Case Study Apple Of Your I

Aicha Sylla
IS 3100: Information Systems Management
Friday/Hybrid – 12:30pm – 1:45pm
Instructor: Professor Wes Rhea

Case study: "The Apple of Your i" As I am writing this essay now, Apple has become the world most valuable brand of all time; and it remains the company whose approach to technology and design is a standard for others.
After reading the case study in the book, there are couple questions I would like to answer about this innovative company.
1) Which of the Porter’s four competitive strategies does Apple engage in? Explain.
Apple founders and employees have always preferred to design and build good quality products that are simpler, better looking and more reliable than their competitors. Apple use one of the four Porter’s competitive strategy which is “Industry-Wide Differentiation.” It means that the company basically differentiate itself from competitors by providing better products and services across the industry that have value to customers. Apple organization goals, objectives, culture, and activities are very consistent with the organization strategies. Its founders, its people, and customers continue to think differently and to design cool and easy to use devices that are excellent in quality and value.
2) What do you think are the three most important factors in Apple’s incredible success? Justify your answer.
Apple has shown its capability to create innovative product that meet and exceed its customer’s satisfaction and has also been able to keep that stream of innovations going until today. It has enable these innovations to play off of each other. It demonstrated his ability to break from away from the computer market and created successfully new markets with its iPod, iPhone, and iPad. Apple has developed an ability to sell and market its new products successfully by teaching its customers and the market that the price for an Apple product represents an outstanding value for the quality, design, and functionality. The great innovation, the product’s quality, design, differentiation, uniqueness, give a sustainable competitive advantage that has resulted in it becoming the number one valued brand in the world. Apple has a very loyal and dedicated customer base and almost no other company can match the passionate tribe of loyal fans and customers that Apple has created.
3) Steve Jobs passed away in the Fall of 2011. Until his death, he had been the heart and soul of Apple’s innovation. Today, 35,000 Apple employees continue onward in his absence. A huge question to many investors is whether the company can be successful without him. What is your opinion? What role did he play? How can Apple respond to his loss? Would you be willing to invest in Apple without his leadership? Why or why not?
There is no question that Apple will be a different place without Jobs’ influence and visionary skills but it is not necessarily doomed. Jobs was the chief innovator in the organization and he has brought everything that is essential to Apple to make it as successful as it is today. He will be forever the brain and the great leader behind Apple Inc., he has contributed in every way in the development and innovative and success factor of this organization. Of course he didn’t do it all alone, but he seemed to set the direction for the business in a very effective way. For the time he spent in the company, he has been very involvement as a leader and as innovator with the help of all the people around him.
And I think that he taught them well enough to maintain and keep the company as successful as he has always planned it to be. Some people might think that the progress of Apple will just diminish or even stop without jobs unique vision and leadership style and would therefore not invest in Apple. That’s is totally their opinion which I respect but as for me I think Apple is set to stay as long as it has dedicated leaders, employees and loyal customers.
4) Microsoft took an early lead in the development of slate devices (like the iPad), and it had the world’s leading operating system and applications for over 20 years. Provide five reasons why Microsoft was not able to achieve the same success that Apple has. Most industry analyst would agree that the skills and abilities of Microsoft’s 88,000 employees are as good, on average, as Apple’s.
Personally, I think the first reason would be the lack of strong and visionary leadership as Apple had in the person of Steve Jobs. Since Bill Gates, Microsoft haven’t had a real innovative and great leader that would help them accomplish exceptional thing that would revolutionary the industry. It has multiple goals that don’t help them focus on developing one particular but exceptional thing at the time. Its people are more focused on having technology than improving and innovating what they already have. Tim Cook in an article said, Apple’s strength result from its expertise in three main areas hardware, software, and services (having them all at the same time). While Microsoft is rich at building software, then hand the software to hardware makers, who would then built something customer want. Microsoft did not place so much emphasis on its marketing until recently while Apple has being performing an intensive marketing and advertising to promote its products and make people switch.
And finally, the loyalty of the customer is another reason why Microsoft haven’t be able to surpass Apple; Apple has a loyal and passionate customer base and Microsoft doesn’t have that kind of customer.
5) Considering your answers to the four questions above, if you had a spare $5,000 in your portfolio and wanted to buy an equity stock with it, would you buy AAPL (Apple)? Why or why not?
If I had the above amount of money in my portfolio, I would definitely buy an equity stock with it; especially with Apple today’s market share value. Apple just released some new products that have boosted its value and confirm its position of most valuable brand in the world. Therefore, whether I decide to choose stock or cash dividends, my investments will grow and increase in value with the possibility of realizing a capital gain over the investment. Notice Apple has sold over 10 million new iPhone 6 and iPhone 6plus models, a new record, just in three days after launch on September 19th and “the sales exceeded our expectations “ says Tim Cook. Steve Jobs is gone but he has left a remarkable team of people or family behind him.
Work cited:
Romain Moisescot. March 7th, 2012. http://allaboutstevejobs.com/persona/steveatwork.php.
Apple.com/hotnews