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How Apple Came To Control the Component Market
An anonymous reader writes "Phillip Elmer-Dewitt draws on several sources to argue that 'Apple has become not a monopoly (a single seller), but a monopsony — the one buyer that can control an entire market.' According to Dewitt, Apple uses its $70 billion cash hoard to 'pay for the construction cost (or a significant fraction of it) of [tech factories] in exchange for exclusive rights to the output production of the factory for a set period of time...' This gives Apple 'access to new component technology months or years before its rivals and allows it to release groundbreaking products that are actually impossible to duplicate.'"
It would make sense that a term with somewhat dubious connotations would contain the word "Sony."
Based on the article summary, if Apple is fronting the cash to BUILD factories in exchange for exclusive rights on the items the factory produces, I think it's fair to say that a lot of groundbreaking is going on.