Microsoft Becomes World’s Most Valuable Company After Apple Rout. After briefly claiming the top spot on Monday, Microsoft shares rose 0.6

percent Tuesday, pushing the company's market value to $828.1 billion at the

close. That exceeded by more than $1 billion the value of Apple, which has

tumbled this month on concern about iPhone unit sales. The last time

Microsoft's market capitalization was bigger than Apple was in 2010, according

to data compiled by Bloomberg. A recent stock market swoon has taken a toll on

nearly all technology companies. But investors have punished consumer-focused

companies like Apple and Amazon.com Inc. more than firms that mostly cater to

businesses, like Microsoft. It's down 6.3 percent since the start of October,

while Apple has lost 23 percent. Starting more than a decade ago, Microsoft

fell behind Apple as computing shifted from desktop machines to mobile devices

like iPhones, making Microsoft's PC dominance less relevant. Attempts to

regain its footing by acquiring Nokia's handset business and releasing its own

phones led to expensive writedowns. This was particularly galling for the

Redmond, Washington-based company because it once kept Apple afloat with a

cash infusion in the 1990s. The rise of cloud computing changed Microsoft's

fortunes about five years ago. Under Chief Executive Officer Satya Nadella,

the company invested heavily in data centers and other infrastructure to run

applications and store data for corporate customers. And instead of trying to

tie Office work productivity software to its Windows operating system,

Microsoft offered it as a subscription service over the internet and on other

companies' devices -- including Apple's. It also stopped making smartphone

hardware, while boosting the quality of its tablet and PC designs. Microsoft

is now second behind Amazon Web Services in the cloud. That's insulated

Microsoft's stock from worries about declining consumer spending on devices

and increased regulation of digital advertising businesses like Facebook Inc.

and Alphabet Inc.'s Google. DM