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August 18 -August 25,2002 |
An impending split between giants
The Microsoft-Apple relationship is reaching an end following a five-year agreement
By Alessandro Cancian
Originally Published: 2002-08-04
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Microsoft creator and head Bill Gates (left) and Apple’s co-found and ‘prodigal son’ Steve Jobs (right)
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Judging from the boos that greeted the appearance of Bill Gates' face on the giant screen of MacWorld five years ago, few would have bet on this marriage surviving for long. The news of Microsoft investing some $150 million in what had been the only real alternative, Apple, had the same bitter taste as a spoonful of castor oil.
The times have changed, and Steve 'prodigal son' Jobs, recalled to steer the wheel of a sinking ship, had decided that any medicine was OK as long as it brought the sick back to their feet.
A marriage with no courtship, destined to last for five years, whose terms included the use of Internet Explorer as Apple's official browser in exchange for a cash injection in Apple's anemic coffers but also for a commitment by Microsoft to continue developing its Office suite.
The deal was good for both parties, allowing Apple to invest in its own future but at the same time shedding a very different light on Microsoft from the point of view of the U.S. administration, which wanted to scrutinize the business ways of the Redmond giant.
For five years the deal went almost unnoticed, occasionally punctuated by bittersweet remarks, mostly from Jobs, or by the launch of a new version of Microsoft's suite.
Apple's strongman must have chomped at the bit for this relation, but it is a well-known truth that the ideas of the two masters of this technological era do not go well together. Mr. Jobs never commented, unlike many other Silicon Valley CEOs, on Microsoft's judicial misadventures or business ethics, despite the fact that the company most damaged was his own.
However, like even better matched marriages, this too is coming to an end, and the cracks that until recently were being meticulously closed are now turning into gaping holes, and the dam is starting to crumble.
The first signs that something was amiss came when first Jobs and then Apple intervened in order to stop an out-of-court settlement for the allegations of being a monopoly that would let Microsoft off the hook by giving free software worth some million dollars to schools. An idea that had Jobs blow his top, forcing him to act personally against this threat to one of the few domains where Apple computers still win significant victories.
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