APPLE – THE KING OF TECH

In the year 2021, Apple is recorded as the most valuable brand in the whole world with an estimated brand value of about 263.4 billion U.S. dollars. It is followed by Amazon, the second most valuable brand, with the brand value of about 254.2 billion U.S. dollars.

Apple screams to whole world that it is here to dominate the tech market.

How Apple got the honour of becoming a King in this industry?

The birth of Apple began in the mid 1970s as an assembled circuit board Apple 1 invited by the co-founder Steve Wozniak. The Apple 1 did not have any keyboard or a monitor, it was just a circuit board.

Steve Wozniak was an Albanian inventor who was born in 1950. He met Steve Jobs while designing the calculators. Jobs was five years younger than Wozniak.  At that time, while working for the arcade game company Atari in the 1970s, Atari gave Steve Jobs the assignment of creating a circuit board for one of their video games.

Jobs having limited knowledge and experience of circuit boards made a deal with Wozniak to share the pay if he could design the circuit board. Though Wozniak designed the circuit board, it wasn’t accepted by Atari. The same invention that would later lead him to the Apple one.

Just two years later, Wozniak designed , developed and tested his first prototype by 1976. The Apple 1 was completed.  It was Steve Jobs idea to sell the Apple 1 themselves. They sold most of their belongings and assembled the first Apple 1 boards at Steve Jobs’s house. They sold the Apple 1 for 666 dollars and their first 50 system boards were sold to a new computer shop called The Byte Shop in California. Apple computers now called Apple Inc was founded.

One thing they lacked was money, though they had an order for 50 system boards with a

byte shop, they didn’t have the resources to fulfil the order. They were both turned down by banks and Atari where Jobs worked and wanted payment for any components.

Steve Jobs convinced Intel executive and multi-millionaire Mike Markkula to invest two hundred and fifty thousand dollars into Apple.

The next three years Apple saw an incredible growth as sales grew approximately 118 million dollars . However, during that time, other companies began to emerge .IBM launched its own personal computers and took full advantage when Apple was facing losses.

Due to the lack of interest, the apple also faced a lot of in-house issues as Wozniak decided to leave Apple in the 80s. He was simply no longer interested in running Apple computers. Steve Jobs then brought on John Sculley to be the President.

Jobs became the interim CEO and immediately began implementing his plans to revitalize Apple. One of his first acts was forming an alliance with

Microsoft to create a version of their office suite software for Apple. This would help them to retain their current customers as well as gain those that

previously didn’t use Apple.

Steve Jobs launched the iMac in 1998. Its unique design and use of modern technology made it a favourite and Apple sold approximately 800,000 units in five months. Not long after that he reimagined, the personal computer and introduced the iBook.

Three years later, Apple launched their iPod a digital music player freeing up customers from portable cassettes and CD players, giving them the capacity of taking more music with them.

Steve Jobs in 2007 he showed the world the shift Apple was making in the direction of consumer electronics even further by launching the iPhone with phenomenal success.

Apple continues to launch innovative yet modern and stylish looking products that always come with a new assortment of upgrades.

Apple has also made shopping for their products and experience at their 506 branded retail stores worldwide. Apple believe that traditional retail stores would not provide the experience they wanted.

Tim Cook, the current CEO of Apple, shared at Apple’s annual meeting that there’s a long great roadmap of fantastic products on the horizon.

Apple has begun developing its services category, there have been improvements to Apple music, the App Store and they may be launching a new streaming TV service with original television series.  Netflix may have something to worry about especially as consumers who subscribe to Netflix through their iPhone or iPad app, 30% goes to Apple every month for a year. Situations such as these are key factors in Apple’s growth.

It’s clear that Apple’s long term profitability is due to control and not allowing their products to be standardized. However, unless Apple creates the next iMac or iPhone, recreating some of their

historical profits may be quite a task especially with a trade war between the US and China.

In, 2018 Apple recorded its highest annual revenue of approximately 265.6 billion dollars. 218 billion was generated by iPhone sales.

Apple has been a pioneer in the computer industry on several occasions throughout history.

It believes in innovation and removing any boundaries that limit creativity in order to produce valuable products for its consumers. It is undeniable that Apple has provided immeasurable value and made an impact on technology influencing how we use it in our daily lives!!

Advertisement