Market Analysis: Apple Inc.

Market Analysis: Apple Inc.

Introduction

The purpose of this report is to analyze Apple's business model and advice whether it is going to remain strong in the future. Moreover, the objective is to evaluate current strategies organization is adopting and recommend a future strategic business unit (SBU) or corporate strategy. In order to examine current Apple's strategies internal and external analysis will be performed. The company's reporting currency is USD.

Steve Jobs was a co-founder of Apple Inc which was established in 1976 and became incorporated in 1977. The company trades on NASDAQ stock market and is the largest company in the world by market capitalization. A company is highly vertically integrated including product design, marketing and retail across 357. Apple stores in 11 countries and online sales in countries around the globe. Apple also makes money from foreign exchange hedging.

There are 8 SBUs and 5 operating segments within Apple.

Discussion

Background

Is the iPad a success? Experts are skeptical. In geek circles dominated the disappointment of missing features. But tech bloggers and people, who always buy the newest smart phone, are not Apple's target audience. Steve Jobs' company makes products for the masses and with a unique approach to marketing.

It was in January 2007. A long-awaited product announcement from the Silicon Valley was in technology circles with general disappointment added. This should now be? This meager feature lists for an advertised as revolutionary product. Beautiful design, OK, but so many technical limitations? That could be just the gigantic flop.

Of course, Apple's iPhone was still a success. Specifically, it has revolutionized the mobile phone industry. Today, no more providers without models with large touch screens, a nice user interface and a rich app store dares to market.

The criticism just presented iPad sounds suspiciously similar. Again disappointment prevailed, the experts and the critical DRM opponents revolutionary. Only: Presumably this is again irrelevant. IPad has today made front page of most American newspapers. Ordinary people who deal with new gadgets otherwise never have heard about it almost guaranteed to be the thing to look at the Apple store two months of their local mall, and many will buy it, the lack of multitasking or not (Marketing Apple, 2012).

Apple does not play the same game as the rest of the gadget industry. To understand this, one has to deal somewhat with the usual principle; with the other high-tech products are marketed.

The standard reference to the book "Crossing the Chasm" by Geoffrey Moore (affiliate link) explains how new products are included in the market piecemeal and what hurdles they have to skip.

New technologies are typically first bought by the "innovators". This is a very small group that just has fun with the technology and is willing to grapple with expensive and immature products as long as they are only new and interesting. In the next phase, the "early adopters" to it. These are people who already want to see some benefit in new products, but also a willingness to pay problem and ...