Apple is now bigger than Microsoft
Apple surpasses Microsoft to grab the title as most valuable technology company, at least in terms of market capitalization.
Apple's market capital passed Microsoft's, puts Apple's market capital at $225.98 billion to Microsoft's $225.32 billion.
Shares of Apple are worth more than ten times their value ten years ago. Apple last had a higher market value than Microsoft in December 1989 but almost went out of business in the 1990s.
Microsoft, under arrogant Steve Ballmer's hands, said that they still make more profit than anybody else and that no other technology companies, including Apple, have managed to match them until now with 94 percent of computers being sold with a Windows OS.
That might change if the likes of Google, Apple and IBM manage to bring down Microsoft's twin cash cows, Windows and Office by convincing people to switch to cheaper web-based alternatives or using other operating systems.
Microsoft has been under pressure all month, as concerns have mounted about the health of the global economy, particularly in the Europe markets, which have taken a beating from an economic crisis in Greece and worries about stability in other countries, such as Italy and Spain.
Those worries, as well as concerns about the companies' prospects in the mobile device market in the U.S., have contributed to a sharp selloff that has pushed the shares down by more than 20% since Microsoft reported results for its third fiscal quarter on April 23.
The biggest corporation of all, however, remains oil giant Exxon Mobil at $278.64 billion. Considering that Apple was $50 billion behind Microsoft a mere two months ago, and the fourth generation iPhone is expected to release in June, and new iPods usually release in September, so the idea of Apple surpassing ExxonMobil this year is not totally out of the realm of possibilities.
