Apple Computers Essay Research Paper Apple ComputersApple

Apple Computers Essay, Research Paper

Apple Computers

Apple Computer.s was founded on April Fool.s Day in 1976 by Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak. They were two college dropouts who started selling computers through Jobs family garage. Between the two Wozniak was the technical man and Jobs had the vision, so together they created their first computer named Apple I. Jobs. mission for Apple was to provide an .easy-to-use. computer to almost everyone. Two years later the Apple II was launched. The Apple II was extremely user friendly; so easy you could use it straight out of the box. Because of the Apple II, Apple Computer became the industry leader and eventually went public in winter of 1980.

In 1981 a new challenger entered the PC market, IBM. IBM relied on a different type of operating system and microprocessor. In comparison to the Apple II, IBM.s designs were dull, boring, and incompatible. They also had an .open. system, which made it easy for other manufacturers to clone, where as Apple was the only one who could produce their designs. Apple.s next generation computer was the Lisa which also featured Apple.s creation of the mouse and the GUI (graphical user interface), however, the Lisa was incompatible with the Apple II and IBM standards and did not get much sales. The Lisa was eventually dropped. Apple then began to concentrate on creating a cheaper computer with the same advanced features as the Lisa. In 1984, the Macintosh was introduced.

During the 80.s the majority of people buying computers were Apple.s buyers. Apple sold more than 100,000 Apple II.s to homes, schools, and small businesses and Apple had only one main competitor at that time, IBM. Retailers carried only three major brands on their shelves: Apple, which was the user-friendly computer, IBM, which was the average priced industry standard, and Compaq, which built IBM-compatibles. By the 1990.s Apple not only had IBM as a competitor but many other PC manufacturers as well such as: Dell, Acer, HP, and Gateway to name a few. During the 1990.s computer consumers were shifting to PC.s more. Buyers viewed PC.s as a commodity. The main buyers of PC.s now are mainly big businesses and homes, but schools are also changing their systems to PC.s. Before during the 80.s consumers of PC.s were first-time unsophisticated customers. Many of them placed their buying decisions upon service, support, and compatibility. By the 90.s PC customers became more knowledgeable and were able to buy systems that were catered more towards their needs.

The main suppliers of the PC industry fell into two categories. 1) Suppliers of memory chips, disk drives, and keyboards. 2) Suppliers of microprocessors and operating systems. Suppliers of the first category were price competitive, while Intel and Microsoft dominated suppliers in the second category. Due to Microsoft.s dominance on it.s operating system federal and state attorney.s felt that Microsoft created a monopoly in order to penetrate the Web browser market. This however, did not change Microsoft.s performance and they still remained strong and viewed as most valuable company.

Apple Computer has come a long way with many struggles and reorganizations of the company. Within five years Apple had gone through four CEO.s. The first was John Sculley. Sculley came about after Steve Jobs left the company in 1985. Sculley.s first step in Apple.s turnaround was the introduction the Macintosh Plus that boosted sales and made Apple a worldwide brand. Apple never integrated over to microprocessors because they created their own products from scratch. Sculley wanted to reposition Apple by creating .cheaper computers with mass-market appeal. and bring out new products every 6-12 months. Sculley also formed a close relationship with their rival, IBM to create an alliance in order to better Apple. This alliance included three steps: 1) a joint venture to create an operating system incorporating the latest technology advancements (Taligent). 2) Switch from the microprocessor to IBM.s PowerPC chip. 3) Create another joint venture that would collaborate a common language for multimedia applications (Kaleida). During his time, Sculley also created what he called the PDA (personal digital assistants), which was a handheld electronic organizer with wireless communication. Internally, Sculley had cut his workforce by 20% the first time and another 10% the second time in order to make Apple a low-cost producer. The board felt that with these changes were not enough to keep Apple.s profits sustainable, therefore Sculley became chairman and Michael Spindler was appointed the new CEO.

With Spindler as new CEO, he continued to roll out new products and made sure that Apple was price competitive. Spindler also wanted the company to refocus its market to schools, mainly kindergarten through high school, where Apple obtained 60% and 80% of shares. However, his main key focus for Apple was to grow internationally. Apple was doing great business in Japan, until prices were kept higher than in other parts of the world. Japan then launched a price war and Apple responded by cutting prices, but it wasn.t enough because within a year Japan went from one of Apple.s best divisions to it.s worst. China was also a fast growing computer market, therefore Spindler wanted to target them. He predicts that China will consume 50 million computers by 2010. Apple was also believed to