After blogging about how Google can take on Microsoft and vice versa, I was interested in the writer of the article, Rob Enderle. I followed his articles and came across another interesting "what if" discussion on the merger of IBM and Apple. Even though chances of such a merger is really zero to none just because both companies have redundancy in products as well as in customers, a look at the similarities and differences of both giants would not hurt. In the following paragraphs, a discussion of how the two companies could benefit from each other if they do merge will take place.
Lets take a look at the similarities of both IBM and Apple. First, just as Apple has Steve Jobs to lead it successfully through its life cycle, IBM is successfully lead by Sam Palmisano who has managed to reward IBM with often the strongest profitability. Second, Both companies has solid bases for carrying business and gaining global attention; IBM focus on its intellectual property base in system cooling and analytics and energy management. Similarly, Apple focus on its rich operating systems and differentiated product line. Third, Both companies try to ignore price competition and concentrate on product value. Lastly, they both have loyal customer base that consists of different groups from individuals to organization and government sectors.
Moving on to the differences; While Apple inserts customer voice on its marketing strategies, IBM fails to do so. Most of IBM top products serve as back end products that has no apparent advantage to many customers. On the other hand, integrated marketing and products development is perhaps the biggest success factor for Apple. Second, IBM is known or having high end products that usually gain wide satisfaction of customers whereas Apple fails to provide the equivalent quality due to different customers' perceptions. Lastly, IBM does not solely depend on Sam Palmisano because it has a strong structure, however, Apple pretty much runs on Steve Jobs; whenever he's sick, Apple stocks go down and vice versa. In conclusion, If both companies looked at each other strengths and weaknesses, they will be able to enhance their presence in the market which eventually means more customer satisfaction.
I would be greatly interested if the two companies merged, all though i see them as having to fundamentally different business approaches, but maybe that's what will make them such a good combo. With IBM already doing partial business mergers with Cisco, some powerhouse that would be.
ReplyDeleteAlthough I partly agree with you, I think if these two great companies are not in constant competition to try to out due each other, they would produce less new and updated products.
ReplyDelete