Yes, and one time they had to be bailed out by Microsoft to stay in business.
They also don’t have Jobs now.
Sigh. No, Apple was NOT bailed out by Microsoft. For the six hundredth and third time. Microsoft paid Apple to settle a LAWSUIT which Microsoft was losing big time. Apple won this round big time. At the time Microsoft bought $150,000,000 in non-voting preferred FIVE YEAR RESTRICTED stock in Apple Computer, Apple had over $2 Billion in cash and other liquid assets. Apple had already booked three quarters of profits after having only two quarters of losses, and had just BOUGHT NeXT from Steve Jobs for $450 Billion and were still able to show a profitable quarter. In addition to buying the stock, Microsoft also assigned to Apple the right to use ALL of Microsoft's intellectual property at no licensing cost or royalties for the lifetime of the copyrights and patents, agreed to re-activate the Microsoft Office for Mac program and continue development, sales, and support for the five years of the settlement agreement, and agreed to license from Apple the in-suit patents and copyrights for a period of five years for undisclosed license fees and royalties with future royalties and fees after the five year period of the agreement to be negotiated after the close of the agreement.
For Apple's side of the agreement, Apple would issue the stock, agreeing to drop all past disputes with Microsoft, including the patent and copyright infringement in-suit, licensing to Microsoft said in-suit patents and copyrights for a period of five years for an undisclosed licensing and royalty fees, agree to include Microsoft Internet Explorer with all Macintosh Computers and MacOS shipments for a period of five years. All agreements hinged on the purchase by Microsoft of the RESTRICTED non-voting preferred stock. . . for which Microsoft got no control of what Apple did with the money.
Had this been a "bail-out," Microsoft would have gotten voting shares AND at least one or two seats on Apple's Board of Directors, none of which happened. But, as outlined above, it was not a bail-out, but rather a settlement of a long-running patent infringement lawsuit which the trying judge had told Microsoft they were most likely going to lose given the smoking gun evidence of an Apple engineer's Social Security Number and Mother's Maiden Name along with other hidden markers being imbedded inside Microsoft's supposed "Microsoft Windows Media Player" software that was accused of infringing Apple's QuickTime software code. . . which it did indeed contain un-modified and did indeed infringe.
Forensic accounting auditors estimate that over the life of the five year agreement, Microsoft paid out over $2 Billion to Apple to settle this lawsuit.
It was not a bail-out by any stretch of anyone's imagination. These are the facts. The three interlocking agreements outlining this settlement were unsealed by the court ten years after they were signed and approved by the court of record and are available on Lexus-Nexus for any subscriber to read. They outline exactly what I summarized above. . . but none of it would occur until Microsoft delivered the certified check to purchase the preferred stock. That was a bone Steve Jobs tossed to Microsoft to make the deal palatable. . . it cost Apple nothing to issue a piece of paper and did not even dilute the common stock shares, being preferred stock. It was restricted for five years so Microsoft could not even sell the shares until the end of the agreement to assure their compliance with the rest of the agreements. It was a cheap deal for Microsoft. . . as the judge indicated the economic damages of an award judgement against MS should the case go to trial could reach as high as $5-6 BILLION. Microsoft deemed settlement the best way to go, especially with the US Department of Justice investigating just such infringement shenanigans as part of its Anti-Trust investigation at the time. They wanted the whole thing to just go away. Steve Jobs offered them a way for this lawsuit to do just that for the benefit of both companies.
These are the facts, not the false bail-out myth.