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It saw its losses mounting to $125M in 1996.
It was during that memorableMacworld 1997 presentationthat Jobs outlined a plan to bring Apple back.
What people remember about that day is that Microsoft committed to buying $150M Apple shares (non-voting).
Bajarin has been covering Apple almost since its inception.
The reaction was understandable.
The antagonism once appeared to fuel both companies.
But those days were long gone.
Of course, Microsoft was not being entirely altruistic.
I’m not sure that move helped it whenit faced an antitrust suit in 2000.
Within a year,the value of Microsoft’s investment virtually doubledand only grew from there.
During his presentation, Jobs described incredible brand recognition and its enviable market position in education and creative content.
Today the company has over 2 billion.
What Apple lacked for more than a decade, though, was its founder and visionary.
Jobs came with ideas (and the remnants of theNeXT platform).
Bajarin believes the cash infusion gave Apple time to developthe iconic iMac, which shipped in August 1998.
Of course, it gave us far more than that.
One could argue that without Microsoft’s $150M life preserver, Apple might not have survived.
Without them, the Apple of 2024 might not even exist.
