Steve Jobs: Apple will use $51B for big moves, not 'stupid' ones - Page 3

Originally Posted by kerryb

The last time Apple made a big purchase like these investors are suggesting brought Steve Jobs back to Apple along with the brilliant crew of Next. Since then purchases have been a small chip maker here, a specialized software company there, the jukebox company which iTunes is based on (sorry the name escapes me) none of which are household names.
Apple doesn't seem to subscribe to the mentality of companies like, Microsoft-Yahoo, HP-Palm, Time Warner-AOL, etc... who's mergers or acquisitions have not proven to be great successes. Rumors and suggestions that Apple buy Adobe would benefit nobody but Adobe stock holders. Apple seems to look for technologies that have something new and exciting to offer allowing Apple to realize a product fully. Buying a large expensive company like Facebook (which may have peaked in popularity by now) is not how Apple does business. Why buy when you can license or make a deal to integrate a technology that seems timely giving you a way to drop it when the world has moved on.

Originally Posted by Prof. Peabody

While not originally anything to do with racism, the word "tarbaby" has a lot of bad racial overtones in large parts of the USA. Just sayin.

Originally Posted by DarenDino

Buy ADOBE !!!!

Originally Posted by Joe hs

Buy Microsoft.

Originally Posted by mjtomlin

Why does everyone think they need to buy a huge company to spend some of that money?

Why not start building? They just spent $1B on that data center in North Carolina. I could see Apple spending a few billion on a chip foundry and manufacturing their own silicon like the A4.

Originally Posted by mitchell_pgh

I like the idea of buying Adobe, but I'm not sure that's what Apple needs. They have a number of competing products.

iPhoto/Aperture
vs.
Lightroom

Final Cut Pro
vs.
Adobe Premiere

After Effects
vs.
Motion

Etc. etc. etc. Considering Adobe is still ingesting Macromedia... I'm not sure if now is the time to strike.

Originally Posted by kerryb

The last time Apple made a big purchase like these investors are suggesting brought Steve Jobs back to Apple along with the brilliant crew of Next. Since then purchases have been a small chip maker here, a specialized software company there, the jukebox company which iTunes is based on (sorry the name escapes me) none of which are household names.
Apple doesn't seem to subscribe to the mentality of companies like, Microsoft-Yahoo, HP-Palm, Time Warner-AOL, etc... who's mergers or acquisitions have not proven to be great successes. Rumors and suggestions that Apple buy Adobe would benefit nobody but Adobe stock holders. Apple seems to look for technologies that have something new and exciting to offer allowing Apple to realize a product fully. Buying a large expensive company like Facebook (which may have peaked in popularity by now) is not how Apple does business. Why buy when you can license or make a deal to integrate a technology that seems timely giving you a way to drop it when the world has moved on.

Originally Posted by alexkhan2000

I've seen a lot of names being brandied about for acquisition targets but Jobs never said the word "acquisition" specifically. Apple has a very unique culture and ways of doing things and a large existing company would be very difficult to assimilate. I'm sure that's why Apple's been more focused on small companies with IP's, engineering talent, and niche expertise that they could absorb and fit in to what Apple is doing. "Strategic opportunities" may just be more capital investment in their own manufacturing or helping out in building out an infrastructure in the wireless communications field, etc.

Originally Posted by digitalclips

Totally correct: "The name Trinitron was derived from trinity, meaning the union of three, and tron from electron tube, after the way that the Trinitron combined the three separate electron guns of other CRT designs into one."

My first ever TV (That I bought) was a 13" Trinitron in a wood cabinet with a dish type antenna. I loved it to bits even if I did have to sit really close

Originally Posted by digitalclips

Ok, you convinced me ... Buy Adobe

Originally Posted by nyctree

Buy Land
Build 21st Century Factory
Make Apple "Made in USA"
in 20 years, every other consumer electronics co. will come begging for apple to make their products

Originally Posted by noirdesir

You people you should think outside the box, let them buy ... a country.
Maybe the Cayman Islands would fit the bill.

Originally Posted by anantksundaram

This is an interesting thought. One of the few.....

Originally Posted by julesburt

I've put this question out there many times and never had a response (from someone who knows such stuff)...

But isn't it possible assuming Apple's worth say 300 Billion presently...that if the market should take a silly 6-18 month nose dive (not sure it would)...say to half it's value...then Apple's at 150B...then couldn't Steve/Apple potentially borrow 100B based on cash-flow levels and cash in hand and actually buy Apple back from the shareholders?

My internet prediction is that's what Steve is waiting for!

Originally Posted by digitalclips

Most are being funny

Originally Posted by Hiro

The world can do with less faux indignation. The tarbaby has nothing to do with racism except be conveniently used politically against some candidates by opportunistic political enemies.

Simply it's a story of stupidity and counter-stupidity illustrating the need to think before you act in a way that's detrimental to your ends.

Originally Posted by anantksundaram

I know. But I thought I should recognize an interesting one!

Originally Posted by addicted44


I have, for example, almost completely stopped using FB. Yet, I keep a profile available, because its the best (often only) way to keep in touch with distant friends and family. The only time I log on is when I get a message, and want to reply. Despite disliking facebook tremendously, its really unlikely I will ever delete my profile (worst case, i use it only to get people's numbers, etc).

Originally Posted by digitalclips

True. And by the way ... I'd love to see manufacturing here in the US again for sure, even if mostly done by robots. At least we'd have made in the USA back on the boxes!

Originally Posted by cnocbui

Perfectly sensible name if you ask me. Most CRT tubes have an elecTRON gun. Sony came up with a CRT that used three instead of one. TRI means three so TRIniTRON makes perfect sense

Originally Posted by digitalclips

Pitcairn Island!

Originally Posted by DarenDino

Buy ADOBE !!!!

Originally Posted by Porchland

* Improving access to content and distribution. I could see Apple buying a studio (Sony, CBS) to improve its access to content, buying a local cable provider (Comcast, Charter, TWC) to get better access to the living room, buying Netflix for its delivery patents or Tivo for its DVR patents (though neither of those would be a major acquisition).

Originally Posted by cgc0202

To even suggest that Steve Jobs ever entertained acquisition of Facebook is preposterous -- no matter how relevant Facebook is to the ecosystem carefully developed and nurtured by Apple.

Very close collaboration is one thing. In fact, while Apple fans and Apple haters seem to have "black and white" concept of alliance", Steve Jobs never thought that way. He respected Bill Gates, and collaborated with him when it suited the development of the long term ecosystem, he had in mind.

First, there is the "projected market capitalization" of Facebook. The cash reserve of Apple would not be enough. Apple has into go into debt to acquire Facebook. A move that Steve Jobs is not likely to do, considering the history of Apple, once at the brink of bankruptcy ca 1997. That was a very traumatic experience for Steve Jobs, he has to make a deal with Bill Gates and sacrificed a lot in terms of intellectual property shared with Miscrosoft. I doubt Steve Jobs would have ever done such a deal had Apple been in better shape when he came back to Apple. It is likely that he might not even have sold its Apple ARM shares were it not for the need for cash. There are many other things that Steve Jobs had to let go, at the time.

The "cash horde" predisposition might be a consequence of that situation of Apple around 1997. I believe, since then Apple has strived to have no debt and started building its cash reserve.

Second. Social sites are not very stable. One classic example is Geocities -- acquired by Yahoo for more than $4 billion dollars during the height of the internet mania in late 1990's. Considering how young Facebook is, it is already involved in many very controversial issues -- privacy issues, harboring of pedophiles, all the sex scandals, the theft of personal information, etc. Aoart from this, there is no assurance that the taste of the incoming generation of youth wuold be the same as the Facebook culture. This happened with MySpace which actually too the ascendance from yet another social group.

Third. Steve Jobs had a chance to acquire other companies, that would have been perfect fit for Apple also -- movie companies with vast library of films, television media, etc.; or music labels, but Steve Jobs did not acquire them for one reason or another.

Steve Jobs did sell Pixar to Disney, and became the largest stockholder of Disney. It gained access to all the properties of Disney that is part of the backbone of the iTunes movie and tv materials. He was able to achieve this, without Disney getting a bite of Apple. In that merger acquisition, Pixar did not have the same scope and potential as Steve Jobs envisioned Apple since he came back in 1997.

Also, if Apple will acquire Facebook, the founder of Facebook will become a major stockholder of Apple. From what I read about him, it would not be a cultural fit with Steve Jobs. He is also young and has the ego (perhaos more) than the Steve Jobs before 1985.

There are also the venture capital investors of Facebook that would require not 10x return on their investments, but hundred fold or even thousand fold return in their investment. This is part of the bloat in the projected value of Facebook.

Apple has been very selective in the companies it acquired, indeed also perfect fit and sometime core in the technologies being developed by Apple. They are usually small.

Finally. Many forget that Apple enters into log term deals with its suppliers; and in large quantities. The large screen monitor deal with LG alone was $500 million, and they are not even fully utilized in the products of Apple. If you consider all the parts that go into the iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, and Macs-- even at iSupply estimates -- would total tens of billions of dollars in a 5-year long term deals.

CGC

Originally Posted by lvidal

iDo