And while Big Blue has a raft of inventions to its credit, the disk drive among them, Apple has made its name as the early adopter of other peoples technology (e.g. Xerox's mouse, tablets).
OK, so it easy to sneer. But Microsoft overtook IBM in exactly the same way, by taking someone else's invention (DOS) that IBM had not seen the potential of and the rest is history.
Little wonder that IBM has a dinosaur image, being outmanouevred by those pesky little mammals.
And first Microsoft, then Apple, have found that when you become the biggest kid on the block, suddenly everyone wants to take you down. You are now the Establishment.
I think one lesson is that big corporates often have so many irons in the fire, they don't always realize when to pull them out.
The other is that great marketing will beat great technology any day. Both Microsoft and Apple saw a market, and made the right moves.
Microsoft's strategy has always been to get new technology out quickly, even with a few bugs, cheaply, and let the early adopters spread the word. Apple's products must above all look cool, and be easy to operate.
That's one thing Apple have always had a knack for - seeing where the market is going, and getting there first. Ipod, Iphone, Ipad - they're all the same - no new technology, just a very well engineered combination of technologies to deliver new levels of functionality.
And it is clear that that's all it takes, folks.
