This Thursday, Microsoft became the most valuable company in the world. Its rise on the stock market and the decline of Apple, until recently the undisputed market leader, were enough to give the global throne to the company founded by Bill Gates and headed by Satya Nadella, with a total market capitalization of $2.88 trillion. Microsoft has closed the gap on Apple until it has overtaken them, thanks in part to the success of its artificial intelligence commitment with OpenAI. Added to this is the good development of other businesses.
Apple and Microsoft have been historical rivals since their founding by Steve Jobs and Bill Gates and Steve Wozniak, respectively. Apple accused Microsoft of copying the style of its computers, with its drop-down menus and ease of use. The computer world was divided between the two. Apple was behind for a long time, but overtook Microsoft thanks to the iPhone. In 2010, it surpassed its competitor in terms of market value and remained at the top almost continuously. There were two occasions during the pandemic when Microsoft overtook Apple, but the Tim Cook-led company quickly regained the top spot on both occasions. It remains to be seen whether overtaking will take longer this time.
Microsoft is leading the race for generative artificial intelligence with OpenAI. He benefits from his agreement with the company led by Sam Altman, on whose board he joined as an observer. Microsoft is the majority shareholder of OpenAI's commercial subsidiary, although its structure as a nonprofit organization complicates the group's governance. In any case, Microsoft has integrated the available advances in artificial intelligence into its products and services, while also providing extensive cloud computing services associated with the enormous computing demands of the new technology.
The weakness in Apple shares, on the other hand, comes from a series of downgrades by analysts that have stoked fears that sales of the iPhone, its most profitable product, would remain weak, particularly in China, its main market. Apple also sees a threat to its services business from the possible monopoly abuse lawsuit against Google, which could lead to the breach of its lucrative agreements to prioritize Google as the default search engine for its mobile phones, tablets and computers.
Microsoft started the 2023/204 financial year with a brilliant quarter. The company's revenue and profit jumped between July and September compared to the same period last year, driven by growth in its cloud computing business, which has become a revenue driver. The technology company increased its sales by 13% to 56,517 million dollars (around 53,350 million euros at the current exchange rate). Profit, in turn, rose 27% to a record $22,291 million, exceeding analysts' forecasts.
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