with the economy the way it is, i think a lot of these companies are gonna have to start focusing on their own business models. google is competing very hard both on the marketing and product innovation front and is snatching away market share from the others and will continue to do so because of this. google offers significantly cheaper prices on their products compared to microsoft (the quality of google offerings is up for discussion). they are well positioned to compete with the telcos as well, with products such as grandcentral and android. they are even spurring up competition in the entertainment biz with youtube. yes, it is true that the big companies are not willing to partner with them, but the underdogs are lining up to work with google.

with the moderate size force of lawyers (compared to the competitors) that google has acquired over the years, and the amount of legal information they have learned from all these legal dealings, i have no doubt in my mind that google is fully prepared to take on the big dogs.

keep in mind that google is a very efficient company and has a lot of cash. as many venture capitalists know, cash is very important in making your ideas work.