Apple-Microsoft: The View from China


We don't usually report on stories from the People's Daily, mouthpiece of the Chinese Communist Party, but both Microsoft and Apple are making major plays for the giant mainland Chinese market. China, of course, is going its own way with its own OS, eschewing Microsoft and Apple in an apparent attempt to free itself of dependence upon US technology - albeit with IBM's help.

The People's Daily engages in some conjecture about Microsoft-Google collaboration, which it sees as way to overcome Apple's dominance of the online music and video services market.

Oddly, though, the article focuses upon Microsoft and Apple's historic rivalry, overlooking the enormous amount of collaboration in which the two companies have engaged, virtually from year dot. That relationship was cemented, once again, only recently with a new 5-year agreement between Redmond and Cupertino.

There was a time when Microsoft was just small fry and Apple was the big banana. But MS developed Excel first for the Mac, and it has almost always had an Office product of some description available. Moreover, Apple even knifed its old partner, Adobe, and co-developed TruType with Microsoft under the Sculley regime, which gave MS the on-screen and printable fonts it needed when Windows 3.0 was in development. Without paying those pesky, outrageous Adobe PostScript licensing fees.

Fast-forwarding to Google, there is little reason for MS and Google to collaborate on anything big right now. The word 'AOL' still burns in Microsoft's mouth, at least since Google's successful pitch to AOL last December. But rather than partnering with Apple, MS is more likely to duplicate its innovation. As Jobs said recently, MS will have to, at some stage, intro its own MP3 player if it wants to get in on that lucrative market.

Jobs and Gates had it right in 1997; they spoke of 'co-optition' - a mixture of competition and cooperation. The two companies compete in a number of areas, but cooperate in others. Apple clearly has a vested interest in cooperation; Google doesn't and only views Redmond and its vast resources with increasing wariness.