My cousin-in-law is a project manager for a major "IT solutions implementer" in Australia. He lives and breathes Windows and HP, Dell, IBM. One of my relatives is in London doing IT contracting systems admin for Unix and Linux, running of Sun and other servers. For the banking industry in UK.
For desktop/server mid-large-enterprise Macs have a foot in the door and growth potential for the edu & corporate market. But not the mainstream stuff - not the majority. Not a goal of Apple, Inc. at the moment.
With Office 2000/2003/2007, various other MS Apps brought out, VisualBasic and .NET stuff, a ton of customised programming for a lot of mid-large-enterprise systems, it is a daunting task for Apple, Inc. But at the same time Apple, Inc. has never been in a better position to "fight" in this space.
The iPhone is going to blow out of the water anything previously done by Apple - Mac, iPod, AppleTV, iTunesStore, whatever. It is going to be MASSIVE.
I think many will agree its going to be an interesting product with alot of good features. The issues im raising is what percentage of the population is going to pay 599.00 along with being trapped into a two year contract, with on discount.
At least in the US people have become use to getting there phones for next to nothing if they sign a two year contract. Having to buy a 600.00 phone along with locking into a 2 year contract could cause a mental block.
It may be a massive product and honestly I dont know what Cingulars agreement is going to be regarding contracts but massive or not doesn't ment it can't fail badly.
Based on what I have read I believe even Apple has Zune like expectations for the iphone at release.
Its funny how Jobs flip flops all the time he said no one would pay money for the Zune because people don't want alot of features thats what makes the ipod so great, now he is asking people to pay alot of money for features. He does it all the time.
what year did the Mac come out? what year did Windows come out ... hint AFTER the Mac..
yet they continue to to gain ground as you point out
and then
yet they continue to make money and their share price goes up
---
its really tedious to quote from multiple posts so i wont bother
You shouldnt continue to quote you haven't made any valid points. Apple has not continued to grow, going from 3% market share to 6% isn't ground breaking growth, for Apple fans its might be but it still doesn't put them on the map regarding true competition.
When people talk about the Halo effect that is exactly what Apple is trying to do, iphone, itv and so on. They know in reality they will never be 50/50 with any of the hardware vendors nor with MS so they need to expand other avenues.
Which is smart, but don't fool yourself into thinking they are going to have 50% market share with there current line of products.
That's clearly the case with Vista. Expensive. More expensive than OSX. And, poor quality. Given Windows, it dominates the market. So are we talking about Apple or Microsoft here now? 8)
Well really im talking about both. I disagree that Vista is expensive, remember Leopard is an upgrade and if you look at Vista upgrade prices for premium it really is on par price wise with Leopard. Ultimate for an upgrade is expensive if you buy it if its not preloaded on a new system.
We also need to look at the fact that most will never buy Vista at least percentage wise, they will get it as part of their new system.
Its never good, ever for any one company to dominate the market it allows them to put out whatever they want when no one is on their tail. Ive used both these products for a very long time because I have to for work and I considered XP beta for the last 4 years.
MS is not like Apple they will send a product to market when its good enough for people to tolerate and then patch the shit out of it for the next five years. The reason they do that is because history has proven they can.
Consecutive quarters. Meaningless. Year over year, there is growth, and that's all that matters.
I'd love to be that (over)confident in Apple, but the quarter in which they stumbled was a holiday quarter, which is troubling. And with Vista released... well, let's just say I'd like Apple to get it's Mac momentum back sooner, rather than later. \
yet [Apple] continues to make money and their share price goes up
That isn't really the question, though... the real question is, could Apple be doing even better with their Mac business if they changed their tactics a bit?
I thought Bill Gates rant was just a PR spin for Vista. With him leaving the fold and Ballmer replacing him I think things may change. We'll see. But you all oughta learn about co-opetition.
Well really im talking about both. I disagree that Vista is expensive, remember Leopard is an upgrade and if you look at Vista upgrade prices for premium it really is on par price wise with Leopard. Ultimate for an upgrade is expensive if you buy it if its not preloaded on a new system.
We also need to look at the fact that most will never buy Vista at least percentage wise, they will get it as part of their new system.
Its never good, ever for any one company to dominate the market it allows them to put out whatever they want when no one is on their tail. Ive used both these products for a very long time because I have to for work and I considered XP beta for the last 4 years.
MS is not like Apple they will send a product to market when its good enough for people to tolerate and then patch the shit out of it for the next five years. The reason they do that is because history has proven they can.
Hence, it works best to have a finger in all the pies. I have a MacBook Core[1]Duo now 2ghz 2gb ram. OS 10.4.8. Needless to say, it rocketh hardcore. I have WinXP2Pro running in Parallels. I encoded some favourite clips (Lobby Fight and Morpheus vs. Neo) off The Matrix DVD. Did some stuff in OSX, switched over to MeGUI and AviSynth for fine control over trimming and h.264 encoding, then switched back to OSX and checked it against QuickTime7, etc. Runs beautifully in Front Row.
I am back where my AMD64 Venice 3000+ 1.8ghz OC'ed 2.16ghz 1gb ram 80gb sata 7200rpm nVidia 6600gt 128mb vram OC'ed 500 to 570mhz core, 1.25ghz mem. I am running dual-boot XP2Pro and Vista. Using XP2Pro just for gaming (NFS: Most Wanted and FEAR: Extraction Point) at this moment. It's not even connected to the Internet, the gaming is fine singleplayer, and Vista, well, after exploring some pretty graphics and the totally, totally overblown and overhyped "3D window switcher" (which isn't that great, really), I suspect Vista will just sit on that PC partition for a while. I also had Vista in Parallels on the MacBook but deleted it because it was a total waste of space. Seriously.
Using my Sony 17" 1280x1024 LCD with DVI input spanning for OSX MacBook and single-screen VGA input for the PC.
I would suggest a setup like mine offers the best of many worlds and if we are really feeling strongly about monopolies, a setup like mine is the best "weapon" in this "war".
Nonetheless, I would also suggest this setup: two Macs. an iMac and a MacBook/MacBookPro. Run Vista and XP2Pro in Parallels (or soon perhaps VMWare Fusion). A great way to fight the monopoly.
If cost is an issue, then this setup to fight the monopoly: Mac Mini unit. Cheapest one. Cheapest reasonable PC box. KVM switcher and Cheap 15" LCD, CRT if needed.
That isn't really the question, though... the real question is, could Apple be doing even better with their Mac business if they changed their tactics a bit? .
At this stage I really don't think they could be doing better. We've seen so many growth "bubbles" on both a micro- and macro-economic scale. Sustainable growth is the key. And remember, the new focus is iPhone, which is a MAJOR undertaking. This is alongside Apple, Inc. "clamping down" on the reseller circuit. Well okay, not so drastic, but Apple, Inc. is shoring up it's major Apple, Inc.-controlled Stores around the world.
I think many will agree its going to be an interesting product with alot of good features. The issues im raising is what percentage of the population is going to pay 599.00 along with being trapped into a two year contract, with on discount.
At least in the US people have become use to getting there phones for next to nothing if they sign a two year contract. Having to buy a 600.00 phone along with locking into a 2 year contract could cause a mental block.
It may be a massive product and honestly I dont know what Cingulars agreement is going to be regarding contracts but massive or not doesn't ment it can't fail badly.
Well, that's one take on the situation, I respect that. I think the iPhone will be a real success. One would also need to think beyond the US market and mobile phones are bigger than computers anytime. AROUND THE WORLD.
Quote:
Based on what I have read I believe even Apple has Zune like expectations for the iphone at release.
Too easy. Check this out:
MP3 players: 135million
a "Zune" expectation by Microsoft of say, 1% sold in 2007 would be something like 1.5 million units roughly.
2% sold in 2007 would be roughly 3 million units.
Let's go to mobile phones: 1000million (1 billion)
a "Zune" expectation by Apple of say, 1% sold in say mid 2007-mid 2008 would be 10 million units.
(Jobs in his keynote says 1% market share for 2008 is his target)
2% sold in say mid2007-mid2008 would be 20 million units.
The profit margin on the iPhone, if you think about it as a "higher-end iPod", means that even if Apple clears only 3-5 million units per quarter, the target market and opportunity for growth, alongside higher profit margins than the low-to-mid-end iPods, the iPhone, I feel Apple, Inc. has a very bright future here, and alongside the halo effect "flow down" into the Macs (the important profit driver).
Quote:
Its funny how Jobs flip flops all the time he said no one would pay money for the Zune because people don't want alot of features thats what makes the ipod so great, now he is asking people to pay alot of money for features. He does it all the time.
Well, he's a marketing guy. He also said at one time TV didn't interest him at all. At least he's not a politician. He *is* a very shrewd marketer. But, interestingly, unlike the nonsense that is Windows, at least, for those that discover it, he's marketing better products with a lot of innovation. Feature count is a niggle-type issue.
I'd love to be that (over)confident in Apple, but the quarter in which they stumbled was a holiday quarter, which is troubling. And with Vista released... well, let's just say I'd like Apple to get it's Mac momentum back sooner, rather than later. \ .
I think y'all need to stop obsessing too much about market share. Because, this is in proportion globally with the tons and tons and tons of beigeboxes sold US/ worldwide. If you think about the 10% laptop marketshare in one of the previous quarters, that is pretty damn amazing.
The point to focus on and clearly the are Apple, Inc. as a business is looking at, is a sustainable growth of unit sales, revenues and profits quarter-over-quarter, and maintaining it's roughly 25%-30% profit margin (nett after tax, etc.).
Let the chips (market share) fall as they may. Let's look at the fundamentals of the business. And clearly there's a lot of financial modelling that puts the iPhone clearly into this picture of strong growth of unit sales (Macs, iPods, iPhones, etc.) alongside strong growth of revenues and most importantly, profits.
Steve Jobs as the CEO and charismatic marketer, will say, this is the BEST THING EVER and it is SUPER AWESOME and my favourite, "BOOM! Just like that!" -- but there is a clear financial strategy behind the "awesome factor" of Apple, Inc stuff.
At this stage I really don't think they could be doing better. We've seen so many growth "bubbles" on both a micro- and macro-economic scale. Sustainable growth is the key. And remember, the new focus is iPhone, which is a MAJOR undertaking. This is alongside Apple, Inc. "clamping down" on the reseller circuit. Well okay, not so drastic, but Apple, Inc. is shoring up it's major Apple, Inc.-controlled Stores around the world.
Well, its obvious actually that they could be doing better... last quarter Mac sales stagnated worldwide and were actually DOWN in the US:
Shipments of Macs in the U.S. also dipped significantly from 975,000 US systems to 808,000, indicating a genuine slowdown in sales for the Cupertino-based company following a stellar back-to-school quarter.
And the slowdown was during a holiday quarter too.
The real question of course is whether or not that was just a one quarter 'blip', i.e. cyclical, or is there something fundamental/structural slowing down Mac sales. I would say that's its largely the latter. Apple needs refreshes of... pretty much everything in their Mac product lineup, and to fill some notable product line holes, and to be more competitive on price (though no one is saying they should go low-end).
Remember also, Vista is out now, and its the quintessential 'good enough' MS product. You can actually picture the army of pimply teenage Best Buy salesmen braying in unison, "Oh yeah, its JUST LIKE OS X."
I don't think Apple can afford to get complacent with its Mac business, regardless of the success of the iPod or iPhone.
I think y'all need to stop obsessing too much about market share.... Let the chips (market share) fall as they may.
I'd love to relax, Sun. But remember, it was that kind of thinking that got Apple on the endangered species list in the '90s. How soon we forget. \
Apple can never get complacent, and should always be pushing for marketshare, within reason. You can bet that the boys in Redmond still obsess over marketshare... to them, its still actually a big deal whether they have 93% or 94% of the market.
Apple has to stay hungry, in every business they do. And I do feel like perhaps their attention has wandered a bit from Macs of late, what with all the iPod success and iPhone hype.
Comments
For desktop/server mid-large-enterprise Macs have a foot in the door and growth potential for the edu & corporate market. But not the mainstream stuff - not the majority. Not a goal of Apple, Inc. at the moment.
With Office 2000/2003/2007, various other MS Apps brought out, VisualBasic and .NET stuff, a ton of customised programming for a lot of mid-large-enterprise systems, it is a daunting task for Apple, Inc. But at the same time Apple, Inc. has never been in a better position to "fight" in this space.
It's always been said that MS always copies the best.
what year did the Mac come out? what year did Windows come out ... hint AFTER the Mac..
Let me also state that Apple will never gain ground .....if they continue to refuse to price drop based on market standards.
yet they continue to to gain ground as you point out
...and Apple is back to its 6% market share if that, I havent looked recently.
and then
Anyone can dispute what OS is better that subjective, bottom line math isnt.
Its just bad business on their part.
yet they continue to make money and their share price goes up
---
its really tedious to quote from multiple posts so i wont bother
The iPhone is going to blow out of the water anything previously done by Apple - Mac, iPod, AppleTV, iTunesStore, whatever. It is going to be MASSIVE.
I think many will agree its going to be an interesting product with alot of good features. The issues im raising is what percentage of the population is going to pay 599.00 along with being trapped into a two year contract, with on discount.
At least in the US people have become use to getting there phones for next to nothing if they sign a two year contract. Having to buy a 600.00 phone along with locking into a 2 year contract could cause a mental block.
It may be a massive product and honestly I dont know what Cingulars agreement is going to be regarding contracts but massive or not doesn't ment it can't fail badly.
Based on what I have read I believe even Apple has Zune like expectations for the iphone at release.
Its funny how Jobs flip flops all the time he said no one would pay money for the Zune because people don't want alot of features thats what makes the ipod so great, now he is asking people to pay alot of money for features. He does it all the time.
such a load of contradictory text
what year did the Mac come out? what year did Windows come out ... hint AFTER the Mac..
yet they continue to to gain ground as you point out
and then
yet they continue to make money and their share price goes up
---
its really tedious to quote from multiple posts so i wont bother
You shouldnt continue to quote you haven't made any valid points. Apple has not continued to grow, going from 3% market share to 6% isn't ground breaking growth, for Apple fans its might be but it still doesn't put them on the map regarding true competition.
When people talk about the Halo effect that is exactly what Apple is trying to do, iphone, itv and so on. They know in reality they will never be 50/50 with any of the hardware vendors nor with MS so they need to expand other avenues.
Which is smart, but don't fool yourself into thinking they are going to have 50% market share with there current line of products.
That's clearly the case with Vista. Expensive. More expensive than OSX. And, poor quality. Given Windows, it dominates the market. So are we talking about Apple or Microsoft here now? 8)
Well really im talking about both. I disagree that Vista is expensive, remember Leopard is an upgrade and if you look at Vista upgrade prices for premium it really is on par price wise with Leopard. Ultimate for an upgrade is expensive if you buy it if its not preloaded on a new system.
We also need to look at the fact that most will never buy Vista at least percentage wise, they will get it as part of their new system.
Its never good, ever for any one company to dominate the market it allows them to put out whatever they want when no one is on their tail. Ive used both these products for a very long time because I have to for work and I considered XP beta for the last 4 years.
MS is not like Apple they will send a product to market when its good enough for people to tolerate and then patch the shit out of it for the next five years. The reason they do that is because history has proven they can.
Consecutive quarters. Meaningless. Year over year, there is growth, and that's all that matters.
I'd love to be that (over)confident in Apple, but the quarter in which they stumbled was a holiday quarter, which is troubling. And with Vista released... well, let's just say I'd like Apple to get it's Mac momentum back sooner, rather than later.
.
yet [Apple] continues to make money and their share price goes up
That isn't really the question, though... the real question is, could Apple be doing even better with their Mac business if they changed their tactics a bit?
.
Steve Jobs and Bill Gates together at the recent
I thought Bill Gates rant was just a PR spin for Vista. With him leaving the fold and Ballmer replacing him I think things may change. We'll see. But you all oughta learn about co-opetition.
Well really im talking about both. I disagree that Vista is expensive, remember Leopard is an upgrade and if you look at Vista upgrade prices for premium it really is on par price wise with Leopard. Ultimate for an upgrade is expensive if you buy it if its not preloaded on a new system.
We also need to look at the fact that most will never buy Vista at least percentage wise, they will get it as part of their new system.
Its never good, ever for any one company to dominate the market it allows them to put out whatever they want when no one is on their tail. Ive used both these products for a very long time because I have to for work and I considered XP beta for the last 4 years.
MS is not like Apple they will send a product to market when its good enough for people to tolerate and then patch the shit out of it for the next five years. The reason they do that is because history has proven they can.
Hence, it works best to have a finger in all the pies. I have a MacBook Core[1]Duo now 2ghz 2gb ram. OS 10.4.8. Needless to say, it rocketh hardcore. I have WinXP2Pro running in Parallels. I encoded some favourite clips (Lobby Fight and Morpheus vs. Neo) off The Matrix DVD. Did some stuff in OSX, switched over to MeGUI and AviSynth for fine control over trimming and h.264 encoding, then switched back to OSX and checked it against QuickTime7, etc. Runs beautifully in Front Row.
I am back where my AMD64 Venice 3000+ 1.8ghz OC'ed 2.16ghz 1gb ram 80gb sata 7200rpm nVidia 6600gt 128mb vram OC'ed 500 to 570mhz core, 1.25ghz mem. I am running dual-boot XP2Pro and Vista. Using XP2Pro just for gaming (NFS: Most Wanted and FEAR: Extraction Point) at this moment. It's not even connected to the Internet, the gaming is fine singleplayer, and Vista, well, after exploring some pretty graphics and the totally, totally overblown and overhyped "3D window switcher" (which isn't that great, really), I suspect Vista will just sit on that PC partition for a while. I also had Vista in Parallels on the MacBook but deleted it because it was a total waste of space. Seriously.
Using my Sony 17" 1280x1024 LCD with DVI input spanning for OSX MacBook and single-screen VGA input for the PC.
I would suggest a setup like mine offers the best of many worlds and if we are really feeling strongly about monopolies, a setup like mine is the best "weapon" in this "war".
Nonetheless, I would also suggest this setup: two Macs. an iMac and a MacBook/MacBookPro. Run Vista and XP2Pro in Parallels (or soon perhaps VMWare Fusion). A great way to fight the monopoly.
If cost is an issue, then this setup to fight the monopoly: Mac Mini unit. Cheapest one. Cheapest reasonable PC box. KVM switcher and Cheap 15" LCD, CRT if needed.
Just some food for thought. Munch away. 8)
That isn't really the question, though... the real question is, could Apple be doing even better with their Mac business if they changed their tactics a bit?
At this stage I really don't think they could be doing better. We've seen so many growth "bubbles" on both a micro- and macro-economic scale. Sustainable growth is the key. And remember, the new focus is iPhone, which is a MAJOR undertaking. This is alongside Apple, Inc. "clamping down" on the reseller circuit. Well okay, not so drastic, but Apple, Inc. is shoring up it's major Apple, Inc.-controlled Stores around the world.
I think many will agree its going to be an interesting product with alot of good features. The issues im raising is what percentage of the population is going to pay 599.00 along with being trapped into a two year contract, with on discount.
At least in the US people have become use to getting there phones for next to nothing if they sign a two year contract. Having to buy a 600.00 phone along with locking into a 2 year contract could cause a mental block.
It may be a massive product and honestly I dont know what Cingulars agreement is going to be regarding contracts but massive or not doesn't ment it can't fail badly.
Well, that's one take on the situation, I respect that. I think the iPhone will be a real success. One would also need to think beyond the US market and mobile phones are bigger than computers anytime. AROUND THE WORLD.
Based on what I have read I believe even Apple has Zune like expectations for the iphone at release.
Too easy. Check this out:
MP3 players: 135million
a "Zune" expectation by Microsoft of say, 1% sold in 2007 would be something like 1.5 million units roughly.
2% sold in 2007 would be roughly 3 million units.
Let's go to mobile phones: 1000million (1 billion)
a "Zune" expectation by Apple of say, 1% sold in say mid 2007-mid 2008 would be 10 million units.
(Jobs in his keynote says 1% market share for 2008 is his target)
2% sold in say mid2007-mid2008 would be 20 million units.
The profit margin on the iPhone, if you think about it as a "higher-end iPod", means that even if Apple clears only 3-5 million units per quarter, the target market and opportunity for growth, alongside higher profit margins than the low-to-mid-end iPods, the iPhone, I feel Apple, Inc. has a very bright future here, and alongside the halo effect "flow down" into the Macs (the important profit driver).
Its funny how Jobs flip flops all the time he said no one would pay money for the Zune because people don't want alot of features thats what makes the ipod so great, now he is asking people to pay alot of money for features. He does it all the time.
Well, he's a marketing guy. He also said at one time TV didn't interest him at all. At least he's not a politician. He *is* a very shrewd marketer. But, interestingly, unlike the nonsense that is Windows, at least, for those that discover it, he's marketing better products with a lot of innovation. Feature count is a niggle-type issue.
I'd love to be that (over)confident in Apple, but the quarter in which they stumbled was a holiday quarter, which is troubling. And with Vista released... well, let's just say I'd like Apple to get it's Mac momentum back sooner, rather than later.
I think y'all need to stop obsessing too much about market share. Because, this is in proportion globally with the tons and tons and tons of beigeboxes sold US/ worldwide. If you think about the 10% laptop marketshare in one of the previous quarters, that is pretty damn amazing.
The point to focus on and clearly the are Apple, Inc. as a business is looking at, is a sustainable growth of unit sales, revenues and profits quarter-over-quarter, and maintaining it's roughly 25%-30% profit margin (nett after tax, etc.).
Let the chips (market share) fall as they may. Let's look at the fundamentals of the business. And clearly there's a lot of financial modelling that puts the iPhone clearly into this picture of strong growth of unit sales (Macs, iPods, iPhones, etc.) alongside strong growth of revenues and most importantly, profits.
Steve Jobs as the CEO and charismatic marketer, will say, this is the BEST THING EVER and it is SUPER AWESOME and my favourite, "BOOM! Just like that!" -- but there is a clear financial strategy behind the "awesome factor" of Apple, Inc stuff.
At this stage I really don't think they could be doing better. We've seen so many growth "bubbles" on both a micro- and macro-economic scale. Sustainable growth is the key. And remember, the new focus is iPhone, which is a MAJOR undertaking. This is alongside Apple, Inc. "clamping down" on the reseller circuit. Well okay, not so drastic, but Apple, Inc. is shoring up it's major Apple, Inc.-controlled Stores around the world.
Well, its obvious actually that they could be doing better... last quarter Mac sales stagnated worldwide and were actually DOWN in the US:
from http://www.appleinsider.com/article.php?id=2420
Shipments of Macs in the U.S. also dipped significantly from 975,000 US systems to 808,000, indicating a genuine slowdown in sales for the Cupertino-based company following a stellar back-to-school quarter.
And the slowdown was during a holiday quarter too.
The real question of course is whether or not that was just a one quarter 'blip', i.e. cyclical, or is there something fundamental/structural slowing down Mac sales. I would say that's its largely the latter. Apple needs refreshes of... pretty much everything in their Mac product lineup, and to fill some notable product line holes, and to be more competitive on price (though no one is saying they should go low-end).
Remember also, Vista is out now, and its the quintessential 'good enough' MS product. You can actually picture the army of pimply teenage Best Buy salesmen braying in unison, "Oh yeah, its JUST LIKE OS X."
I don't think Apple can afford to get complacent with its Mac business, regardless of the success of the iPod or iPhone.
.
I think y'all need to stop obsessing too much about market share.... Let the chips (market share) fall as they may.
I'd love to relax, Sun. But remember, it was that kind of thinking that got Apple on the endangered species list in the '90s. How soon we forget.
Apple can never get complacent, and should always be pushing for marketshare, within reason. You can bet that the boys in Redmond still obsess over marketshare... to them, its still actually a big deal whether they have 93% or 94% of the market.
Apple has to stay hungry, in every business they do. And I do feel like perhaps their attention has wandered a bit from Macs of late, what with all the iPod success and iPhone hype.
.