“Back when I was a formal competitive analyst, I worked with one of the most advanced teams in the technology market. While we paled when compared to the vastly better funded and staffed teams in the pharmaceuticals industry, in our own industry, we were market leading. Part of what we did was profile CEOs to forecast future moves based on personality, age, health and past behavior,” Rob Enderle writes for TechNewsWorld.
Enderle writes, “For Apple, profiling Steve Jobs would probably give a more accurate measure of where that company is going than anything else, much like profiling Larry Ellison would do in Oracle’s case. As I, and others, have commented lately, however, Jobs isn’t looking healthy of late and his age does appear to be catching up with him. This suggests retirement or another path may be looking more and more attractive to him.”
“Jobs isn’t much of a technology buyer, but he did sell Next to Apple and, more recently, Pixar to Disney. Recall that he had been planning to completely separate from Disney before this move. This suggests that, perhaps now that his health isn’t what it once was, we may see a trend toward selling properties to other entities. This trend may be likely to accelerate as time goes on,” Enderle writes.
Enderle writes, “In addition to this, Jobs in the past was serving in a senior government position and rumor has it he only lost that when some of his questionable past practices came to light — which made the then-Clinton administration nervous. He is in a much better position now, in terms of popularity, and could likely play a big role in the next cycle of national elections but would need the freedom from Apple to do it properly.”
“He can’t sell to Microsoft. The antitrust issues alone would be near impossible to overcome. He can’t sell to Dell or HP because they simply wouldn’t buy. He can’t sell to Sony because culturally, it would be a train wreck, and Sony doesn’t have the resources. Of the new age companies (Google, Yahoo, etc.) that might be able to afford Apple, only Google is rumored to be looking at making a hardware play, and that firm really wants to take Microsoft on head to head. Google is certainly building that massive backbone of a network for something,” Enderle writes.
“Culturally and physically, Apple and Google are relatively close, though, to make this work, both firms would need to continue to have diverse management teams. Too much integration would be a problem given Google’s lack of hardware knowledge. Still, the end result could be a platform play that eventually grows to rival .NET, and overnight, you have to admit, the result would change the landscape to an incredible degree. With Google’s CEO on the board, the transition could go amazingly easily,” Enderle writes. “I know, I know, merging with Google is probably as likely as Apple switching to Intel. Oh, wait …”
Full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “HOG” for the heads up.]
On Monday, August 14, Katie Cotton, Apple’s VP of worldwide corporate communications, stated that Apple CEO Steve Jobs’ “health is robust.” We don’t see an Apple-Google merger in the cards, but stranger things have happened. We think (hope?) Enderle’s reading more into an Apple board addition than is really there.
Related articles:
Google CEO declines Apple automatic stock option grant; plans to buy 10,000 AAPL shares instead – September 01, 2006
Is Steve Jobs heading for the exit door at Apple? – September 01, 2006
Google + Apple + Al Gore’s Current TV = ? – August 31, 2006
Google CEO on Apple’s board opens up many possibilities, including outdueling Microsoft – August 31, 2006
Re: Google CEO elected to Apple Computer’s Board of Directors – August 30, 2006
Dvorak: Does Apple’s board addtion of Google’s Schmidt portend Apple-Sun merger? – August 30, 2006
Apple and Google cozy up to make Microsoft jealous – August 30, 2006
Google CEO to help shape Apple’s future – August 30, 2006
Google CEO Dr. Eric Schmidt joins Apple’s Board of Directors – August 29, 2006
Apple: ‘Steve Jobs’ health is robust’ – August 14, 2006
Is Steve Jobs sick? – August 08, 2006
time for the hit police…
Hmmmmm, all I can say is “Enderle: BS artist extrodinare!!! ” He hates anything apple (JMHO) so of course Apple must be sold to someone, just so they can dissapear.
N.
Grows to rival “.NET”? .NET can’t even rival .NET.
Apple is growing business and evolving internally as well. If there is going to be a merger it is not Jobs selling Apple to Google (you must be Enderle to think that) but why not Apple acquiring a control over Google and integrating it? A Google for Mac only developments.
MDN “wrong” so even that might be baseless speculation.
Note to Enderle: Apple did not sell to Intel. The parallel is stupid: Oh, wait, Apple switched to Intel thence Jobs might truly going to sell to Google.
Oh, wait… YOU are Enderle…
Not his worst idea ever…but still probably won’t happen. Maybe that’s what Apple means when it says “it’s showtime”. Announce new ipods, new imacs, and a new corporate merger. that would give new meaning to the phrase “oh, and just one more thing…”
forget Apple and Google…i’m predicting yet another merger between Enderle’s foot and his mouth. remember: you read it here first.
MDN: “might,” as in “although it MIGHT be his thumb and his arse. i’m not completely certain of the details.”
Look back at the full history of Enderle articles. This guy has almost NEVER been right on ANY topic in the past. Check it out! His articles speak for themselves! This guy is pure speculation & imagination… he just pulls ideas out of his ass on a regular basis.
Enderle, Enderle, fly away home,
Your house is on fire and your children have gone ….
I’ll have what HE’S having!
Well that confirms it then: If Rob thinks its gonna happen, it won’t!
Well, just checked the Big Board . . . and AAPL is sitting at $70.51, probably due to the coming September 12 event and rumors such as this.
I just wonder where that genius “Stock Boy” is right now? You know, the puffed-up BIWfinancial guru who asserted that AAPL was heading into the $47 range and that only a moron would buy shares in the low $50’s.
WHERE ARE YOU NOW, STOCK BOY? Still trying to cover your “shorts”? Dude, you’re behind $23 per share right now, with more pain to come. If you’re weren’t such an a**hole in your MDN postings, I might feel sorry for you.
But that ain’t the case. You buttered your bread; enjoying the sour dough taste?
To MDN:
It’s clear the Enderle and Dvorak are only writing these articles for high page view counts and not because of any journalistic value or factual basis. In the future, please end these articles not with:
“Full article here.”
and instead end them with
“Due to the lack of knowledge, intelligence, and any journalistic integrity on the part of Rob Enderle and John Dvorak, I will no longer provide links to articles that are designed not to inform you, but merely to drive traffic to their respective sites to provide advertising revenue. If you are interested in reading the full article, feel free to Google it.”
Or some such……
Just an idea….
Enderle is such a fool. If we assume that everything he says is true about Jobs health etc., Enderle is still wrong about any merger plans.
Why? Simple.
At Next and Pixar both, Jobs owned the lion’s share of stock. To extricate himself from those companies meant selling his stock.
Jobs doesn’t own any stock in Apple. At best he holds stock options (not the same thing).
If Jobs wanted to withdraw from Apple management he could do so simply by grooming a replacement for himself. This does not require a merger, buyout or takeover with/by another firm.
For all of Enderle’s backpatting over where he has worked in the past, he hasn’t got anything right vis-a-vis Apple. My guess is that Enderle was an intern, and never allowed to go anywhere near a white paper (except to read it).
DreamTheEndless…
Maybe a warning like:
Troll Road ahead.
Come on guys, Rob was, to quote him “Back when I was a formal competitive analyst, I worked with one of the most advanced teams in the technology market. While we paled when compared to the vastly better funded and staffed teams in the pharmaceuticals industry, in our own industry, we were market leading” the man. He’s gotta be right.
NOT
DreamTheEndless,
a good idea.
“Jobs isn’t much of a technology buyer, but he did sell Next to Apple and, more recently, Pixar to Disney.
It could be argued that Jobs is a very savvy technology buyer.
He did, after all, pester Spielberg to sell him Pixar back in 1985 which, at the time, wasn’t doing much financially. But under Jobs’ direction, he and Lasseter began producing a string of monumental animations that would salvage Disney’s reputation on the animation front. So all in all, I’d say that was a genius-like technology buy and an even greater sale.
With NeXt, it proved that even wicked-smart people can’t create a whole new platform out of thin air and not without a lot of help from external sources, anyway. He took that company as far as he could while still trying to maintain some joy for life and when that became too much he gave new life to a floundering Apple Computer.
Jobs is the consummate salesman.
He sold Pixar to Disney because being full-time CEO of two major technology players can rob you of quality of life.
Pixar is in good hands with Disney.
As far as I’m concerned Jobs proved to be the salvation of both Apple Computer and Disney animation. So, I’d say he knows more about the face of technology than some wannabe, now as of late, informal, un-competitive analcyst who now works in his pajamas with feet.
Dream the Endless…
But what would be your keywords?
“Know-nothing bozo”
“Windows-shill”
“Apple-hating asshat”
If google buys Apple they will open OSX.
They did it with everything else they have purchased.
Wow, is Enderle as much of a buffoon as he appears to be?
“Recall that he had been planning to completely separate from Disney before this move. This suggests that, perhaps now that his health isn’t what it once was, we may see a trend toward selling properties to other entities.”
Uh, Rob, every other “competitive analyst” saw this as a negotiating tactic, to force Disney into acting proactively to court Pixar. That’s why Jobs managed to sell Pixard to Disney for a huge premium, and why Pixar people basically took over Disney’s animation units.
But obviously, the technical analysis escapes you, so I’ll have to put it another way.
It’s called “playing hard to get,” Rob. But I suspect you don’t have much experience in this arena, as most normal people first encounter this phenomenon while dating.
I have no idea who Enderle is and don’t care. I’d love to see Apple and Google merge — I can’t imagine better leverage for Apple in the consumer desktop content delivery battle.. seems like a perfect marriage to me.
G4Dualie…
Actually, it was George Lucas not Steven Spielberg. Or “Bearded Guy No.1” rather than “Bearded Guy No.2” as the kid who played “Short-Round” in “Temple of Doom” used to refer to them when communicating with his mother.
Pixar was originally just another division of Lucasfilm, employing Ed Catmull and Alvy Ray Smith who developed Renderman. The Renderman concept was eventually spun off into Pixar – still owned by Lucasfilm – and the company produced a dedicated and quite expensive rendering machine (called the Pixar Image Computer) that used some sophisticated hardware to optimise the performance of Renderman.
John Lasseter joined relatively late in this part of the story – having been fired by Disney (how ironic that he and Jobs share such a similar biographical arc) – and effectively became the story-telling soul of the company.
It could work, it could work very well. I don’t think its a “perfect marriage” though. Perfect marriages require both love and convenience, this marriage would only offer convenience; and I’m not really sure how much of that.
There probably some areas where Apple and Google would benefit each other administratively, but I’m not clear exactly how Google helps Apple, or anyone else, level the OS playing field.
I think Enderle has screwed the pooch with his facts. It wasn’t Steve Jobs who was being considered for a government position, it was Sulley. Sculley had worked tirelessly for the Clintons and was, according to Apple Confidential, only removed from consideration as vice president because of his divorce. A cabinet post may have also been considered but it was Sculley, not Jobs, who was in line for the government job.
Wow, is Enderle as much of a buffoon as he appears to be?
No, he’s probably more of a buffoon than he appears to be.
Remember, all of this stuff that he writes has been through a self-censoring editing process and all of the crap he supplies through his rent-a-quote ‘consultancy’ service is edited by someone else.
I could make better predictions or give a more accurate analysis by gutting a chicken or reading tea leaves in the bottom of a cup.