Apple is a 'consumer company' and not a normal tech firm, suggests Tim Cook

Posted:
in AAPL Investors edited May 2019
Berkshire Hathaway's investment in Apple is proof that the company isn't really a normal tech company, Apple CEO Tim Cook has suggested, with the fund's holdings in the iPhone maker serving as a sign the iPhone maker is closer to a consumer products company in its current state.




Following after Berkshire Hathaway's annual shareholder meeting, Tim Cook mused on the fund's sizable holding in Apple in an interview about famed investor Warren Buffett's opinions on the iPhone producer. While Berkshire Hathaway and Buffett typically avoid any major investments in technology companies, it made an exception for Apple, and currently holds stock worth over $50 billion.

Warren Buffett "has been very clear, he didn't invest in technology companies and companies he didn't understand," Cook told CNBC. "He's been totally clear with that. And so he obviously views Apple as a consumer company."

"We believe that technology should be in the background, not the foreground, and that technology should empower people to do things and help them do things they couldn't do otherwise" Cook continued. "We're in the tech industry, but we work at that intersection of technology and the liberal arts and the humanities, and so we make products for people, and so the consumer's and the center of what we do."

Buffet's favorable opinion of Apple "seemed like recognition" of its continuing evolution, Cook mused. "We run the company for the long term, and so the fact that we've got the ultimate long-term investor in the stock is incredible."

Cook's comments were made as he attended the investor event for the first time.

Berkshire Hathaway's previous and rare investment in tech was in IBM, which it effectively ended in 2018 as it increased its investment in Apple, though it is slowly moving to buy more tech-related stocks. Recently, the fund started buying shares in Amazon, with Buffett reportedly an admirer of both the company and CEO Jeff Bezos.

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 13
    lkrupplkrupp Posts: 10,557member
    On tech blogs when Warren Buffet invests in Apple he’s a senile old man who doesn’t know anything about anything. When he invests in Coca-Cola he’s a frick’in genius. And that’s how the universe works in techieland.
    radarthekatjony0
  • Reply 2 of 13
    SpamSandwichSpamSandwich Posts: 33,407member
    Tim, just fix the increasingly buggy iOS software and release better Mac pro-level computers. Dumbing down the hardware (and keyboards) is bad for developers and users with money ready to spend right now.
    ElCapitandysamoriatyler82
  • Reply 3 of 13
    lkrupplkrupp Posts: 10,557member
    Tim, just fix the increasingly buggy iOS software and release better Mac pro-level computers. Dumbing down the hardware (and keyboards) is bad for developers and users with money ready to spend right now.
    Apple is a complete fail on so many levels, right? iOS is increasingly buggy? Funny, I’m experiencing just the opposite. iOS is more stable than it ever has been in my opinion.
    lolliverjony0
  • Reply 4 of 13
    tmaytmay Posts: 6,311member
    Tim, just fix the increasingly buggy iOS software and release better Mac pro-level computers. Dumbing down the hardware (and keyboards) is bad for developers and users with money ready to spend right now.
    Pretty sure that iOS 13 is in fact the end result of the  bogus "fix increasingly buggy iOS software" meme that is frequently posted. I too find iOS 12.2 incredibly stable.
    lolliverjony0
  • Reply 5 of 13
    ElCapitanElCapitan Posts: 372member
    So they've gone from being a serious computer company to a toy-store. That explains a lot, Timmy!
    dysamoriaavon b7tyler82
  • Reply 6 of 13
    LatkoLatko Posts: 398member
    Just another blatter story to please Warren.
    Tim doesn’t even seem to know what Apple is:
    monitors, no monitors, own screen techn, no screen tech, peripherals, no peripherals, network devices, no network devices, discontinued servers. After so many years, most customers are completely fed up with the diversity of direction, perceived indifference, lack of strategy.
    edited May 2019 dysamoria
  • Reply 7 of 13
    dysamoriadysamoria Posts: 3,430member
    lkrupp said:
    Tim, just fix the increasingly buggy iOS software and release better Mac pro-level computers. Dumbing down the hardware (and keyboards) is bad for developers and users with money ready to spend right now.
    Apple is a complete fail on so many levels, right? iOS is increasingly buggy? Funny, I’m experiencing just the opposite. iOS is more stable than it ever has been in my opinion.
    Not using much of it, then?

    I’m using an iPad Pro with a Smart Keyboard, daily; sometimes all day. I do lots of text editing on websites in Safari (broken as hell), editing notes and email (undo often skips undo steps and defeats the whole purpose of undo), multitasking (CMD-Tab shows me every app I’ve ever opened, not the running apps), trying to watch 720p YouTube videos in Safari (they have been freezing on resolution change ever since iOS 12)... I find constant annoying bugs in even these most basic functions.

    Only two bugs I’ve reported in 7+ years have been fixed, while more keep appearing.
  • Reply 8 of 13
    dysamoriadysamoria Posts: 3,430member
    Yes, Apple, we know what you are. You’ve made it clear for years now. You’re a Wall Street toy. 
  • Reply 9 of 13
    apple ][apple ][ Posts: 9,233member
    dysamoria said:
    Yes, Apple, we know what you are. You’ve made it clear for years now. You’re a Wall Street toy. 
    Sounds good to me.

    I use and enjoy plenty of Apple products, they're all working nicely and smoothly, and my AAPL stock is doing well. Sounds like a great combo, imo.
    lolliverradarthekat
  • Reply 10 of 13
    radarthekatradarthekat Posts: 3,842moderator
    Latko said:
    Just another blatter story to please Warren.
    Tim doesn’t even seem to know what Apple is:
    monitors, no monitors, own screen techn, no screen tech, peripherals, no peripherals, network devices, no network devices, discontinued servers. After so many years, most customers are completely fed up with the diversity of direction, perceived indifference, lack of strategy.
    No.  No they’re not.
  • Reply 11 of 13
    avon b7avon b7 Posts: 7,624member
    There are moments when Tim Cook shouldn't say anything. This was one of those moments.


    muthuk_vanalingamchemengin
  • Reply 12 of 13
    spice-boyspice-boy Posts: 1,450member
    The general public does not have endless admiration for tech companies and the "geniuses" of Silicon Valley, Facebook, Alexa and most likely Siri, spy on its customers, collect information which is sold to advertisers and who knows else. Bezos and his 2010's version of Walmart is destroying retail and those Amazon boxes each day are probably responsible for the loss of forest each day which is perhaps Bezos sick joke when naming his company.  Seamless, Grubhub and similar apps have moved in mob style and are getting a "pieces of the action" from small restaurants who survive from local deliveries, 1stdibs has done the same with the vintage and antiques market, while Uber has destroyed urban taxi systems which provided generations of drivers with a steady income, with an unregulated nightmare and zero security or benefits for its drivers. 
    The optimism and pride we once had for the Valley has now soured, as we see tech companies only looking to get rich and not develop something which actually makes the world a better, safer and fairer place. 
    edited May 2019 badmonk
  • Reply 13 of 13
    tyler82tyler82 Posts: 1,100member
    Confirmation that Apple has given up on their Pro customers. 
    muthuk_vanalingam
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