As of August 2014, Forbes’ Peter Cohan wrote that Apple’s market share is declining. This is a surprising fact as I feel that Apple seems to be the leader in the tech industry, similar to what Vicky Hu wrote on her blog post. Carl Icahn’s open letter to Tim Cook (CEO of Apple inc.) talks about how Apple should intensify in its stock buybacks, while assuming that the consumers with Apple products will continue to increase in sales and that consumers will continue to upgrade to newer Apple products after they bought an Apple product, i.e. upgrading to an iPhone 6 if you have an iPhone 4. I would personally say that one would be a little too optimistic to say that Apple will continue to have an increase in sales in the long run as other companies will try to innovate in order to become the ‘leader’ in the tech industry.

As an Apple customer, I would say that in order to gain advantage in the market, Apple should invest on social innovation and employee education rather than intensify in its stock buybacks in order to gain more profit. Further supporting William Lazonick’s open letter to Tim Cook, Apple should create, improve and market its shared value in order to sustain their market share.

People: I would personally say that Apple’s main advantage is its customer relationship. Apple’s employees are well-qualified and they obviously have a high knowledge of Apple products. Even though Apple already invests $5,000 for employee education, Apple should try to invest more on the education of others in the community – having Corporate Social Responsibility.

Planet: Despite Apple’s excellent marketing strategy, its environmental policy is what I think lacks in their advertisements. Since Apple believes to be more environmentally friendly through less packaging and using greener materials, they should advertise it more to the market in order to create and improve their shared value.

Profit: I believe that both by contributing to the community and the planet through more advertising about Apple’s values, they are able to create more profits rather than just using stock buybacks. I believe that they will also improve customer relationships as customers are able to believe in their values, and thus may also charge premiums for being ‘environmentally friendly,’ even though it can be argued that it would be unethical to do so.

 

Sources:

http://blogs.hbr.org/2014/10/what-apple-should-do-with-its-massive-piles-of-money/

http://carlicahn.tumblr.com/post/99561448231/sale-apple-shares-at-half-price

http://www.forbes.com/sites/petercohan/2014/08/07/can-apple-halt-its-eroding-market-share/