Launched at the same time 45 years ago, how did the gap become so large?

In December 1980, Nike and Apple went public within 10 days of each other. Interestingly, for the first 40 years, Nike completely outperformed Apple, but in the last 5 years, the situation has reversed dramatically.

Data Comparison: If $1,000 was invested by each in 1980 -

• Nike is now worth about $356,000 (an increase of 35550%)
• Apple is now worth approximately $2.72 million (an increase of 272310%)

Isn't the gap big?

Why? In the early years, Nike experienced aggressive growth, with a revenue increase of 85% and net profit doubling, directly suppressing Apple. At that time, Apple was being beaten by IBM, and its market share once fell to 3.1%, nearly facing bankruptcy.

The key turning point was in 1997—Steve Jobs returned and cut the product line, the iPod sold 100 million units right after its release in 2001, and the iPhone rewritten history. Moreover, this time Apple played even tougher: starting in 2012, it began paying dividends, growing 174% every year; last year, it paid out $15.2 billion in dividends compared to Nike's $2.17 billion.

A detail: In Q4 1997, Nike's net profit was 158 million, while Apple's annual profit was less than a third of that. If you had bought Nike back then, you wouldn't have made as much as buying Apple. The tech space is just that brutal.