In my opinion, augmented reality glasses are going to be the next big hardware paradigm shift and Augmented Reality as a whole will lead the next tech transformation. It took multiple iterations before smartphones became the platforming changing phenomenon that made Apple one the most profitable company in the world. Smartphones made it possible for people to carry a powerful computer in their pockets and stay connected at all times. Nokia failed to create the hardware for the smartphone just like Microsoft failed to create the software because it is extremely difficult to discard your old assumptions/beliefs and start with a clean slate.Īdaptation of Cover Page of the book “The Four” by Scott Galloway Nokia dominated the phone market in 2007 but the iPhone created such a transformative change in what a ‘smart phone’ really meant that most of the incumbents had to start again from scratch. Microsoft had also launched the PocketPC in 2001 and had a bunch of windows phones on the market when the iPhone was launched. Windows came pre-installed with the internet explorer which crushed Netscape which was the company that enabled the transition from building for windows to building for the internet. Microsoft on the other hand did not miss the transition to the internet. Microsoft capitalized on this paradigm shift because IBM failed to understand the power and importance of software. They built the most important PC in my opinion because it upended Apple’s PC monopoly. IBM understood the threat to their business and created a PC in partnership with Microsoft. Another important observation is that the incumbents did not completely miss the paradigm shift. This does not mean that the established companies went out of business, Microsoft and IBM are both powerful companies even today but they are not perceived as a threat to the incumbents like they used to. Paradigm shifts made is possible for new companies to form and disrupt the incumbent monopolies. IOS by Apple and Android by Google became the default OS for smartphones Summarizing the Past This gave rise to a new crop of companies like Google, Amazon and Facebook.
Instead of creating software for windows, people started creating applications for the web. Microsoft’s dominance was challenged primarily when web became the new paradigm. IBM did not realize the importance of software at the time allowing Microsoft to create and license the operating system which became synonymous with the PC industry and established Microsoft’s dominance for two decades.
This was also the initial days of the software industry and the idea that software could be a sold separately and didn’t just have to be something that came with the hardware purchased.Īpple dominated the PC market for almost 20 years but the most important personal computer came from IBM and Microsoft. Steve Wozniak created the original Apple I in 1975 and the entire value chain shifted towards this new paradigm, the personal computer. A decade later, personal computers were going to overtake the mainframes. In the 1960’s, IBM dominated the tech industry because mainframes were the central paradigm of the computing industry.