Quote:
Originally Posted by Ralph Sir Edward
What ever "walled garden" you are in is the garden you tend to stay in, as the change over cost is too high. That was what Microsoft lived off of for decades.
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This is true to a point. That is what Microsoft lived off of, but it was not really "walled" like current ecosystems, it was simply the result of all the programs being writen for it. Microsoft wasn't controlling what you could put on it, just as Google is not with Android today. In the meantime they built up other areas of the company and now have 16 Billion+ dollar businesses. Without that they may not have survived their recent blunders. Yet they continue to be quite profitable and successful as a whole, and have all the pieces in place to stay strong for some time to come.
Apple is not building up other areas of business to any serious extent. They are remarkably undiversified for such a large company. They continue to rely almost exclusively on the rather fickle and unstable consumer electronics market, and do so while offering a very limited portfolio of hardware. It's a high-risk business plan.