It is just Apple vs Samsung. No one else is making any real money at
all.
Apple has about 65% of the total profit, Samsung probably has 25%.
Samsung is about to have a record quarter. I am a HUGE Apple fan but
ended up going with Galaxy Note. I think iPhone is still better in
software (my wife's iPhone 4 is smoother than my Note for certain
things, and has more apps), much better games selection, but Apple will
not make a screen that big any time soon. GS2 did not make me switch,
but I could not resist the Note.
HTC not doing great, Nokia/Motorola/Sony all losing money, Chinese
vendors all have razor thin margins. Amazon is losing money on Kindle
Fire. It is just Apple vs Samsung, everyone else is just there to give
Google market share. The money they make is really non-factor.
The Apple of 1980's was NOWHERE near world's most valuable company. It
also did not have Tim Cook and Terry Guo and 100 billion dollars in
cash. This is very, very different from Sony, Nokia and Rimm at their
peak. Never before in history a technology company managed to beat an
oil company for #1 spot.
Of course when you are #1, the only possible direction you can go is
down. But Apple has at least couple more good years left. If it can
successfully launch iTV to complete its ecosystem, it can stay there for
a while.
