Apple Now Worth More Than Microsoft & Intel Combined

Apple, which made big news when its market cap surpassed Microsoft‘s last year, is now worth more than Microsoft and Intel combined.
MacDailyNews crunched the numbers on Friday after the market closed and found that Microsoft had a market value of $201.59 billion, while Intel’s value was $115.21 billion. Combined, the two are worth $316.8 billion, which is still less than Apple’s $317.6 billion valuation.

Of course, “Wintel” still has a commanding market share lead in desktop computers. In the fourth quarter of 2010, Apple had just 7.4% of the U.S. market for PCs, in units, according to Gartner. The vast majority of the remaining 92.6% went to Wintel PCs.

Nevertheless, Apple’s successful expansion into new categories, like smartphones and tablets, is reflected in the company’s valuation, which is based on estimates of growth, rather than current sales. Microsoft also cited the strong response to Apple’s iPad and iPad 2 as a factor in its slack consumer PC sales in the calendar first quarter.