Slashdot Mirror
Apple Becomes the First $1 Trillion US Company in History (reuters.com)
Apple became the first $1 trillion publicly listed U.S. company on Thursday, crowning a decade-long rise fueled by its ubiquitous iPhone that transformed it from a niche player in personal computers into a global powerhouse spanning entertainment and communications. Reuters: The tech company's stock jumped 2.8 percent, bringing its gain to about 9 percent since Tuesday when it reported June-quarter results above expectations and said it bought back $20 billion of its own shares. "Apple's $1 trillion cap is equal to about 5 percent of the total gross domestic product of the United States in 2018," David Kass, professor of finance at the University of Maryland, told The Washington Post. "That puts this company in perspective." The company's fortunes were turbocharged by the launch of personal gadgets such as the iPod in 2001 and the iPhone in 2007. Since then 18 different iPhones have been launched and more than 1.2 billion of the devices have been sold.
Brad Stone, writing for Bloomberg: As critics enjoy pointing out, the company under Cook has failed to come up with another iPhone-type hit. But that's like saying da Vinci never came up with another Mona Lisa-type painting. The release of the iPhone is up there with the founding of Standard Oil as one of the greatest business moves of all time. And while the iPhone has altered daily life so much that no one remembers life before it, Apple has also persuaded customers to embrace other inventions they never knew they wanted, such as connected watches that buzz and beep (to cure the distraction of the phone, Apple says) and wireless dongles that hang ridiculously from their ears.
Apple isn't alone on this mountaintop. Amazon.com, Alphabet, and Microsoft are likely at some point to pinwheel across the $1 trillion finish line, too, and they're almost as good as Apple at manufacturing customer desire. No one told Amazon they needed a speaker they could talk to, or Google a self-driving car, or Microsoft a ... OK, it's been a while since Microsoft has driven civilians wild with desire.
Brad Stone, writing for Bloomberg: As critics enjoy pointing out, the company under Cook has failed to come up with another iPhone-type hit. But that's like saying da Vinci never came up with another Mona Lisa-type painting. The release of the iPhone is up there with the founding of Standard Oil as one of the greatest business moves of all time. And while the iPhone has altered daily life so much that no one remembers life before it, Apple has also persuaded customers to embrace other inventions they never knew they wanted, such as connected watches that buzz and beep (to cure the distraction of the phone, Apple says) and wireless dongles that hang ridiculously from their ears.
Apple isn't alone on this mountaintop. Amazon.com, Alphabet, and Microsoft are likely at some point to pinwheel across the $1 trillion finish line, too, and they're almost as good as Apple at manufacturing customer desire. No one told Amazon they needed a speaker they could talk to, or Google a self-driving car, or Microsoft a ... OK, it's been a while since Microsoft has driven civilians wild with desire.
From the MacRumors article (emphasis mine):
Apple has officially become the world's only trillion dollar publicly traded company, in terms of market capitalization, which is simply the company's number of outstanding shares multiplied by its stock price. [...] As with most milestones of this nature, however, Apple reaching exactly a trillion dollar market cap doesn't have too much significance, beyond the vanity of it.
Pretty much sums it up.
It is amazing how good your margins are when you employ overseas slave labor to assemble your products. But yeah: kudos to the management team.
[...] And that's very sad, that such a money-making personal computer happens to be so horrifically crippled and locked in.
Um, HOW is the Mac (you said "personal computer"; so I assume you mean Macs, not iPhones) either "horrifically crippled" or "locked in"?
"Locked in"? To WHAT?!? You can literally legally run more OSes (and even conveniently switch between them using the Mac's built-in Bootloader) on Macs than ANY other computer. You can purchase Applications from anywhere on the planet, and even write your own with Apple's FREE IDE (a Developer License only costs money if you want to submit Apps to the Apple App Store). So, where EXACTLY is the "Lock In"?
"Horrifically Crippled"? Well, since you didn't mention any specific models, it is impossible to know what was in that little pea-brain of yours when you vomited out that Apple-Hating bile; but here's some examples:
1. iMac Pro: Released in December, 2017. Pretty damn nice specs, if a bit pricey (but price != "crippling"). Up to 18 core Xeon CPU (that wasn't even really released when they started taking orders for the iMac Pro; so it doesn't get any "fresher" than that!), with a AMD Vega 56 or 64 GPU that was released about a month before the iMac Pro was released. Up to 128 GB of ECC RAM And with a built-in 5k display, with USB-C/TB3, USB-A and 10GigE ports, plus analog audio.
2. MacBook Pro: Last updated about 3 weeks ago. Up to a 6-core i9 CPU. Up to 4 TB of SSD (the fastest in any laptop!) and 32 GB of RAM. AMD Radeon GPUs that can drive up to TWO 5K external displays, PLUS the internal display. And don't forget the whopping 80 Gb/sec I/O Bandwidth, which can be easily and inexpensively (and non-Apple-specifically!) broken-out into up to FIFTY TWO Simultaneous Ports(!!!), in any one of a myriad of combinations (according to the USER's needs; not Apple's whims), and which can even be changed as the User's needs change. This is REALLY unique. Yes, other laptops have USB-C (and some even TB3); but NONE have Apple's FOUR full-speed USB-C/TB3 Ports. Oh, and don't forget, with the recent Refresh, Apple even doubled the number of cores AND the number of full-speed USB-C/TB3 Ports on the 13 inch MacBook Pro; further "UN-crippling" it... Oh, and I almost forgot: The TouchBar and TouchID (an Application-Configurable, unique touch input/display device, which provides a modicum of Touch control without stealing Screen real-estate) and the convenience and security of Apple's excellent Fingerprint sensor. How is ANY of that "Horrifically Crippled"?
Please explain rationally. I'll wait...