Apple Inc. History 1997 to 2011 (Essay Sample)

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Apple Inc. History 1997 to 2011
Following the various challenges that had befallen the Apple Company earlier on, there was need for more efficient and effective leadership. It was in 1997 when Jobs took over from Gil Amelio as an ‘interim CEO’, with a sole purpose of enhancing the company productivity and performance. During this period, Apple Company underwent a significant transformation with Jobs announcing almost a new panel of the board of directors which included Ellison, who was by then the CEO of Oracle. Additionally after takeover from Amelio, Jobs announced an alliance with the Microsoft Company in order to ensure long-term survival of the company. In the agreement, both companies would have a 5-year patent cross-license and, more importantly, a final settlement in their ongoing GUI argument. This agreement was set forth in exchange for $150 million in Apple Stock.
It is during this period that Microsoft introduced office 98 for the Mac Pc’s an aspect that made it one of the most popular office packages by then. This further increased the competitive advantage for the Microsoft products as its packages essentially did run on almost all PC clones thereby sparking a very stiff competition between the two companies. Additionally, during this period, the Apple Company faced great obstacles from PC clones vendors who by then had flooded the market. To curb this Apple announced its intention to buy out Power Computing's MacOS license, and much of its engineering staff. According to Apple History (2014), In July 1999, Steve Jobs filled the final quadrant in the "Apple Product Matrix"--The consumer portable--when he introduced the iBook. The iBook proved to be a boost to the Apple company profits in the low-end portable market.
In 2010, Apple surpassed Microsoft to become the most valuable technology company in the world. In 2010, Apple was valued at $222.12 billion, while Microsoft was valued at $219.18 billion (Random Facts, 2014).On the same point of view, by August 2011, Apple pushed past Exxon as the most valuable public company in the world. This part of Apple history is very important as it outsets how Jobs managed to make the company profitable after a takeover from Amelio by forging an alliance with Microsoft company to develop Microsoft Office software for the Macintosh for the next five years in exchange for $150 million that Microsoft was investing in Apple. The success story of...