There was a time when being ‘a trillion dollar company’ seemed quite sizably voluminous milestone to reach, but current tech biggies are making their way to it as if it is nothing. The technology industry hasn’t optically discerned such high market capital in the last 242 years and now it’s just a time span of 33 days and we have two Trillion dollar organizations.
On Tuesday, Sept 4, 2018, Amazon officially achieved the denomination of Trillion dollar organization and marked itself second to this list. Four weeks ago, Apple became the first Trillion dollar company. If we take a look at Amazon’s background, it went from selling books and CDs online to morphing itself into a potent organization. Cleary, the plethora of business units are proving its ascendance in the retail market.
Apple technically took 38 years to become worthy of $1 trillion while Amazon got there in just a sprint of 21 years. The company’s stocks doubled in the last year as it grew rapidly in the retail and cloud computing services. It has surely revolutionized the rules of retails in the past couple of decades.
Well, we can’t gainsay that this success is a historic one for its founder Jeff Bezos, who commenced it in 1994 in the Seattle Garage. At that time Amazon was nothing but a mundane bookselling company. Now, Jeff Bezos is leading the list of Billionaires on top. The company hasn’t got such magnification in its capital overnight. It took investors a while to plenarily appreciate Bezos’ long-term strategies.
Bezos, in the year 2011, told a magazine that, “If everything you do needs to work on a three-year time horizon, then you’re competing against a lot of people.But if you’re willing to invest on a seven-year time horizon, you’re now competing against a fraction of those people, because very few companies are willing to do that.” Well, surely such knockout orchestrating seem to work pretty well for the company.
Apple or Amazon: Who did it better?
The two business giants may have achieved market capital of $1 trillion, but both of their voyages have been quite different from each other. While Apple has ever relied on the computer hardware services, Amazon, on the other hand, targeted capitalistic infrastructure.
Well, it is pellucid that Amazon has been a value rocket ship in reaching $1trillion. We weren’t witnessing this landmark achievement of Amazon if it weren’t for the cloud computing services of the company. They played their role with retail side by side in making the organization a voluminous success.
Though we can’t ignore the fact that other organizations are also following them in this trillion dollar race. Currently, Google’s Alphabet is having a market value of $852Biliion. So, don’t be surprised if one day you will find it joining the club with Amazon and Apple.
Apple, the tech giant never fails to justify its motto – Think Different and why not to have an extraordinary approach? Look where this approach has brought them, a trillion dollar worth company. This time they came up with the new announcement regarding privacy policies. The iPhone maker is asking all the developers to link the applications and their updates on the Apple App Store with the Privacy Policies. These new privacy rules will be under effect by October 3rd, 2018.
Which apps are required to be linked with the policies?
Well, till now you must have thought that the iOS apps are already equipped with the Privacy Policies. Then what’s the motive of enforcing them?
Actually, till now the privacy policies were linked with only subscription-based apps on the iOS store. But, now it is mandatory for all the applications and even their updates to comply with the concerned policies. As per the official announcement, the iPhone maker is even mandating the privacy policies even to the offline applications that do not require internet for operation. The offline app developers have been asked to host a website with concerned privacy policy page.
How will it benefit the iPhone users?
Apple has made itself clear that it won’t pull out the apps which are already there in the store, but it even asked their developers to link the policies whenever any future update is shipped. With this move, Apple is trying to bound the app developers to actually explain to users the ways in which they can delete their personal stored information on the applications. In order to bring it into effect, the tech giant even requires all the developers to comply apps with the GDPR rights at some level. After this, the customers will just tap associated privacy policy and read it in Safari.
On Thursday, 30 August 2018 Donald Trump in an interview lashed out at current technology companies of being in a very Antitrust situation. While talking to Bloomberg, the American President pointed out that these organizations are misusing their power and influence, but didn’t comment on whether they should be broken up or not.
Donald Trump’s war of words
“I won’t comment on the breaking up, of whether it’s Google or Amazon or Facebook,” Trump’s reply on breaking the companies by the US government. This anger was quite foreseen as on Tuesday when the President alleged Google of rigging its search results for suppressing positive coverage about him. Google said that this wasn’t true, pointing out that it had promoted his address, and buzz feed News.
Companies’ take on the comment
After Trump’s attack this week, the company said its search function is not used to set a political agenda and isn’t biased against any ideology. Amazon and Facebook representatives didn’t respond yet on the warning.
Antitrust allegations have never left our tech giants
Whenever it comes to Antitrust allegations, tech companies are alleged now and then. In July 2018, European Union slapped Google with $5B for Android abuse. Apple, the trillion dollar company wasn’t even able to bypass the Antitrust threats and accused of one with Yahoo’s Game Plus platform. Now, let’s see where these how far will these accusations will go and how they will affect the organizations.
Lately, we all have been listening to the news that Magento 1 is going to end this November 2018. Well, it appears to be a fuss to me as there is no reputable source available to confirm the authenticity of the news.
Why the rumor spread in the first place?
Actually, the rumor came out when Magento announced that they are stopping the support and updates for Magento 1 in the Meet Magento Prague in the year 2017.
I just had a call with the technical team — so support for 1.x will be till June 2020. This may be pushed out in the course of the year- but will not be any time before that.
No reasons to worry
Hence, we needn’t worry about the end of Magento 1.x anymore till there isn’t any public announcement by the officials. Owners should continue to work forward with their store. You might be planning to migrate to Magento 2 platform but that doesn’t mean that you will be deprived of the services and support of Magento 1.x.
We all are aware of the ongoing Android Antitrust case between Google and EU. In this case the European Commission alleged Google of having control of their Play Store in Android devices to stifle competition for search. On July 18th 2018, the European Union fined Google with $5B for favoring its own product in the smartphones.
Why Google has been accused of Android abuse?
Actually, the key issues, in this case, were the licensing terms that bounded smartphone manufacturers to pre-install Google apps especially Google Search and Google Play in Android-based devices. Google Play has been the most dominant app store for all these years, the phone makers had no choice but to accept its terms. Google has even been accused of going a step further and paying to make its search engine default in all the new devices.
What were the motives behind this abuse?
Google has lost its biggest case, but the motive of doing it in the first place is still a debatable topic. Some say that Google wanted its apps to be familiar so that users can rely on it. This argument seems valid to some extent as users will seek it out which they have used it for a long time duration. Some other theories are also in the wind that Google tried to lower the value of being default search by pre-installing apps in devices.
Well, no matter what the motives were! But, European Commission has found Google guilty for Android abuse and it will have to pay. This Android abuse case has been in the top highlights lately and now we can only wait for any further lead on the issue. Suggested Reading:Apple should also be fined over Antitrust Abuse, know why?
According to a report, Apple is going to win EU Antitrust Approval to buy Shazam of worth $400M. It was announced by Apple last year and now EU is set to clear Apple’s Shazam buyout. This deal between EU regulators and the iPhone maker will help Apple in competing with the Spotify music app.
The whole story
It all started in the month of December 2017 when Apple announced its intent to acquire Shazam. EU opened a full-scale investigation in April, for they had doubts that this deal might give an unfair advantage to Apple in approaching users of the rivals. Apple Music is the second-largest music streaming service in Europe. So, EU was also concerned that Apple might halt the referrals from Shazam to its rivals.
The Commission took over the case from national EU regulators following a request from seven European countries including France, Italy, Spain, and Sweden. Now, the EU executive is scheduled to decide on the deal by Sept. 18. Apple has declined to comment over the news as of now.
On Thursday, August 16, 2018, Apple was probed in Japan for anti-competitive practices against Yahoo game platform. Apple has been accused of applying pressure to prevent publishers from working with Yahoo’s Game Plus Platform. As per Japanese Media , the Fair Trade Commission (FTC) is investigating these antitrust allegations.
The Whole Story
In July 2017, Yahoo Japan came up with the Game Plus platform allowing the users to stream games online without needing to download them. Also, it benefitted the developers with fewer restrictions regarding sales, fees, and updates in comparison to the Apple App Store. This platform gained the interest of a number of companies with some big names on the list as Square Enix Holdings and many more.
Apple, who recently became $1 Trillion company, took this Game Plus Model as a direct threat to their App Store. It started pressurizing the companies to back away from Yahoo. It even got some of them off from the list. Apple apparently believed that the deal of Yahoo with around 50 big organizations can damage App Store’s business and thus tried its money and power to put pressure on them.
How has it affected Game platform?
Apple pressure on Yahoo to quash the Game Plus Platform slashed its budget in September 2017. After the organizations started withdrawing from the platform, Yahoo has now stopped promoting its services. Yahoo has been reporting these issues to Fair Trade Commission and industry ministry from the last autumn and now they are investigating the matter.
Antitrust allegations aren’t new to Apple
Going through Antitrust allegations isn’t new to Apple. Its Universal compatibility violation is the latest on the plate. Its Irish tax bill and Qualcomm antitrust battle are also leading the list. Apple hasn’t responded to any of this accusation of Yahoo. A spokesman at Yahoo Japan said that they are adding game titles on the website. Let’s wait for Apple to comment on the matter and see where this fight goes in future.
Recently, Apple became the first $1 trillion company. Apart from being the biggest tech organization, it is best among its counterparts. From building a motherboard without a monitor and keyboard (Apple I) to the newest iPhone X (Behemoth), Apple has left every tech biggie behind. Apple, primarily being a product-based company focused on their iPhone instead of trying their hands everywhere and see where it has brought them. Their one Smartphone’s progress is so high that the other phone makers can’t even move the needle. Let’s dig deep into Apple’s Success Story and know how it all happened.
Apple and technology are like two sides of a coin. The way they are bringing the amazing new technologies in these small-sized handsets is just incomparable. Its current dominance and rise is quite puzzling for its competitors and even for us.
Both past and the recent success of Apple are based on the growth of its products. Other than their trademark iPhone, Apple has even other successful products. For instance, its iPad brought the tablets into the market. iPad boasted 46% of US market share and grabbed $5.9 revenue. It is by far the most successful tablet in the world.
Apple’s Evolution: When Apple was nearly bankrupt
Apple’s journey has been a bit extraordinary from the beginning. Who would have thought then that a 21-year-old college dropout would have this enormous vision?
It all started with Jobs hanging out in a garage with his two friends Steve Wozniak and Ronald Wayne. Jobs and Wayne started working for a gaming company while Wozniak worked for the Hewlett Packard. But, on April 1, 1976, this trio built the first Apple computer and it was the first foot of this remarkable journey.
But, Wayne sold its Apple shares for just $800 just three months after the initiation of Apple while the two Steves went on with their vision.
Everyone is aware that Apple had a great fourth quarter and has became the first $1 trillion company, but the way to success hasn’t been an easy one for the iPhone maker. The iPhones are doing better than ever today. But, very few of us know that Apple was once on the brink of bankruptcy. Yeah right! It happened 20 years ago in the August of 1997. Let’s take a detailed look at what happened with the Apple in the back of summer of 1997.
Apple was going through a disastrous phase at that time and it was on the verge of getting defunct. Apple decided to buy a computer company ‘ NEXT’ with the hope of a right direction to their company. But, Steve Jobs convinced the board of rather getting a help from an established organization than to buy a company. Steve Jobs knew that if Apple was to be saved, the only chance was to seek help from the competitors.
Microsoft realized that eliminating competition isn’t the only way to win and it came forward to rescue Apple. It invested $150 million in return for non-negotiating shares. It assured Apple that it would support Mac for five years. In the favor, Apple dropped the lawsuit against Microsoft that claimed that Microsoft had copied Mac OS to make Internet Explorer the default browser in computers instead of a choice. After the agreement, Jobs even thanked Bill Gates for their support, which was even reported in the Time Magazine that year:
Summer of 2018: When Apple is worth $1 trillion
Various tech biggies such as Alphabet (Google), Amazon, Microsoft have been doing a great job in the technology space. On Aug 2, 2018, Apple hit the market value with $1 trillion in which iPhone X played a major role. iPhone sales increased in such a way that when it grew by 1 percent, revenue instantly jumped by 20 percent. With $53.3 billion in revenue, the company managed to grow by 17 percent per year. Other Apple services may not be showing the same magical growth, but iPhone is killing from one side and it’s enough of what Apple requires.
When we talk about market capitalization, Apple has been the biggest company in the world for all these years. Now, Apple and Tim Cook are becoming more powerful than ever and we can hope that they make fruitful use of this success.
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The company’s bright fortune is surely a good news for the individual investors. The stock of Apple is widely owned by teachers to electricians to lawyers. By rising to $1 trillion, it has given a reflection of how big is the investor’s scope with Apple. Apple is now at a position where it is growing and is profitable for investors of all sort, be it the newbie’s or the established ones.
Kate Warne, the investment strategist at Edward Jones, says,” Apple’s $1 trillion valuation is a great reminder to investors that companies with innovative ideas combined with world-class products and service can create value for investors over time”.
Apple rose to $1 trillion: now the hard part
Every area that Apple is targeting and investing money has got competitors lurking around. Whether it’s for the Chatbots and AI to cars and voice, hungry co-opted companies are following it like a shadow.
Apple surpassed the one trillion dollar mark and left us all amazed. But, can they maintain their edge in the tech market? Can Apple provide the amazing technological advancements as it has done in the past? Will it be able to engage more loyal customers? Because if we look behind, there are other competitors in the race. Sustaining such big numbers won’t be easy when they have other competitor biggies who themselves carry the potential to overpower it.
Actually, the main challenge would be to manage complacency of this growth. As they say, success comes with both blessing and curse, thus, Apple has to plan their next moves properly.
Apple and controversies have never left each other’s side. Various allegations have followed Apple in the past two decades. Lately, Google has been fined $5B over Android Abuse and the sword is even hanging on Apple. Here, are few allegations which Apple has faced in the past:
The list isn’t ending here; big or small Apple’s span is full of allegations. But, somehow it dodges them every time. Negativity has always been there around Apple, but it never lets itself undermine.
Apple’s reign is full of loss, defeats, triumphs, and controversies, but it has proved its potential in the market. It hasn’t built its empire overnight. Apple has overcome product flops, near bankruptcy, the death of its founder to be worth $1 trillion. Had Microsoft not invested in Apple, the company would not have come this far. Imagine today’s world without technologies like iPhone, iPad, Mac etc.
Apple’s success story is full of efforts and sacrifices, so, it won’t let anyone overpower so easily. It isn’t hidden from anyone that it has some tough competition in the market. It would be interesting to see the technology fight put up by other companies to surpass Apple and how will Apple counter them. That time will tell.
On 9th of August, 2018, Qualcomm, the largest chipmaker announced that a mutual settlement has been agreed between them and Taiwanese regulators in Antitrust abuse case over $774 million fine.
Actually, last year in the month of October, Taiwan announced a fine on this chipmaker organization for increasing the licensing fees of the devices used in the smartphones. In the lawsuit, Taiwan alleged Qualcomm of abusing its monopoly power over smartphone modems. In short, Qualcomm has tried to forbid the new companies from setting their foot in the market and this is not the first time it is in a legal battle. Qualcomm’s patent battle with Apple is also a big highlight these days.
Lately, Google has also been fined $5B by EU over Android abuse. News regarding Antitrust abuse are coming from all directions. In the settlement between Qualcomm and Taiwan, the initially announced fine has been dropped but Qualcomm is bound to invest money in Taiwan and work with its Government to bring 5G services in the country. Qualcomm can’t even pull off its chip supplies in this deal.
European Commission claims that smartphone makers have failed in adopting universal compatibility and is planning to enforce a standard on them. It gives a signal that Apple might be the next target of EU.
Actual Story:
In 2009, 14 big companies like Nokia, Samsung, Apple etc. signed a memorandum, agreeing to harmonize their chargers for upcoming phones in the year 2011. This memorandum expired in 2012 and all the companies adopted the standards except for the tech giant Apple.
European Commission’s Move:
After putting a $5B fine on the Google last month, European Commission is now getting ready to put Apple in the line of fire. They are going to conduct an ‘Impact Assessment Study’ to fix a standard for the quality of mobile chargers. EU is going to announce new rules which would force Apple to drop the Lightning port for USB-C.
European Commission is justifying their statements with the fact that lack of compatibility cost 51000 tons of electrical waste every year as users throw their old chargers. The EU executive said they are not happy with the status quo.
On 1st of August, while responding to a query from EU lawmaker, Margrethe Vestager said,” Given the unsatisfactory progress with this voluntary approach, the Commission will shortly launch an impact assessment study to evaluate costs and benefits of different other options”. EU is hoping that this study will decide whether any strong action needs to be taken against the tech biggies. Elzbieta Bienkowska, the market colleague is made in-charge of the matter.
Is Apple really in danger?
Now, the time will tell whether this decision of EU would affect the trillion dollar company or Apple will dodge it off. Till now, Apple has not responded over this issue. It would be interesting to see whether Apple will be fined again as of Irish Tax Bill or left with a warning.
