this might be the apple killer. now that google's bank is behind motorola mobility

Motorola’s New Patent Lawsuit Against Apple: The Details | TechCrunch

FOSS Patents: Google loses leverage as Motorola Mobility confirms German patent license to Apple edit: Google's bank: how much cash do they have vs Apple's "bank"?

"Apple killer." ROFLMAO

The word "killer" is one of those words that when you see it, you know whatever it is they're talking about is probably junk. Same goes for the word "authentic" - if you have to qualify something as authentic, it's probably not. ie "Authentic Mexican food"

When I was at the West Coast Computer Faire in April '77 and we were introducing the Apple II, the competitors were saying it was a "toy" and doomed and "might make a good video monitor driver" for their serious computers. So I've listened to people predict the demise of Apple from the very beginning. Yes, it came close to happening in '85 and '97. But to predict an Apple failure today? Wow.

good article

AAPL's cash balance: 7.945 bil
GOOG's cash balance: 7.974 bil


on par with each other for sure.

AAPL cash balance is approximately $97 billion.

97B, wow. Last I heard it was 85B. I wonder where Apple would rank in the list of countries? Can't wait to see their new spaceship campus.

that was on March 19, 2012....over 100 billion now:)

One important point about Apple's announcement that it will begin to pay a 2% dividend and spend $10 billion on a share buyback...
The company's cash balance should continue to grow rapidly even while it is using this cash.
Why?
Because Apple is generating a lot more cash each year than it plans to pay out.
Apple generated about $33 billion of cash last year.
Assuming Apple continues to grow rapidly and maintain high profit margins, the way most analysts expect it will, this annual cash flow should increase. A back-of-the-envelope assumption would be cash flow of $40 billion this year, $50 billion next year, and $60 billion the following year, for a total of about $150 billion over three years.

Meanwhile, Apple says its dividend and buyback program will use up to $45 billion of cash over the next three years. This is composed of about $10+ billion a year in dividends and $10 billion in the buyback.
If Apple generates $150 billion of cash and pays out ~$45 billion in dividends and a buyback, its net cash should increase by ~$100 billion over the next three years.
So in three years Apple's cash balance could approach $200 billion, even with the dividend and buyback.
Now, Apple could obviously use some of its cash to make acquisitions or investments. And it could increase its dividend and buyback program. And its margins or growth could stumble.
But the important point is... assuming ongoing growth and no huge acquisitions, Apple's cash balance should continue to grow rapidly, even with the dividends and buyback.

Some analysts are saying Apple could accumulate that $200 billion in cash by the end of 4Q 2013.

Their cash balance hit $110B in March, but between dividends, $45 billion in (reported) purchases, data center investments and other, less visible changes, I'm seeing reports of a cash balance as low as $27 billion today. Reasonably healthy in any case.

$45 billion in purchases? Who did they or will they buy for that amount? I haven't seen any big purchases by them.

Are they going to buy Dell, shut it down and return the cash to their shareholders?

I haven't seen any purchases over several hundred million this year, so unless they are committing to huge amounts of RAM or LCD displays or other components for stockpiling (as rumored), I have no idea where that cash went. The land they've bought (TX, NC, CA) is only in the millions, AFAIK.

The big story of Apple is to prove to the MBA's of the USA that off shoring is bullcrap. Just check out any box an Apple product comes in: Designed in Cupertino, CA. This means all the developers and marketing people all are in one location. The success of Apple shows that face to face interaction of all departments makes pretty damn good products. Off shoring just cuts (perceived) cost which just fragments the critical thinking due to time zones.

The greatest strength of the US is ideas. Don't see how ideas can get anywhere with time and distance in the way. The hallway conversations can't be quantified on a finance sheet, which the bean counters don't get.

The return on investment of off shoring just means you're just sending your Intellectual Property (IP) off shore, with shady laws to protect that IP. Most executives can't think past one quarter with no regards to long term strategy. Shameful. Of course this lesson will be bypassed in hopes that reduced costs can bring a company on the path of success. (Penny wise, pound foolish.)

And Foxconn is not Apple.

IMHO

Does anyone else here think that the publicity over the Samsung vs apple stuff has actually strengthened samsungs brand image?

I don't think apple is going anywhere. Just sayin'

You don't know things work.

The model works this way: You keep enough jobs onshore to minimize profits generated in the high tax location. You build the product elsewhere and keep the profits in the low tax location.

We will never get low tech manufacturing back here. But high tech manufacturing should be here. It isn't because of the very high taxes. We can "onshore" a lot of this manufacuring if we change our taxation model to sales tax and stop taxing all forms of income.

So US tax policy incents companies to keep jobs in the US (on shore)? Interesting.

The tax strategy actually has more to do with transfer pricing. Overseas subsidiary spends $1.00 to build the widget and transfers it to the onshore company at $2.00, the onshore company sells it for $2.50 and spends $0.25 on G&A and R&D, that is $1.00 of profit offshore and $0.25 onshore. If your offshore operations are in a low tax jurisdiction, you have successfully lowered your tax bill.

The number of low tax jurisdictions where major operations can be carried out is, however, shrinking.