[www.cultofmac.com]

October 6, 1997: Michael Dell makes an infamously bleak appraisal of Apple’s fortunes. Asked what he would do with the struggling company, the founder of Dell Inc. says he would “shut it down and give the money back to the shareholders.”

As incorrect forecasts go, this is one of the more notable in tech history. But it doesn’t seem that way at the time.

To give Dell the benefit of the doubt, he’s a smart guy. Only in his early 30s at the time of his infamous blunder — making him a decade younger than Steve Jobs — the pioneering entrepreneur had already made billions selling built-to-order PCs directly to consumers.
Apple, by contrast, had just announced its biggest losses in history. Cupertino had also just seen its clone Macintosh strategy, which many thought would save the company, misfire spectacularly.

In recent years, Dell walked back his infamous statement, which came during a talk at a Gartner Symposium. During a Q&A at TechCrunch’s Web 2.0 Summit in 2011, Dell “clarified” his earlier comment, saying he only suggested he would close shop at Apple because he was so dedicated to running Dell at the time.

Apple became profitable again in 1998, when it made a big impact with the iMac G3. The company followed that with the iBook in 1999, iPod in 2001, iPhone in 2007 and iPad in 2010. Its Dell-like strategy of selling computers over the internet also turned out pretty darn well.

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Ways to improve web conference image and sound quality. [forums.macresource.com]






Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/06/2020 10:30AM by pRICE cUBE.

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pRICE cUBE
Its Dell-like strategy of selling computers over the internet also turned out pretty darn well.[/i]

Too bad those retail stores we such money losers..../sarcasm

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San Antonio, TX (in the old city)


"All that is required for evil to prevail is for good men to do nothing." - Edmund Burke
“Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented." - Eli Weisel

"To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public." - Theodore Roosevelt (1918)

"I don’t want to see religious bigotry in any form. It would disturb me if there was a wedding between the religious fundamentalists and the political right. The hard right has no interest in religion except to manipulate it." - Billy Graham 1981

"Politics and governing demand compromise. But these Christians believe they are acting in the name of God, so they can't and won't compromise" - Barry Goldwater

I remember his comments but I ignored them and invested in Apple at the time. I'm certainly not as rich as he is but I'm laughing every time I open my account to check on my portfolio. As my old financial advisor used to tell me, "you're heavy weight in Apple stock, but I understand why and I'm not saying you need to re-balance, besides I love my iPhone."

I wish I had owned some Apple stock back then. I would not have sold it.

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My life goes smoothly and in regular intervals

It was not a bad statement at the time, considering Apple's recent half decade of history. But Apple had Steve back and well, even we had no idea what he had planned.

Still, it's perhaps the most infamous statement in the history of home computing. Yes, worse that the Gates one about 640K because that one is mostly remembered inaccurately and taken out of context. The Dell quote is not.

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Lew Zealand
It was not a bad statement at the time, considering Apple's recent half decade of history.

Nah, it was a bad statement, just brimming with arrogance and tempting karma.

Quote

Still, it's perhaps the most infamous statement in the history of home computing. Yes, worse that the Gates one about 640K

Well, my hero Steve Ballmer's derisive statement about the iPhone being the most expensive phone in the world comes pretty close.

Bring back Ballmer—he was the funnest CEO ever!

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ka jowct
I wish I had owned some Apple stock back then. I would not have sold it.

I wish I had owned some Apple stock back then. I wish I would not have sold it.

I STILL contend that it was not unreasonable advice in OCT 1997

Their quarterly announcement that came out a week later was BAD NEWS!

NEW YORK (CNNfn) - Trouble-plagued Apple Computer Inc. said Wednesday its net loss for the fiscal fourth quarter exceeded Wall Street's consensus estimates.

For the quarter ended Sept. 26, the Cupertino, Calif.-based computer maker reported a loss of $161 million, or $1.26 a share, compared with a net profit of $25 million, or 20 cents a share, in the same quarter a year ago.

Revenue declined 30 percent to $1.6 billion.

Included in the current quarter's results are a $62 million charge to increase its restructuring reserves, as well as a $75 million write-off related to the company's purchase of the Mac OS license from Power Computing Corp.

Without the charges, the company's net loss for the quarter would have been $24 million, or 19 cents a share -- still exceeding the 14 cents a share that analysts expected.

[money.cnn.com]

Some of you foresaw the iMac, the iPod, the iPhone, the iPad and the music subscription service way back then - hats off to you.

Or maybe you were just lucky as hell



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/06/2020 05:22PM by hal.

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hal
I STILL contend that it was not unreasonable advice in OCT 1997

Your quote just reminds me that Wall Street and the popular press were making a mountain out of a molehill.