problem with Google is that they have a faddish focus, and don't appear to maintain some product offerings once they are past the "look! It's NEW!" phase. If you made the recommendation to switch to Google's systems, would your manager be asking "How long is it going to be there for?". It's a pity. Do you see "enterprise" switching to systems like that? Do you see loads of Chromebooks and Chromeboxes (do they even still make them?) on desks instead of PCs? Honestly? This is different to Microsoft's strategy where you can still run software from 20 years ago, and some businesses like only investing in software once, instead of an ongoing licensing fee. I do not see Microsoft disappearing quickly, despite how popular web apps are in startup circles; Windows still rules the enterprise desktop. I myself write software on a Mac but everybody else here has never used a Mac and are flummoxed if presented with its desktop, and typically see Apple products are overpriced. High end customers would involve large corporations where there would be a need for many PCs traditionally. Although iPads have become popular with BYOD, do most people just accept that it's a great consumer (consuming) device and not marvellous for creation of content? If large corporations were to switch their desktops to Apple machines, do you think the profit margin would increase or decrease? It just isn't going to happen.