At the beginning of its release, things were looking good for Netscape. Its initial stock offering was $28 per share, which soon skyrocketed to almost $3 billion. However, this successful start may have blinded the company from any upcoming competition. At the same time of its release, Microsoft was preparing to release a similar product, Windows 95, which included the famous web browser we know today-Internet Explorer, version 1.0.
Once Microsoft released its first version of Internet Explorer, they were only more determined to defeat Netscape and therefore kept coming out with new versions. In fact, by the time version 3.0 was released, Microsoft had succeeded in matching Netscape feature for feature, increasing the threat towards Netscape. Netscape in its haste attempted to come out with more versions, including more features. However, by this point, their competitor had already attracted an audience and eventually took the win over Netscape for good.
Later, AOL, an American web portal and computer service provider marketed by the brand Verizon Media, recognized Netscape's struggle which led them to buy the company for $4.2 billion in 1998. However, by this point, Netscape was already long gone, though AOL had not yet come to this realization. Microsoft was already abusing monopolistic power, and people had forgotten about Netscape.
Though Netscape did not last long, it did bring much innovation and added much value to the tech industry, and it lasted longer than it would have when AOL acquired it. For one, the creation of the Mozilla Organization by Netscape gave birth to Firefox which was a success, and it laid a foundation for innovation in technology and online web browsers.
The "innovation" mentioned in this post that was brought about by the founding of Netscape can be seen in the huge strides in Internet standardization set by the World Wide Web Consortium. For example, the use of Uniform Resource Locators (URLs) was popularized by Netscape, which was made into an internet standard. The navigation menu, forward and backward buttons are also features in Netscape which have been made into standards for browsers. Now, Mozilla, a creation of Netscape, became a lead organization for internet standardization through the MDN Web Docs.
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