Contemporary issues in marketing-Apple Inc Essay

Contemporary issues in marketing-Apple Inc - Essay Example The intention of this study is Apple Inc, previously known as Apple Computer, Inc., as a multinational corporation based in United States of America. It designs, manufactures as well as markets wide range of electronics and computer products or hardware as well as various computer software. It was established in 1976 in Cupertino, California, by Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, and Ronald Wayne, although Wayne got dissociated from the company the next year itself. The first product they sold was Apple I personal computer kit, which was actually a motherboard of a computer, and included a CPU, RAM and some video related chips. It was hand-built by Steve Wozniak, and included only the basic components of the today’s computer. After functioning for 30 years as Apple Computer, Inc. it became Apple Inc in 2007, as the company focused on the consumer electronics sectors like Cellphones, in addition to its traditional area of computers. As mentioned above, Apple Inc. started off with compu ters particularly its Macintosh line of computers. From that start, Apple Inc. is now offering wide range of products and that includes Computers, the iPod (both audio and video features), the iPhone and iPad. Other than these hardware products, Apple Inc. also offers software applications like Mac OS X, an operating system for its line of computers, iOS, a operating system for the mobiles, iTunes online store as well as media browser; the iLife a multimedia tool, wide range of apps or applications for iPhones and iPads. Market segmentation The market segments of Apple Inc. does get restricted to particular territories, it sells its products through the world, thus catering to various geographical market categories. However, with the prices of its products mainly in the upper ranges, it does not sell its products maximally in low-cost markets. Although, it sells its products in low Cost markets like least developed and developing countries in Asia, Africa and South America, it does not cover all markets, and sells only minimally. When one views market demographically, as mentioned above, people from different age-groups, different sex, etc. buy its products. The customers of Apple Inc. include people from various sections of the population or various market segments, who want to buy electronics hardware as well as software for their day-to day living, entertainment and also for their professional work as well. As Apple Inc. offers range of day-to-day used products, particularly mobile phones, it is being used by customers of all ages, who want a Smart phone to fulfill their professional commitments as well as entertainment quotient. On the same lines, iPad is being bought by customers who want portable computing for the above mentioned purposes. iPod on the other hand are bought by the customers, particularly in the age segment of 15-35, mainly for entertainment. Along with these, Apple’s other products and softwares are also used by â€Å"professional content creators like authors, musicians, artists, filmmakers who want tools that free them to focus on their art, not the technology† (Chazin 2007). As Apple Inc. offers products constituting different product market categories, its competitors include various companies and products. When one focuses worldwide, the competitors of Apple Inc. in the Personal computer segment are Dell, HP, etc, in Operating systems, it is Microsoft Windows, in mobile phones, it