Apple MR headset may be delayed by software problems

AppleInsider

Analyst Ming-Chi Kuo reports that Apple's Mixed Reality headset has slipped because of software development issues, and fewer than 500,000 may be made in all of 2023.

Apple MR headset render

As Kuo reports of changes in hardware development of the Apple MR headset, he's now also saying that according to his sources, there are software issues. He has no details of what they are, or their severity, but it's sufficient to mean that shipping of the headset may be delayed.

(6/8)
My latest survey indicates that the mass shipment schedule of Apple's MR headset may delay to 2H23 because of software-related issues (vs. the previous estimate of 2Q23).

-- (Ming-Chi Kuo) (@mingchikuo)

December 4, 2022

In a thread on Twitter, Kuo says that he still expects components to be produced in the first half of 2023, most likely the second quarter. But where the industry expected Apple to ship between 800,000 and 1.2 million headsets in 2023, it will "likely be less than 500k units."

Kuo says that it's not known yet whether Apple intends to postpone its public announcement of the headset. "It still needs to be determined whether the media event schedule (previously estimated in January 2023) will also delay," he writes, "but usually, if the time frame between the media event and end product mass shipment is too long, it's detrimental to promotion and sales."

Read on AppleInsider

xed

I love how an unannounced product can be "delayed". 

rogue01

What about the problem with no one wanting them?  With inflation and a looming recession and most living paycheck to paycheck, people have much higher priorities than wasting $3,000 on a pair of Apple goggles that probably won't do much.  Apple thought the iPhone 14 Plus was a such a great idea, and look how bad that turned out.  Apple severely cut back on production because no one wants it.

edited February 2023

xed

Rogue01 said:

What about the problem with no one wanting them?  With inflation and a looming recession and most living paycheck to paycheck, people have much higher priorities than wasting $3,000 on a pair of Apple goggles that probably won't do much.  Apple thought the iPhone 14 Plus was a such a great idea, and look how bad that turned out.  Apple severely cut back on production because no one wants it.

The same can be said for $3,000 Macs and $1,000 iPhones but people still buy them because 1) they want them and 2) they can finance them (often at 0% interest).

None of us needs a Mac, iPhone, or iPad, but if we feel their utility warrants the price so we get them. If Apple can show that their mixed-reality headset is worth owning then people will buy them. Personally, I neither want nor don't want to get Apple's headset. I'll first have to get a feel for the experience before I make a decision on cost v utility. It's like only ever having experienced a Blackberry or Windows tablet to claim that the iPhone and iPad would be crap copy-cat devices that "no one wants".

How about we let companies actually announce a product before we weigh on on whether we like it or not? Crazy, right?

thedba

AppleInsider said:

Analyst Ming-Chi Kuo reports that Apple's Mixed Reality headset has slipped because of software development issues, and fewer than 500,000 may be made in all of 2023.

As Kuo reports of changes in hardware development of the Apple MR headset, he's now also saying that according to his sources, there are software issues. He has no details of what they are, or their severity, but it's sufficient to mean that shipping of the headset may be delayed.

In a thread on Twitter, Kuo says that he still expects components to be produced in the first half of 2023, most likely the second quarter. But where the industry expected Apple to ship between 800,000 and 1.2 million headsets in 2023, it will "likely be less than 500k units."

Read on AppleInsider

I boldfaced the key parts of his argument.

The first part of his prediction is anywhere between 0 and 499,999. So if they don’t ship, then he’s right.
Second part, software issues but he has no idea what. Should we put our money on that?
Third part, which industry?  The only one that matters here is, Apple. Unless they announce something that should be available by some specified date, it doesn’t matter what outsiders “industry experts” claim.

Wasn’t that same industry talking about an Apple car, until they stopped talking about it?

strangedays

Rogue01 said:

What about the problem with no one wanting them?  With inflation and a looming recession and most living paycheck to paycheck, people have much higher priorities than wasting $3,000 on a pair of Apple goggles that probably won't do much.  Apple thought the iPhone 14 Plus was a such a great idea, and look how bad that turned out.  Apple severely cut back on production because no one wants it.

So much rubbish in just one paragraph! Well done! 

How long have you been embedded on the team? Surely a long while since you know the capabilities and pricing of this unannounced product. Do share with us!

daalseth

StrangeDays said:

Rogue01 said:

What about the problem with no one wanting them?  With inflation and a looming recession and most living paycheck to paycheck, people have much higher priorities than wasting $3,000 on a pair of Apple goggles that probably won't do much.  Apple thought the iPhone 14 Plus was a such a great idea, and look how bad that turned out.  Apple severely cut back on production because no one wants it.

So much rubbish in just one paragraph! Well done! 

How long have you been embedded on the team? Surely a long while since you know the capabilities and pricing of this unannounced product. Do share with us!

I disagree. @Rogue01 raises some good points. Rev one products are historically very limited in function. Ex; AppleWatch and iPhone. Plus this is a totally new market. Most people don’t know why they would need one.  Then, there is very little software out there for AR anything, let alone optimized for Apple’s new device. The $3k figure has been reported on a number of sites and sources, though usually as $2k-$3k. Plus yes the economy is shaky and a lot of people are struggling. They are putting off purchases of stuff they know they need until things turn the corner. I know I have been talking about two new Macs, and one AppleWatch, but all of that has been put off. We’re going to keep the old things running, even with their faults for at least another six months, maybe a year. I have talked to a lot of people in the same boat that are putting off computers, cars, appliances, and more until the economy is a bit more secure. So a multi thousand dollar device with limited functionality, and no track record is going to be a hard sell. The well to do Apple fanbase, which I would have counted myself among even a few years ago, might jump in early, but the rest of the market is likely to hold off to see what the H these things are good for, and how they develop. 

y2an

Why would Apple release an MR headset? Is it for media consumption (and game companies are Apple-sceptics) or for developers? I’m more inclined to think this will be aimed at the WWDC audience meaning numbers would be low and the price high to discourage consumers. When worthy applications start to appear, the price will fall. In parallel, Apple still has to work a lot harder on making their SoC’s game-ready.

genovelle

Xed said:

I love how an unannounced product can be "delayed". 

Apple Is the only company on earth that is possible for.  

fastasleep

Rogue01 said:

What about the problem with no one wanting them?  With inflation and a looming recession and most living paycheck to paycheck, people have much higher priorities than wasting $3,000 on a pair of Apple goggles that probably won't do much.  Apple thought the iPhone 14 Plus was a such a great idea, and look how bad that turned out.  Apple severely cut back on production because no one wants it.

LOL of course nobody wants an unannounced product. Everything else here is based on nothing at all. 

fastasleep

DAalseth said:

StrangeDays said:

Rogue01 said:

What about the problem with no one wanting them?  With inflation and a looming recession and most living paycheck to paycheck, people have much higher priorities than wasting $3,000 on a pair of Apple goggles that probably won't do much.  Apple thought the iPhone 14 Plus was a such a great idea, and look how bad that turned out.  Apple severely cut back on production because no one wants it.

So much rubbish in just one paragraph! Well done! 

How long have you been embedded on the team? Surely a long while since you know the capabilities and pricing of this unannounced product. Do share with us!

I disagree. @Rogue01 raises some good points. Rev one products are historically very limited in function. Ex; AppleWatch and iPhone. Plus this is a totally new market. Most people don’t know why they would need one.  Then, there is very little software out there for AR anything, let alone optimized for Apple’s new device. The $3k figure has been reported on a number of sites and sources, though usually as $2k-$3k. Plus yes the economy is shaky and a lot of people are struggling. They are putting off purchases of stuff they know they need until things turn the corner. I know I have been talking about two new Macs, and one AppleWatch, but all of that has been put off. We’re going to keep the old things running, even with their faults for at least another six months, maybe a year. I have talked to a lot of people in the same boat that are putting off computers, cars, appliances, and more until the economy is a bit more secure. So a multi thousand dollar device with limited functionality, and no track record is going to be a hard sell. The well to do Apple fanbase, which I would have counted myself among even a few years ago, might jump in early, but the rest of the market is likely to hold off to see what the H these things are good for, and how they develop. 

You’re just doubling down on the chicken/egg problem. They’ll show us why we want one. The software will come once developers can get on board. This is literally how every Apple product line rolls out.

Also you both sound like you’ve never used VR before. 

anantksundaram

AR/VR is a solution in search of a problem. I have little doubt Apple will pull this like they did the (rumored) car. 

If Apple had only spent a fraction (on the utterly, embarrassingly useless Siri) of their R&D  budget to achieve what OpenAI did with GPT-3, the world would have been better off.

OTOH, if they did and have nothing to show for it, it’s time to seriously downsize. 

daalseth

fastasleep said:

DAalseth said:

StrangeDays said:

Rogue01 said:

What about the problem with no one wanting them?  With inflation and a looming recession and most living paycheck to paycheck, people have much higher priorities than wasting $3,000 on a pair of Apple goggles that probably won't do much.  Apple thought the iPhone 14 Plus was a such a great idea, and look how bad that turned out.  Apple severely cut back on production because no one wants it.

So much rubbish in just one paragraph! Well done! 

How long have you been embedded on the team? Surely a long while since you know the capabilities and pricing of this unannounced product. Do share with us!

I disagree. @Rogue01 raises some good points. Rev one products are historically very limited in function. Ex; AppleWatch and iPhone. Plus this is a totally new market. Most people don’t know why they would need one.  Then, there is very little software out there for AR anything, let alone optimized for Apple’s new device. The $3k figure has been reported on a number of sites and sources, though usually as $2k-$3k. Plus yes the economy is shaky and a lot of people are struggling. They are putting off purchases of stuff they know they need until things turn the corner. I know I have been talking about two new Macs, and one AppleWatch, but all of that has been put off. We’re going to keep the old things running, even with their faults for at least another six months, maybe a year. I have talked to a lot of people in the same boat that are putting off computers, cars, appliances, and more until the economy is a bit more secure. So a multi thousand dollar device with limited functionality, and no track record is going to be a hard sell. The well to do Apple fanbase, which I would have counted myself among even a few years ago, might jump in early, but the rest of the market is likely to hold off to see what the H these things are good for, and how they develop. 

You’re just doubling down on the chicken/egg problem. They’ll show us why we want one. The software will come once developers can get on board. This is literally how every Apple product line rolls out.

Also you both sound like you’ve never used VR before. 

Before the iPhone, there were phones, Apple just made a much better one. The same is true of the Apple Watch, iPod, and iPad. There was a use case for one. People could pick up pretty quickly what it was for.  You could do things with them out of the box. @Xed mentioned on up the thread that people buy $3k Macs all the time and that’s true. You can take one home and within an hour be doing something with it. There are literally thousands of software packages available. There are thousands of things, both productive and for fun, that you can do with it. None of that will be true with an Apple VR headset.  They might have a few apps for it but what most customers use, Music,Mail, various productivity and art apps, this would not only not have them, it would be a terrible way to try to. You ask a hundred people what an AR visor is for or if they would buy one and most will stare at you blankly. Most won’t even know what it us, or what it does. That makes it massively more difficult to sell. If they target gaming, they better have a suite of AAA titles that roll out on day one. Otherwise the copycats will jump in, be compatible with PC games and be over the horizon before Apple gets going.

 Whether I’ve used a VR headset, which I have on a few occasions, the case still is that I don’t see any use case for me or to be honest the vast majority of people. I do not see this being a consumer product that will sell millions.

Now I may be wrong. Apple might roll this thing out with some incredible purpose that makes it a must have for everyone. But I’m fairly well plugged into both the Apple universe, and what’s being developed, theorized, or suggested, in the tech world and you know what? I don’t see anything like that on the horizon. Like the “Metaverse’, it’s just been hand waving and marketing hype. 

anantksundaram said:

AR/VR is a solution in search of a problem. 

For the consumer world this is, in a nutshell, the case. It’s cool tech, and in various industries would be huge. For consumers though, it would be a hard sell until it has a purpose.

anantksundaram

anantksundaram said:

AR/VR is a solution in search of a problem. 

For the consumer world this is, in a nutshell, the case. It’s cool tech, and in various industries would be huge. For consumers though, it would be a hard sell until it has a purpose.

Last I looked, both Apple’s and Meta’s VR products are (primarily) consumer facing. 

Not ruling out non-consumer (and lots of specialized) use cases, but at the moment those are not the business model.  

fastasleep

DAalseth said:

fastasleep said:

DAalseth said:

StrangeDays said:

Rogue01 said:

What about the problem with no one wanting them?  With inflation and a looming recession and most living paycheck to paycheck, people have much higher priorities than wasting $3,000 on a pair of Apple goggles that probably won't do much.  Apple thought the iPhone 14 Plus was a such a great idea, and look how bad that turned out.  Apple severely cut back on production because no one wants it.

So much rubbish in just one paragraph! Well done! 

How long have you been embedded on the team? Surely a long while since you know the capabilities and pricing of this unannounced product. Do share with us!

I disagree. @Rogue01 raises some good points. Rev one products are historically very limited in function. Ex; AppleWatch and iPhone. Plus this is a totally new market. Most people don’t know why they would need one.  Then, there is very little software out there for AR anything, let alone optimized for Apple’s new device. The $3k figure has been reported on a number of sites and sources, though usually as $2k-$3k. Plus yes the economy is shaky and a lot of people are struggling. They are putting off purchases of stuff they know they need until things turn the corner. I know I have been talking about two new Macs, and one AppleWatch, but all of that has been put off. We’re going to keep the old things running, even with their faults for at least another six months, maybe a year. I have talked to a lot of people in the same boat that are putting off computers, cars, appliances, and more until the economy is a bit more secure. So a multi thousand dollar device with limited functionality, and no track record is going to be a hard sell. The well to do Apple fanbase, which I would have counted myself among even a few years ago, might jump in early, but the rest of the market is likely to hold off to see what the H these things are good for, and how they develop. 

You’re just doubling down on the chicken/egg problem. They’ll show us why we want one. The software will come once developers can get on board. This is literally how every Apple product line rolls out.

Also you both sound like you’ve never used VR before. 

Before the iPhone, there were phones, Apple just made a much better one. The same is true of the Apple Watch, iPod, and iPad. There was a use case for one. People could pick up pretty quickly what it was for.  You could do things with them out of the box. @Xed mentioned on up the thread that people buy $3k Macs all the time and that’s true. You can take one home and within an hour be doing something with it. There are literally thousands of software packages available. There are thousands of things, both productive and for fun, that you can do with it. None of that will be true with an Apple VR headset.  They might have a few apps for it but what most customers use, Music,Mail, various productivity and art apps, this would not only not have them, it would be a terrible way to try to. You ask a hundred people what an AR visor is for or if they would buy one and most will stare at you blankly. Most won’t even know what it us, or what it does. That makes it massively more difficult to sell. If they target gaming, they better have a suite of AAA titles that roll out on day one. Otherwise the copycats will jump in, be compatible with PC games and be over the horizon before Apple gets going.

 Whether I’ve used a VR headset, which I have on a few occasions, the case still is that I don’t see any use case for me or to be honest the vast majority of people. I do not see this being a consumer product that will sell millions.

Now I may be wrong. Apple might roll this thing out with some incredible purpose that makes it a must have for everyone. But I’m fairly well plugged into both the Apple universe, and what’s being developed, theorized, or suggested, in the tech world and you know what? I don’t see anything like that on the horizon. Like the “Metaverse’, it’s just been hand waving and marketing hype. 

anantksundaram said:

AR/VR is a solution in search of a problem. 

For the consumer world this is, in a nutshell, the case. It’s cool tech, and in various industries would be huge. For consumers though, it would be a hard sell until it has a purpose.

You sure are making a lot of assumptions about what capabilities this platform will launch with (or rather the lack thereof) and how quickly other software and use cases will be developed for it. Chicken/egg again.

avon b7

Xed said:

I love how an unannounced product can be "delayed". 

If the subject matter itself is pure speculation, it is entirely possible for anything mentioned through it to be delayed. 

I see your point but if we are talking about rumours, by definition, anything is possible. 

avon b7

fastasleep said:

DAalseth said:

fastasleep said:

DAalseth said:

StrangeDays said:

Rogue01 said:

What about the problem with no one wanting them?  With inflation and a looming recession and most living paycheck to paycheck, people have much higher priorities than wasting $3,000 on a pair of Apple goggles that probably won't do much.  Apple thought the iPhone 14 Plus was a such a great idea, and look how bad that turned out.  Apple severely cut back on production because no one wants it.

So much rubbish in just one paragraph! Well done! 

How long have you been embedded on the team? Surely a long while since you know the capabilities and pricing of this unannounced product. Do share with us!

I disagree. @Rogue01 raises some good points. Rev one products are historically very limited in function. Ex; AppleWatch and iPhone. Plus this is a totally new market. Most people don’t know why they would need one.  Then, there is very little software out there for AR anything, let alone optimized for Apple’s new device. The $3k figure has been reported on a number of sites and sources, though usually as $2k-$3k. Plus yes the economy is shaky and a lot of people are struggling. They are putting off purchases of stuff they know they need until things turn the corner. I know I have been talking about two new Macs, and one AppleWatch, but all of that has been put off. We’re going to keep the old things running, even with their faults for at least another six months, maybe a year. I have talked to a lot of people in the same boat that are putting off computers, cars, appliances, and more until the economy is a bit more secure. So a multi thousand dollar device with limited functionality, and no track record is going to be a hard sell. The well to do Apple fanbase, which I would have counted myself among even a few years ago, might jump in early, but the rest of the market is likely to hold off to see what the H these things are good for, and how they develop. 

You’re just doubling down on the chicken/egg problem. They’ll show us why we want one. The software will come once developers can get on board. This is literally how every Apple product line rolls out.

Also you both sound like you’ve never used VR before. 

Before the iPhone, there were phones, Apple just made a much better one. The same is true of the Apple Watch, iPod, and iPad. There was a use case for one. People could pick up pretty quickly what it was for.  You could do things with them out of the box. @Xed mentioned on up the thread that people buy $3k Macs all the time and that’s true. You can take one home and within an hour be doing something with it. There are literally thousands of software packages available. There are thousands of things, both productive and for fun, that you can do with it. None of that will be true with an Apple VR headset.  They might have a few apps for it but what most customers use, Music,Mail, various productivity and art apps, this would not only not have them, it would be a terrible way to try to. You ask a hundred people what an AR visor is for or if they would buy one and most will stare at you blankly. Most won’t even know what it us, or what it does. That makes it massively more difficult to sell. If they target gaming, they better have a suite of AAA titles that roll out on day one. Otherwise the copycats will jump in, be compatible with PC games and be over the horizon before Apple gets going.

 Whether I’ve used a VR headset, which I have on a few occasions, the case still is that I don’t see any use case for me or to be honest the vast majority of people. I do not see this being a consumer product that will sell millions.

Now I may be wrong. Apple might roll this thing out with some incredible purpose that makes it a must have for everyone. But I’m fairly well plugged into both the Apple universe, and what’s being developed, theorized, or suggested, in the tech world and you know what? I don’t see anything like that on the horizon. Like the “Metaverse’, it’s just been hand waving and marketing hype. 

anantksundaram said:

AR/VR is a solution in search of a problem. 

For the consumer world this is, in a nutshell, the case. It’s cool tech, and in various industries would be huge. For consumers though, it would be a hard sell until it has a purpose.

You sure are making a lot of assumptions about what capabilities this platform will launch with (or rather the lack thereof) and how quickly other software and use cases will be developed for it. Chicken/egg again.

If we are talking about mixed reality we already know the core capabilities. 

The problem is that AR depends on content and also keeping that content updated. VR is more akin to the established models of platform, application, user (domestic or industrial). 

Throwing it all into one headset (XR) is more challenging. Google and Meta have the data. Apple less so. Then that data has to move up and down the pipe. That is ICT and local (WiFi /CPE) infrastructure. Then there is the question of processing and there are not many options here. Cloud, Edge, secondary device or on device (or a mix). Then the hardware itself. Again, few options. Glasses, headset or mix of both.

I don't know how far contact lenses with integrated electronics have come but I'd rule that out at the moment. 

With all that in mind, we know what the core form factor will probably be and we know the tradeoffs on the hardware side (battery, charging, resolution and compute etc).

The big question will be the user experience but content and content quality will dictate that. 

A good analogy would be Apple Maps when it launched. It didn't matter how sleek your interface was, the quality of animations, the power of your vehicle tracking etc because if the content wasn't there (or was plain wrong) you had no compelling reason to use it. The advantage of Maps though was that you didn't need to buy a dedicated device to use it. Maps essentially removed the need for a dedicated device. 

That takes on a whole new meaning if you need to purchase a device just for the privilege. 

With all that in mind, my guess is a limited roll out (probably the US) and basic functionality that is improved over time. Not dissimilar to how Siri was introduced although Siri seems to have not improved much over the years and many put that down to not having enough core data to feed off. 

In terms of product goals it could go anywhere. A competively priced, scaled back device to gain market traction and stimulate content creation or a high end, expensive 'hobby' experience for early adopters.

In functionality terms though we know what to expect to a large degree. It's what we already have or has been announced by various players.

I'd prefer open standards as far as possible.