OT, re: how come the wintel industry is not on your list of clear losers?
Because it's not clear to me.
It's true, there will be a lot fewer earnings growth opportunities in PC's, going forward. And, since Wintel got most of those profits, they stand to lose the most.
However, both companies realize this, and are working very, very hard to migrate to the new growth areas. And both companies have massive resources, and a long track record of success.
Intel is the best chip manufacturer of all. But, can they design and market chips in areas where they don't yet have a brand name? Maybe, maybe not. CPUs for PCs will become a low-margin commodity, like Micron's business. Chips for servers will not be a commodity for a long time. A number of other niches Intel is targeting will be high-margin. But it will take a lot of successes in a lot of small markets. On balance, I think they don't have as secure a lock on a high-volume high-growth industry as they used to have, so I'm not as sure of their future profit growth.
With Microsoft, I'm also uncertain, but leaning toward thinking they will make a successful transition. both stocks have now been chopped in half, from their highs, and a stunning amount of market cap has evaporated. The uncertainty of the antitrust case has really hammered the stock. They still have the biggest collection of the best software people around, and software is still a growth industry. And Microsoft is still flexible, able to rapidly adjust, switch directions. For the last 20 years, betting against Microsoft has been a losing bet, in niche after niche. |
