Free Boundaries And Future Of Amazon, Apple, Facebook, And Google Case Study Sample

There are thousands of stories of Internet companies that were unable to capture a significant market share for their services, became unprofitable, and folded. Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google represent the giants who overcame the competitions and emerged as having a dominant market share of their respective services. Along the way, they have each created their own unique niche for which they became profitable, but due to the size and scale of each company, there are overtures into each other’s boundaries, which are contested for competition. As time moves on, one question deals in whether or not these companies will continue to be competitive amongst each other or if one will eventually emerge as dominant and choke off the others profitability. To make an informed prediction about this, it is important to understand why each company has found success, and how the success of one of these companies might eventually lead to a loss of market share for another.
Amazon found its success by being an online bookstore, which expanded into household products, which then grew to be able to offer virtually everything that a consumer could want (Deighton and Kornfeld, 2013). From this success it expanded it’s business by offering digital content, both on demand, and for digital purchase. In the digital book market, it’s low priced Kindle. Fortune magazine has explained the success of the Kindle as “Simple minded,” but in business it is often simplicity of service, which can be a key indicator of success. The Kindle is offered at a low price point, the Kindle Fire rivals Apple’s iPad, yet without the hefty price tag attached to it (Mitchell, 2011). Amazon has updated the reading experience into a modern experience of reading digital books, or eBooks, which are currently growing in market share every year. Amazon has also offered a number of cloud suites for companies and individuals, and has found a targeted way of tagging consumers with browser cookies that enable it to advertise it’s products to consumers who have already shown an online interest in them (Deighton and Kornfeld, 2013).
Apple began as a company producing hardware, but has grown to be the most profitable American company of all-time. (Deighton and Kornfeld, 2013). Apple shares a market for digital music and books with Amazon. But both companies attract costumers in different ways. To simplify things, it could be said that Apple produces devices, which are integrated to attract users to digital content through it’s online store. Amazon, is a store where people are going to anyways to buy books and has used that clout in order to attract customers into buying a digital device in order to read books—the Kindle—which then competes with Apple’s existing devices (Young, 2011). The Kindle Fire, a touch screen tablet designed as a reader but with wider applications, competes directly with the iPad, but is available to consumers at a discounted price. Amazon and Apple also compete in terms of their sale models. Both sell a majority of their devices online. Apple can claim to have the “best” devices on the market, but since they cost as much as 4x more than the comparable Amazon market of Kindles, Amazon has the discount market of these devices effectively cornered.
Google and Facebook both have profit models, which rely on selling digital marketing as the largest piece in their profit pie. Google has proven to be more successful in creating a large profit and majority of this market share, but Facebook has been more successful in getting users to sign up for its platform and getting the average American to spend 400 minutes using their service. Google+ is Google’s take at establishing a social network, but thus far it has failed to attract the number of users and to coax users into spending as much time online. Facebook’s vast amount of users and their commitment to using the service will be a big threat to Google in the future. Facebook would even be in a good position to launch a competing search engine, since it already has the attention of its users. More than that though, Facebook gets so many users because it’s social strata of interactivity bases of triggering the dopamine receptor of the brain, making the line between its users and Facebook addicts blurry.
The short history of these four companies has shown that none is hesitant in infringing on the other’s market. As time goes own, they will likely continue to launch products and services. Yet my prediction is that they will continue to be independent, and successful companies. Each has strong products which yield impressive profits. While there is competition amongst the companies, this is part of the reason that the companies are so innovative. While their bounders for products do overlap, the core product/service of each company is distinct. This has likely led to these four companies as emerging as giants together—each offered a core service that was unique and effective.

References:

Explaining Kindle’s success: It’s very simple(minded). (2011, June 8). Retrieved February 21, 2015, from http://fortune.com/2011/06/08/explaining-kindles-success-its-very-simpleminded/
How Amazon Is Competing with Apple and Google [Infographic]. (n.d.). Retrieved February 21, 2015, from http://searchenginewatch.com/sew/study/2134679/how-amazon-is-competing-with-apple-and-google-infographic
Deighton, John and Kornfeld, Leora. Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google (2013). Harvard Business School.