# The IPO Time Machine: Why Apple Crushed Nike Despite Starting Behind

Nike and Apple went public around December 1980, and the 45-year story of these two giants is nothing short of a textbook-level turnaround.

**The First 40 Years: Nike Completely Dominated**
In the 8 years leading up to its IPO, Nike experienced an average annual growth of 85%, and its net profit doubled. In 1982, The New York Times even remarked that Nike "has become so big that one wonders whether its golden period has passed." During the same period, Apple was being beaten badly by IBM—its PC market was drowned by Windows-compatible machines, and by 1997, its market share had fallen to 3.1%, nearly leading to bankruptcy.

In that year, Nike's Q4 net profit was $158 million, while Apple earned only 1/3 of that figure for the entire year.

**Reversal occurs in the last 5 years**
Steve Jobs returned in 1997, cutting off bad projects, launching the iPod, releasing the iPhone... a series of actions that directly changed the rules of the game.

**Data Speaks**:
- Nike IPO price $0.18 → current price up 35,550%, $1000 turns into $356,500
- Apple IPO price $0.10 → Current price increase 272,310%, $1000 becomes $2,724,100

Key differences: Nike started paying dividends in 2001, while Apple didn't start until 2012. But in the past year, Apple paid out $15.52 billion in dividends vs. Nike's $2.17 billion—the difference in scale is like heaven and earth.

One is a sports empire built on clothing, and the other is a tech giant that has changed the way humans live. History always likes to play tricks on people.