AAPL has succeeded in separating the high-profit areas of consumer electronics from the commodity parts. Samsung has not -- while they sell consumer electronics, the lion's share of their numbers come through commodity parts. And many of Samsung's consumer electronics (e.g., smartphones) are using commodity operating systems.
That is part of why Apple's market capitalization is far higher than Samsung's.
While I own a few shares of Apple and own Apple products I have mixed feelings about the huge profit margin on their products. And A4/A5 isn't exactly commodity parts as Samsung is the exclusive maker.
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The investment hasn't panned out -- yet. It's way to early to judge the value of the investment. All we can really report at this point is that AAPL is willing to use their accumulated cash on hand and make big bets.
Nothing is a certainty in the marketplace. Who would have bet 5 years ago that Samsung Electronics would get their lunch handed to them -- by AAPL?
I can't wait to hear the FY 2012 Q1 results later today!
No what's really amazing is Samsung at one point (per quarter or per year not sure) made more $$$ than top 9 Japanese electronics makers (including sony) combined.
Apple pays vendors to expand manufacturing capacity (which you call investment) while Samsung expands its own manufacturing (which is investment imo).
The story of how Apple makes more profit with higher market capitalization should be tempered down with what Samsung deals with.
Profit:
Samsung builds own factories, trains its workers, pays for their salary (not slave wage of course), and does most of this in S Korea. What does Apple do? Of course taking the route with LOWEST possible cost and passing on the cost to Foxconn. Now which would you prefer to see for your nation?
Market Capitalization:
Big deal is made about high market capitalization of Apple. You know a lot of that has to do with the extra media coverage. NOT a day goes by without some US newspaper/magazine/blog covering something about Apple. That drives people to look into and buy stocks of Apple. That's not bad in itself but that's a fact.
Samsung is at real disadvantage as they are not officially traded in US and it's not an American firm. But let's assume Samsung were an American company and I bet it would have just as good if not higher market capitalization compared to Apple. What company has a shipyard that builds half-billion dollar floating oil platforms? What company makes smartphones that are just as good as iPhone WHILE also making the core parts like cpu/display/ram.
Yes Apple has big profit and high market capitalization that you say Samsung can't match but look in more and it's not all what it seems.