SAN FRANCISCO (dpa) – It took more than 30 years, but Apple, after losing out to Microsoft at the dawn of the personal computer age, has finally scored the sweetest revenge on the obstreperous software giant from Seattle.

Powered by investor and customer enthusiasm for its range of iPods, iPhones, iPads and Macintoshes, Apple on Wednesday overtook Microsoft as the world's most valuable technology company, thanks to the persistent runup in Apple shares and the dwindling value of Microsoft stock.

Apple's total market capitalization was 227.1 billion dollars in Nasdaq trading early Wednesday afternoon, after its shares rose 1.53 percent on the day. Microsoft's shares, meanwhile, fell 1.69 percent to give the company a market capitalization of 225.58 billion dollars.

The divergence in the companies' fortunes is even more remarkable when compared to where the companies were just a decade ago. In 2000, Steve Ballmer had just taken over Microsoft from founder Bill Gates, while Apple founder Steve Jobs had just returned two years earlier to rescue the floundering company he had founded.

At the time, Microsoft was valued at a staggering 556 billion dollars, while Apple was worth just 16 billion dollars.

Since then, Apple has gained some 211 billion dollars in value, while Microsoft has lost about 325 billion dollars in market valuation.

Even the most rabid of Apple fanboys could not have predicted such an outcome when, in one of his first public strategy speeches, Jobs identified the development of digital lifestyle products as the company's key activity.

He announced that Apple was taking a 150- million-dollar investment from its old enemy Microsoft in what was widely seen as a sign of the desperate measures needed to keep the company afloat, if not total capitulation.

Microsoft, meanwhile, appeared to have an unassailable position at the top of the tech world. Not only did its Windows operating system run more than 90 per cent of the world's computers, the Internet Explorer browser held similar sway over people's access to the internet, and its Office productivity software was the standard tool of the business world.

Starting with the all-in-one iMac computer of 1998, Apple began its long march back to the top. However, the company's real salvation came not from computers but – as Jobs foretold – from a revolutionary new device that was introduced in 2001.

The iPod took advantage of consumers' ability to download music from the web, offering an easy and intuitive way to manage song libraries on a portable machine. It was followed by the launch of the iTunes online store, which soon became the top music seller in the world.

The combination was the perfect execution of Jobs' vision of tight Apple control over both software and hardware.