rocketpig said:
It's hard to compare Apple to Nintendo anymore. Seven years ago? Maybe. But now they have profitable divisions in their Mac line, iPhone, iPad, iPod, iTunes Store, and now they're going after school textbooks. Within the year, they're going to start pursuing the smart television market. That is beginning to turn into a pretty well-rounded set of offerings. Microsoft is definitely more diverse but much of that diversity struggles to earn them any money and a few divisions are giant moneypits. Their "real" money comes from Windows and Office with the Xbox line starting to come around. They're in more danger over the next ten years than Apple. Microsoft's main money makers (outside of Xbox) aren't only saturated, they're in decline. And they will face real competition from iOS/Android over the next few years. In short, if people stop buying computers and start replacing them with tablets (which Microsoft has ZERO stake in at this point), Microsoft could be royally and utterly fucked. Not that I think they will, but it is a real possibility. Best case scenario is that Microsoft's core businesses will remain stable in the next decade. There is almost zero space for growth. |
I don't see it this way. Though things look a little disjointed, Microsoft here is playing a chess game and is slowly moving the pieces in to place. Win 8, Xbox 720, Windows Phone...will all align in the next 12-24 months. And thats just their consumer side, business, tools and services side is head and shoulders above anyone else.
They have a total monopoly with office, mail exchange and cloud services. Even if you were to wipe windows off the map today microsoft is profitable.
Finally, Windows 8 is coming and this is the tablet ecosystem that competes with Apple and iOS. On top of that, Windows 7 remains unchallenged in the desktop world and will be a viable option for many years to come. So microsoft has everything to gain from Win 8 and not much to lose.
