Dawn of the Planet of the Apple

Imagine the world’s most valuable company by share capitalization, sitting atop an Everest of cash, and thinking about entering a new market. Imagine also that this company was thinking of entering the telecommunications market, and that its plan was to create a platform that would force operators to constantly renegotiate their rates in favor of customers, and that those customers were represented by said company

Imagine if this company’s CEO had publicly promised not to sell its clients’ information to other companies, and that it wasn’t going to bombard them with advertising or promotions, and would instead convince them to buy its products on the basis of their quality and usefulness. In turn, this promise had convinced many customers to work with the company, and that as a result, this company decided not just to enter the telecommunications market, but to go much, much further. Imagine that it had decided to enter the payment market, and that on the back of this, it was going into banking itself. The company would provide its customers with a payment system that would effectively turn banks into mere commodities, and that after a few trial runs, it would offer many businesses the possibility to charge for their products through its payment system, managed through its own devices.

Now imagine that this was so successful that many people simply decided to deposit their money with the company rather than in a bank, and that what had started out a no more than a way to buy music and other entertainment ended up as the biggest bank in the world.

Meanwhile, the company had also decided to enter the music business: following a bumpy start, the best musicians and bands in the world would sign up to the company, using it to launch their work, using it to distribute their music through its various channels, in the process earning much more money than they had been able to do via the traditional labels.

Now think what would happen if the same users of the company’s services were so pleased with the way it worked that they agreed to wear its smartwatches to measure their health parameters, and allow the company to store this information, or even use other devices that connected to this company’s, so that when they had health problems they could share this information with their doctor or hospital.

Can you imagine all this? Don’t worry: they’re just the idle ramblings of an analyst with nothing better to do on a Sunday morning…

(En español, aquí)