What Apple has is its brand — and customer loyalty to that brand. It sustains them, but it only lasts one innovation cycle at a time. An extinction event always comes at the end of that innovation cycle and they have to rebuild and re-grow the user base again.
There is a core user base that buys Apple’s products over and over again, but this base is not enough to keep the company’s businesses afloat and growing given the commoditization effect that impacts the industry as a whole.
