Horizontal Merger: Apple set to merge with Microsoft
As a surprise element for the consumer electronic industry, tech-giants and all time rivals, Apple and Microsoft are all set to merge later this year. The merger activity is rated as the most innovative merger of the century as both Microsoft and Apple are set to offer innovative services to its customers and employees as well, with the first project being moving the employees to new spaceship like campus. In addition, Microsoft will now be able to use ‘I’ before their product name and as per market analyst, this will add tremendous value for the Microsoft products such as Surface, Lumia and Xbox. On the other hand, Microsoft Surface will now be offered as ISurface Pro 4 but with OS offered by apple rather than a Windows Operating System. Both the companies are also working towards developing a combined operating system, ‘MicrOS X v10.11Mug’ that will introduce some innovative and never-seen (or even thought) concepts to the consumers. The list includes, a help button which when pressed will order Starbucks to your location, a moustache-trimmer support, access to everyone's emails, and secretive brainwashing.
The merger can be classified as a horizontal merger as both the companies operate in the same industry and are core competitors, and even after the merger, the basic operations will remain same similar to those of the separate entities. Such types of merger takes place in the industry where there are few yet dominant market players and merger between firms will create synergies and potential gains in the market share for the merging firms by creating more efficient economies of scale.
References
Daws, R. (2015, June 25). MicroApple: Apple and Microsoft announce merger. Retrieved from http://www.developer-tech.com/news/2015/apr/01/microapple-apple-and-microsoft-announce-merger/
Horizontal Merger. (2015, June 25). Retrieved from Investopedia: http://www.investopedia.com/terms/h/horizontalmerger.asp
