[jeffhwang]

The similarities and differences with the 1997 MS-Apple deal are interesting. Arguably, the $150m that Microsoft invested was less significant than: (1) the vote of confidence to customers, 3rd-party developers, and investors that Apple would survive; (2) the commitment by Microsoft to continue developing/supporting MS Office and IE at a time when Apple did not have iWork equivalents or a browser like Safari yet.

Re: (2), even if there were alternatives like ClarisWorks being able to open and share MS Office documents was critical to keeping the Mac alive at that time. Plus, the web was one of the things that helped Apple survive the platform wars (i.e., proprietary document formats, two-sided markets, etc.). And whatever its imperfections, Internet Explorer was becoming the standard as Netscape lost share and this was before Mozilla, Firefox, Safari, or Chrome. the Mac needed a first-class browser and Microsoft committed to providing one for 5 years.

In contrast, while the cash, additional market for EV software, and vote of confidence is no doubt very valuable to Rivian, it would be an even more valuable if VW could provide some distribution or other advantages to get Rivian out of it's current hole.