A fork in the digital road

摘要

Imagine that Apple had folded in the mid-1990s, as some predicted at the time. Perhaps music downloads would still be a hassle, smartphones a novelty and tablet computers two inches thick. But one thing would certainly be different: the information-technology industry would now lack a leading light. Thanks to record sales of its recently upgraded iPhones, on October 20th Apple surprised analysts by revealing excellent quarterly results. It was almost alone among the big technology firms in doing so. Most others reporting in recent weeks seem to be in something of a funk: profits have fallen at Google as well as IBM, SAP and VM Ware. Does this mark the start of a downturn for the tech industry?