[5]In June 2010, I claimed that There Is Another Paradigm Shift Coming in Technology and Media: Apple, Microsoft and Google Know its Winner Takes All [6]. In said piece, I asserted that Google was well positioned to knock Apple off of its perch, but more importantly that Google was also best positioned to be the leader of the new paradigm - the intersection of computing, telecommunications and media.
It's now incontrovertible that I was correct on the first assertion, see Cost Shifting Your Way To Prominence Using The Network Effect, Or Google Wins - Apple, RIM & Microsoft Have ALREADY LOST! [7] - and from an investment perspective, Right On Time, My Prediction Of Apple Margin Compression 8 Quarters From My CNBC Warning Landed Right On The Money! [8] Now, ample evidence of the second assertion is coming to the forefront...
It is Google's Android OS that has enabled this rapid advancement in tech, and it's Google's cut throat open source business model that has provided the impetus for the rapid drop in hardware prices that accompanies the steep spike in functionality.
Judging the tepid take-up of the new Windows 8/phone platform, and the current decline in Apple cache as well as relative market share - the Windows PC platform can now read its own obituary as Android becomes the new computing standard. At the rate things are going, my other prognostications in the space will come to fore rather prematurely...
Smartphone Hardware Manufacturers Are Dead, Long Live The Google-like Solution Providers [9]
Computer Hardware Vendors Are Dead, Part Deux! [10]
All paying subscribers should download the Google Q1-2012 Valuation Summary [11], wherein we have updated the valuation numbers for Google using a variety of metrics. Click here to subscribe or upgrade [12].