fred stein

Disclosure: Fanboy, Long AAPL. Think that making Tim Cook CEO of Apple may be Steve Jobs most brilliant move - And that says a lot.

Does Apple give up anything to China? So far I don't see it. Happy to hear counter argument, as facts not opinions. Apple and China have great synergy. Apple gets the best manufacturers on the planet so that they can launch annual new iPhones at unprecedented quality and unit volume. Only Apple and China can do this. And of course China gets great ROI on their investments in people and manufacturing technology. But Apple sources components from all over the world, not just China. 

More importantly, the real value of Apple's devices is the software. Make no mistake, Apple is a software company, not a hardware company. They design the chips. They don't make them. They design the devices. They don't assemble them. Design is SW. All the SW from FW to xxxKits to the Apps developed by over a million App developers to the music and video and magazines and games etc. are all SW. Even broadcasting a football game is SW, despite big guys giving each other concussions. 

When we buy and iPhone, 60% of the cost is the software and it's worth every penny. The actual assembly and the parts made in China are around 10% (I made up these statistics, but who cares? They're close enough.)

And about HK? Yes it is bad. China is a bad actor. They steal trade and military secrets. They have unfair trade practices and manipulate their currency. The persecution of the Uigyur is worse than that is going on in HK, but our biases devalue the persecution of muslims. No one mentions what's going on in Myanmar.

Back to the main topic. Globalization is not stopping. Nor is capitalism. Nor is the digital transformation and the impact of AI. There are many negative aspects of all these. I'd rather have Tim Cook figuring this out than any one else. 

Forget the accounting quirks. Apple paid $401M and has 478M user. Good deal.

Duo phone? Is MSFT re-entering the SmartPhone market? With a zero market share OS? With a foldable phone that will likely not last a year and cannot be used while walking, nor easily mounted in the car? With a reputation for entering and exiting the phone biz?

OK now. How do the lawyers prove that the replacement devices are not "equivalent to new in performance and reliability." And then how do they assess what is owed? Do they use retail or the wholesale prices in the used iPhone market or some other valuation? 

If a refurbed iPhone has a new battery and a clean screen, there is minimal difference in performance or reliability. Actually, a two year old refurbed iPhone is likely better than the iPhone that was replaced just by having a new battery.

Cool. Re Refinery29 comment - Brand it 'night vision'. Reading menus in low light is nice. For older people, night vision will be a hit. Yup that's me.