“This is an entirely stunning statistic: Apple‘s iPhone sales are now worth more than all of Microsoft,” Tim Worstall reports for Forbes. “‘One Apple product, something that didn’t exist five years ago, has higher sales than everything Microsoft has to offer. More than Windows, Office, Xbox, Bing, Windows Phone, and every other product that Microsoft has created since 1975. In the quarter ended March 31, 2012, iPhone had sales of $22.7 billion; Microsoft Corporation, $17.4 billion.'”
Worstall reports, “Now when we say ‘worth’ there’s a number of different things that we can mean.”
Read more in the full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Readers “Ellis D.” and “Dan K.” for the heads up.]
Related articles:
Apple’s iPhone business alone is now bigger than all of Microsoft – February 4, 2012
Apple’s iPhone business alone generates more revenue than all Microsoft – January 25, 2012
OMG. That is effin impressive.
‘OMG. That is effin impressive.’
You forgot to use the word ‘like’ in there somewhere.
Like OMG. That is really like effin impressive.
No, I did not.
I like their strategy, ideally do.
I thought iPhone passed MS several months back.
Yeah, old as far as news goes. But on the other hand this never gets old!!
🙂
Reading the original article (not much), it sounds like he finally got around to reading the Vanity Fair article that came out a month ago. Or some other belated discovery on the author’s part.
Even RIMM probably has more actual cash in the bank than Ballmers clown workshop – Microsoft is a $100 billion debt hole with an ever increasing negative cash flow.
That’s why they’ve been borrowing tens of $ billions all the while trying to hide it behind a sob story about locked overseas assets. Enron will look like petty cash larceny when the Redmond megabubble bursts.
retard. yawn…
Wow, I’ve heard of lots of financial shenanigans and conspiracies, but the one you’ve just spun is a doozy. Where did you hear it, or did you make it up on your own?
@russ,
I have no idea where you’re getting your numbers from but Microsoft has 12.78 Billion in debt and 62.04 Billion in cash. Their debt was taken on a few years ago because cash was cheap, not because they needed cash.
Microsoft has a *positive* cash flow of 31.63 Billion (TTM). Last quarter was their first Net Income loss ever (492 million), but that was due to a one time charge of 6.193 Billion. Minus that charge, they would’ve had over 6.5 Billion in quarterly profits.
Believe me, I’m no Microsoft fan, but they’re still a very profitable and successful company.
Yes they are still profitable but their O S(Including servers), Office, and licensing earnings are falling. All their other endeavors make little or are hemorrhaging cash. XBox is cash flow positive but they have not yet broken even on it and may never.
I have followed msft financial reporting out of curiosity for years and a about two years ago noticed a lot of value is disappearing out of their balance sheet. Not sure where it is going, asset write downs most likely, plus executive grants etc, but it adds up to billions. This company is shrinking, not just sales/revenue, but total worth. I don’t hear anyone talking about it, but there it is.
@m159,
My comment was just to point out the outrageously false claims by Russ regarding Microsoft’s $100 billion debt and “ever increasing negative cash flow”.
To expand on my previous statement of being no Microsoft fan, nothing I said in that comment or in this comment is meant to be an endorsement of Microsoft in any way. In fact, if you look at my comment history you’ll see plenty of comments by me about Microsoft’s loss decade turning into 12+ years now.
I could go on and on about the drop and subsequent stagnation of their market cap and well as failure after failure in the consumer space, especially when it comes to mobile.
But none of that lessens the fact that Microsoft *is* still a very profitable company. In fact, last year Microsoft was the 4th most profitable company in America and second only to Apple in the tech sector.
Most of Microsoft’s recent quarters (except obviously the last) were record setting in terms of profitability for the company, despite being hit by the recession as corporation cut back on IT expenditures.
Looking at Microsoft relative to Apple isn’t a practical comparison because Apple has skyrocketed at an overwhelmingly unprecedented level, but knowing Microsoft’s profits last year beat out Wal-Mart, any financial company, any car company, all but 2 oil/energy companies, or any other sector besides tech where they came in second, actually puts Microsoft in a pretty positive light.
And no, year over year, Microsoft’s profits aren’t dropping. 2012 – 23,171 (minus one time charge)
2011 – 23,150
2010 – 18,760
2009 – 17,681
2008 – 14,065
2007 – 12,599
2006 – 12,254
The bottom line is that while Microsoft is failing big time with search (Bing), social (?), mobile/tablet, they’re still making obscene amounts of money off their cash cows, especially in enterprise markets.
And to think, Balmer laughed at the iPhone in 2007.
Yes, he laughed and made disparaging jokes. Everybody’s a comedian.
Even then, he was a fink and a stooge. Today, he is a chump, an also-ran, and a stumblebum.
I haven’t read of heard of anyone using “fink” in decades. Nice one!
That’s “rat fink” my friend. RF all the way, as we used to say in Berserkely…
Rounding error indeed…..
May Ballmer remain for as long (or as short) as it takes
Not only did the iPhone not exist a little over five years ago, it almost didn’t exist at all because it wasn’t meeting Apple’s high standards. Contrast this with Microsoft’s “near enough is always good enough” philosophy.
Microsoft may have “thought” about tablets, but Gates and Ballmer simply didn’t “implement”.
So much for their creative genius.
The real question is that with Apple stock at new all time high, then where is it going. Interesting analysis here:
http://beta.fool.com/jaans/2012/08/18/understanding-apple-flash-new-high-where-it-going/9958/
here you go again. is that so fucking important to you? if you are not a owner of each company, it doesn’t mean anything to you. I don’t care who’s better. I stopped buying apple since 2006. in terms of business machine, Apple mac get still huge problem. they will never get into. actually, security is so vulnerable of side of mac if hackers will intentionally choose a target. it’s just matter of time. someday, apple will be change its situation like MS. there is no NO. 1 forever.
It blows my mind how trolls still pretend like OS X isn’t secure.
I mean, god, there are no viruses or real world exploits for OS X after more than a decade. Meanwhile, every single version of Windows up to and including W8 is a festering cesspool of exploits and malware.
How can anyone – even trolls – still deny it at this point?
I think the important thing that we won’t see is a virus, like Conficker or Sasser. You may accidentally hit OK and install a trojan that hoses your data or sends your passwords out, but it won’t automatically infect every Mac on your network with zero user-interaction.
Edward WTF, just shush. Regarding the article its old, and the funny thing is ms actually bought license for the rubber banding os patent from apple to use in their nokia phone lol