Features - QOTW: Which tech company do you admire the most?

[The Hand]

Microsoft.. for learning from past mistakes and producing some good stuff like Windows 7 and producing the Windows Phone platform, which simply suffers from being the "last to market" syndrome. I haven't used Windows 8 too much extent yet, so cannot judge it fairly at the moment. XBox 360 is another example of a platform being made to work after a disappointing entry into the console market back in 2001.

Nokia.. for turning things around from an apparent death spiral.. well done Elop! I just wish I had bought some shares back in July 2012! With entry level phones like Lumia 520 and 620 coming, Nokia and the Windows Phone plaform are bound to make market gains.

ARM.. an awesome business model that stands the test of time, even though the share price seems insanely high even with the huge demand from emerging markets.

IBM.. another company that just keeps going through forward thinking management and good decisions.

AMD.. are worth mentioning simply for producing APUs which are a great for a value based systems, which will sell by the bucket load compare to their FX range.

HTC.. for hanging in there and producing some very nice Windows Phones and am looking forward to seeing their Windows tablets in Q3.

Erm.. Thats about it for the moment!

[shaithis]

VMWare for pioneering virtualisation.

My job would be terrible without it.

AMD and Intel for duking it out for a lot of years....my first PC build had an Intel-clone-amd-made 386DX40 in it when Intel only made a 33MHz version.

And lastly Microsoft for their outright audacity in making so much money selling broken products en mass.

[Moby-Dick]

VMWare for pioneering virtualisation.

I think you'd have to qualify that by adding x86 in. IBM had the concept of a virtual machine back in the 60's

Its like Saying Apple Pioneered Solid state music players.

[Sumarongi]

IBM is without a doubt the most important computer company of all time. Without them we would be lacking a LOT of basic research which translates to better products for everyone from all of the other tech companies.

[luigipogi1234]

AMD for me is the best.. giving me a good performance with my computer combining with my 7870

[Temperment]

I just want to cast my vote.

AMD and Nvidia. They beat each other up in the GPU market but put everything aside to go build supercomputers for various research institutions.