Why Apple Keeps Winning

[Ramseth]

Why is it going to be difficult for the competition to compete with Apple

Apple is the only truely hardware & software company out there. Most computer/handphones companies had relied on Microsoft/Linux for their OS.

As Apple has shown it's when you control the hw & sw that you can come out with better products. That and SJ's ideas on what should be a great product

Apple had insisted on proprietory hardware and software since the original Apple, Apple II, Apple IIe, etc. For those who remember, Sim Lim Tower (not Square, not built yet) was flushed with pirated computers branded Pineapple, Orange or even Banana etc.

IBM PC took the open arhictecture approach and was conned by Bill Gates into giving Microsoft the OS contract. That was DOS, now known as Windows. Apple retained OS propriety but to certain extent became open architecture in software too after MacIntosh.

 

[johnny333]

IBM PC took the open arhictecture approach and was conned by Bill Gates into giving Microsoft the OS contract. That was DOS, now known as Windows. Apple retained OS propriety but to certain extent became open architecture in software too after MacIntosh.

Microsoft 's DOS was proprietary. MS did it's share to sabo the competition e.g. Dr. Dos by making sure to come out with alot of erroneous error messages when people tried to use the competing Dr. DOS products with MS applications.

The mistake that SJ made was in trusting Bill Gates with his vision of a windows OS by showing Bill Gates the early prototype of Mac OS. Bill Gates took the info to clone the Mac OS into MS Windows.

Maybe SJ should have licensed the Mac OS to the PC world but then there wouldn't be the Mac vs Windows war. No iMac, iPod, iPad,....

If you get a chance to watch the movie "Pirates of Silicon Valley" you'll have an interesting take of the time

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pirates_of_Silicon_Valley

 

[drifter]

They had the 1st MP3 player but... sigh

They are alright..

Value for money is not a good thing.. It doesn't make the company any money..
Apple can sell an ipod for $600 last time... People still buy anyway..

i agreed with you...just take a look at LV handbag . with the correct marketing and branding , no matter how expensive still can sell . if company can hit the heart of the comsumers , then those ppl will come crawling to you . japan is very good at that ...they always create "want" instead of "need " in customer brain . always come out with " limited " stuff .

 

[johnny333]

i agreed with you...just take a look at LV handbag . with the correct marketing and branding , no matter how expensive still can sell . if company can hit the heart of the comsumers , then those ppl will come crawling to you . japan is very good at that ...they always create "want" instead of "need " in customer brain . always come out with " limited " stuff .

Also like to add that Apple products are better quality than Creative products.
I'm still using my gen 1 iPod while the newer Creative MPEG player is already history.

How many Creative owners are still using their Zen

 

[paultan]

I agree with you. Ever since Sim Wong Hoo decided to shift his factory to China, I notice the quality of his product also drop from high to low, not to mention poor customer service....

 

[manokie]

i agreed with you...just take a look at LV handbag . with the correct marketing and branding , no matter how expensive still can sell . if company can hit the heart of the comsumers , then those ppl will come crawling to you . japan is very good at that ...they always create "want" instead of "need " in customer brain . always come out with " limited " stuff .

Japan is already in a stage where they sell products with higher profit margin either by innovation or by marketing.

Look at the Sony Vaio series. It's just a normal laptop with sleeker design and yet they can sell it at $200-500 more.

 

[manokie]

I agree with you. Ever since Sim Wong Hoo decided to shift his factory to China, I notice the quality of his product also drop from high to low, not to mention poor customer service....

He is unfortunate not to capitalize on the US MP3 market when he had a chance

He has to blame it on
1) having his management team in SG
2) not hiring the best from US MBA programs to manage his company
3) weak software teams. iPod's success has a lot to do with iTunes and MP3 downloads for $0.99

 

[Leongsam]

but to certain extent became open architecture in software too after MacIntosh.

This only became the case after Classic was replaced by OS X when Steve Jobs returned to Apple.

 

[johnny333]

I agree with you. Ever since Sim Wong Hoo decided to shift his factory to China, I notice the quality of his product also drop from high to low, not to mention poor customer service....

Apple also moved it's manufacturing to China but they have maintained a high standard of quality.

Maybe Sim Wong Hoo should have hired some of the Malaysian & Singaporean quality control engineers that were laid off from the Spore factory when Apple moved its manufacturing operations to China. These same engineers help set up the manufacturing in China.

All too often Spore talent is ignored by our own local towkays