Apple's value is now quadruple Dell's

Dell wasn't doing much better than Apple in 1997, nor were they in 2001, when Mr. Dell was asked to explain his snippy comments from '97:

"If you look at proprietary computer companies, whether it's Digital or Silicon Graphics or Apple I think the fates are all relatively similar. We know how the movie ends. It's just a question of what happens in the middle. Apple has a very little customer base. If you look at the economics, it has been extremely hard for Apple to get a return on its R&D with a shrinking volume base. It's not to say that Apple's products aren't innovative or cool, but the economic factors here are so overwhelming, it's very hard for them to swim against that tide." -Michael Dell

The chart at the time: http://www.macbigot.com/articles/go2dell.html

It's clear (at least to me) from his comments both times that Mr. Dell was acting a lot more afraid of the Apple machine than he had reason to -- and we armchair pundits just found that really funny. Why would big Mr. Dell be afraid of Little Mr. Apple? The answer: they shouldn't have been -- but perhaps the Microsoft hegemony was being sustained at the time by a set of hidden rules about how PC manufacturers were 'encouraged' to treat Apple in public.

Dell is a company that tried to defy gravity and prove that you can survive and prosper long term in the high tech industry without doing any meaningful R&D whatsoever.

That people actually swallowed this hooey and bought Dell stock to hold to retirement boggles my mind.

I never bought Dell stock. Its business model is to rely on the component suppliers for R&D and just build 'em generic and dirt cheap. You do that and eventually the Chinese will eat your lunch. Hell, even the Chinese, as demonstrated when they acquired IBM's PC business, understood that you can't survive in high tech without R&D.

While we're measuring:

Michael Dell: â–²$16.4 billion (2008) [1]
Steve Jobs: â–¼US$5.4 billion (2008) [6]

Khm, khm...

About 18 billion

But I'm an old enough computer vet to know that "hard to come...easy go" I've seen companies with dominant positions dissapear in a matter of years (cough Syquest). Apple won't make blunders like many of these relics did but I'm not too sure I'm going to count Dell out just yet. Dell's acquired EquaLlogic and is making a push into channel distribution. Their postion could strengthen over the next few years.

Calculating worth is pretty useless IMO. Apple's worth is tied up in consumer products which is a rather fickle endeavor. If the iPod or iPhone stumbles Apple loses a good chunk of their worth overnight.

Dell's problem is that they've tried to do "everything" themselves and eventually lost out to HP which balances direct vs channel sales quite adroitly making their "logical workforce" much larger than Dell.

I'm happy for Apple's success but I often opine to myself "just how sustainable is it?"

Let's brag about AAPL stock when it makes new highs... not when it's 20+ pts off it's high :-)

Nice comparison chart showing the performance of Apple versus Dell:

http://switchtoamac.com/site/apple-now-worth-15866-billion-4-times-as-much-as-dell.html

While I believe the statement of Michael Dell has been around the block a few times - this is definitely the first time AAPL has had a market cap quadruple that of DELL. Even when APPL was at 200 they were only 3.45 times more valuable. This is good news not just for Apple but for consumers as well. A tide of change is washing in and everyday people have more than just poorly constructed Windows machines to choose from.

Mr.l Dell was correct when he made that statement.

Apple Computer was on life support when Mr. Jobs returned late 1997. Were it not for Steve Jobs, Apple Computer would have been interred beside Commodore, Digital, Atari, Wang,......

That statement hasn't been waiting in a corner for years. Unless there are about 44,100 corners on the internet.

http://www.google.com/search?complete=1&hl=en&q=I%27d+shut+it+down+and+give+the+money+back+to+the+shareholders.&btnG=Google+Search&aq=f

But internet's a big place, maybe there are that many corners!