Apple Hbr Case Study Questions

As Krames describes, even though the intent was not to revolutionize, the mass customization and the providing competitive price to customer by eliminating the middleman, changed the landscape of computer business. Consumers, for

The PC industry has started to develop fast in the 80 's when IBM launched its first PC series and later on when numerous small companies entered the market. PC is a new product and companies had to create the demand to it from the scratch.

Suppliers have less power because there are a lot of suppliers and they all willing to accommodate and provide discounts for their customers (economies of scale).

For decades the digital war between Macintoshes (Macs) and Personal Computers (PCs) has been a never ending struggle to see who ranks the better competition. Because Microsoft has dominated the software field, more and more businesses use PCs rather than Macs. But does that make the PC better than the Mac. Let 's take a trip back in time and review the evolution of a computer company. It 's not IBM or Microsoft. This company is Apple Computers, Incorporated.

With time, the PC continued to evolve and newer models offered better speed, color screens, more memory and larger hard drives. Further technical evolution continued to deliver higher speeds, larger storage capacity both internal and external. In addition to the hardware progression, the PC world continued to see progress with operating system solutions and advanced software catering to both large and small businesses as well as the home owner.

Social and economic factors also shape the demand, and gave rise to mergers and acquisitions, broader product line and increased capital investment. Manufacturers, who can supply high quality product with wide range of interdependent equipment pieces, have an advantage over competitors.

* Suppliers are numerous, and low differentiation, along with some backwards integration by players who sell their own branded goods, weakens supplier power.

Furthermore, there is the bargaining power of suppliers. This is where the suppliers have power over us being that they

The PC industry has started to develop fast in the 80's when IBM, the leader of the industry thanks to the first mover advantage, launched its first PC series and later on when numerous small companies entered the market. PC is a new product and companies had to create the demand to it from the scratch. We will apply the Porter's 5 Forces model to examine the PC market and see how forces of competition

When the personal computer first came onto the scene in the 1970s, many companies tried to jump into the new market. Some of the names involved are still familiar household names even still today, but some failed in this new market quickly after joining. One name that is still easily recognizable today is Apple. In 1976, Apple designed and released the Apple I. However, it wasn’t until 1980 that personal computers became affordable enough that they could be used at home. In that year, Commodore released a personal computer that only cost consumers $299, which was more affordable to the average consumer than previous computer prices had been. It is estimated that by the end of 1980, there were around one million personal computers in use in the US. In 1993, Apple and Microsoft had become major players in

All these factors make the PC industry interesting, and invite scholars and business analysts for in-depth analysis of the industry to understand the main forces that are shaping its competitiveness.

The industry environment is the set of factors that directly influences a firm and its competitive actions and competitive responses: the threat of new entrants, the power of suppliers, the power of buyers, the threat of product substitutes, and the intensity of rivalry among competitors (Hit, Ireland, and Hoskisson, p.40). In this case, Apple is just one of the many competitors in a saturated markets offering both hardware and software for personal computer systems. Intense players such as, HP/Compaq, Dell, Gateway, and Microsoft all take substantial market share in the industries Apple is competing with. Today in the computer hardware industry there is intense competition and the

Overview Executive Summary............................................................................................................. 1 Apple Inc. Strategy Facts: Scope, Generic Competitive Strategy, and Value Creation ...... 2

And these analyses will be done with the help of Porter’s 5 forces (see appendix 1, 2, 3). This analysing toll deals with issues which are from outside the industry that impacts the nature of competition within the certain industry. Thurlby, (1998) stated “Understanding the nature of each of these forces gives organisations the necessary insights to enable them to formulate the appropriate strategies to be successful in their market”1. The analysis of the three industry are given belowPC industry (See appendix 1) This competition within the PC industry is extraordinarily high consisting with top companies like Dell, HP, Apple, Gateway and Sony. In order to gain competitive advantage, the key factors are advancement in technology, custom built PCs, reliability and standard customer service. The life cycle of PC industry can be seen as mature (See appendix 6); however the growth of PC’s has not decline. The reason is due to the globalisation trends taking place within the major firms. The barriers very high where there are already five main firms that dominate the market. Therefore, the chances of new PC companies entering the market and get significant hold of market share is very slender. The main two factors that are making the entry level high are mainly cost and distribution and the top five firms also control 70 per cent of the global personal computer market. Another factor may be is that

The technology industry in which Microsoft competes in has been one of intense competition and consolidation. From the early-1980s with MS-DOS to the late 1980s with Windows 1.0 and 2.0, Microsoft progressively became the world’s largest PC software company and dominated the operating system market. However, recent analysis from the 2015 Technology Industry Trends indicates that because the current tech industry is always in flux, frequent new products and category innovation define and redefine the sector’s constantly shifting landscape (Casey et al., 2015). According to the latest trends, technology firms are seeking better financial returns by reexamining their business structure. These firms concentrate on increasing their