Christmas share price rally seals turnaround at Apple

Source: Exec Digital USA

Date :12/28/2007 5:16:06 AM

A Christmas rally in Apple’s share price has made it the world’s third most valuable new technology company, behind Microsoft and Google.

The dramatic turnaround has taken the firm past industry stalwarts such as IBM and Intel and this Apple also overtook networking equipment maker Cisco.

With a market cap of $174 billion - up more than $100bn from twelve months ago- Apple, maker of iconic products such as iPods and Macs, is now one of Wall Street’s stand-out successes.

Despite the seasonal stock price surge, and while Apple’s core business of digital music players and desktop computers remains robust, analysts warned that it faces a significant product transition to mobile handsets and a new generation of home digital media devices.

When Steve Jobs Apple returned to Apple in 1997, more than a decade after losing control of the company he co-founded, it was struggling with a declining share of the desktop computer business as its key markets fell to the ubiquitous PC.

Apple’s recovery has been embodied by its iPod digital music player, launched in October 2001, based on a singular approach to product development and marketing that has underpinned all of Apple’s recent products, most notably the iPhone.

However, neither the iPhone or Apple TV, a box for transmitting digital video from a computer to a TV set, has yet made a sales breakthrough to show that it can rival the iPod as a comparable driver of growth.

December 28, 2007