Case Study from Chapter 7: Apple, Google, and Microsoft Battle for your Internet Experience
Business 5460, Management Information Systems
March 30, 2014
Dr. Mical Ramim

Provide a one page summary identifying major issues
The battle between global giants, Apple, Google and Microsoft, is a fight that has been occurring for many years now. All three companies have been hugely successful in different aspects of their industry. However, as our society’s technology continues to develop each company has had to make drastic changes to adapt to new and upcoming trends. As discussed in the case study, the perfect example of this necessary adaptation is a trending statistic that predicts a majority of users will begin browsing the internet on mobile devices versus the traditional PC. This probable trend has led to a lively battle of innovation as each company struggles to be number one in the consumer internet experience. Throughout this battle to the top each company has experienced their fair share of issues.
Microsoft is perhaps one of the most famous and respected companies in the world. The corporation was founded April 4, 1975 by Bill Gates, an inventor known for creating one of the first user-friendly operating systems for personal computers. Over the decades the company has been a huge success, but not without its failures which often seem to be as of late. What once may have been an internet experience that was easily dominated by Microsoft technology is now saturated with heavy competition. For example, Microsoft lately has been at the bottom of the totem pole for mobile devices. It has not been able to strongly compete with Apple and their mobile applications, and its other competitor Google is still dominating the search engine platform.
Apple is also a highly regarded company. Without going into too many details, Apple is also well known for having their hand in similar niches as Microsoft. They have operating systems, phones, tablets and much more. However, whereas Microsoft is leading the operating system production, Apple appears to be doing very well in the mobile device industry.
Google is a global champion in advertising and internet innovation. The company has taken the world in a very aggressive manner. It is perhaps most well-known for its search engine platform that continues to have 80% of internet traffic. In addition, it has also taking a strong stand against Apple in the mobile device industry with operating systems like Android. As a result, Apple and Google are not at the best of terms when it comes to the mobile device industry.
These three internet giants are all uniquely identifiable in specific aspects of the consumer internet experience. However, none of them are currently well rounded to the point of winning this battle. If it is true that majority of internet browsing will soon be done on mobile devices, then the one who conquers the mobile industry may have the best advantage. From recent news and observation it is my opinion that Microsoft may be the underdog in this scenario. It will be interesting to see how these companies approach the development of new products over the next few years.
Case Study Questions 1. Compare the business models and areas of strength of Apple, Google, and Microsoft.
It’s important to note that the business models of these companies have changed throughout time, and it’s only natural for this to occur as the consumer desire changes. Apple has characterized its business model by focusing on making its hardware the “must have” luxury item (Taylor, 2013). Creating high quality products with sheik marketing, they have been able to introduce bigger and better products annually and have bigger and better revenue. Google takes advantage of its ability to mass advertise and invests heavily into creating new and improving existing products. They could be considered the radical innovators (Avram, 2011). Microsoft has achieved many of their goals, such as a PC in every home. They typically focus on the development of software, but lately they have been attempting to expand their business model. According to Austin and Smith, both Microsoft and Google are doing financially well, but are not growing. Apple on the hand as had much growth these last few years (Avram, 2011). 2. Why is mobile computing so important to these three firms? Evaluate the mobile platform offering each firm.
Mobile devices are a new focus point for business models (Avram, 2011). The ability to travel and access the internet is a great consumer feature. Google, Apple and Microsoft realize that this is a huge need for consumers and are attempting to capitalize on this concept. Google is doing well with their Android OS in the mobile device market. Apple is currently dominating the mobile device market, specifically with their application store. Microsoft has attempted to join the market with a few failed attempts, but is hoping to establish some groundwork with their Windows 8 OS on new phones and tablets.
Why is the issue of “net neutrality” important to these businesses? The idea of net neutrality has been a controversial subject for the past six years. Network neutrality is the idea that internet service providers must allow equal access to content and applications regardless of the nature of the content. This concept is essentially a way to prevent network providers from taking advantage of consumer access to information. Advocates for the service believe that restrictions would prevent user innovation and encourage network provider manipulation. Over the past few years there have been many alterations to regulations affecting the net neutrality concept. As of right now, network providers are allowed to put certain stipulations on data plans that thye offer.
Recommend to Google how it could use business intelligence to support decision-making in a highly competitive environment
Data analytics and data mining is a great way to review your goals and determine the state of your standing in a market as well as your competitors. Through reviewing patterns and detecting anomalies you can figure out ways to maximize your standing.

References
Avram, A. (2011, January 142011, January 14). [Web log message]. Retrieved from http://www.infoq.com/news/2011/01/Apple-Google-Microsoft
Taylor, C. (2013, October 232013, October 23). [Web log message]. Retrieved from http://mashable.com/2013/10/23/apple-free-software-expensive-hardware/