charlesn

Interesting, well-written article that I think misses one crucial point: there's a vast difference between perceptions of tech site content creators and commenters and those of the mass market public to whom Apple is primarily selling. I seriously doubt that "out there," there's any perception of Apple being "behind" in the A.I race, or of there being an A.I. race among consumer tech product companies, period. For the mass market, Apple has done an especially brilliant job of branding A.I. to mean Apple Intelligence and to market its version of A.I. as protecting your privacy. I would agree that the marketing outpaces the capabilities, but I don't think that matters nearly as much to mass market buyers as it does inside the technosphere echo chamber. That opinion comes from thirty years of listening to how Apple is so far "behind" on features compared to the competition on virtually everything it has ever sold, how you get more for less with Windows, Android, blah, blah, blah... and here we are, with Apple at the top of the heap, the most successful and valuable company in the history of consumer electronics. 

danox said:

Counterpoint with their semiyearly Apple is doomed in some way posting….

Exactly. And how does Counterpoint come up with such precise numbers for Apple when Apple doesn't release this info. Well... wait for it... "that's a secret." Yes, just like the tooth fairy, you simply have to believe in the proprietary methodology which, you know, they can't possibly reveal!

That said, I would be surprised if this reported downturn in sales wasn't accurate. Functionally, the last few generations of Apple's watch have been doing all you need it to do and all it's capable of doing, at least for now. The design hasn't changed all that much over time, so minus compelling new features or new design, there's not a lot to drive new sales or upgrades from older models. I think everyone knows the holy grail for a new burst of sales would be accurate blood pressure and glucose monitoring, but that tech is still not here. Yeah, yeah, Samsung already offers a useless, crap version of it, but I'm talking about features that actually work and do so accurately. 

CNBC is reporting that the Siri improvements are now delayed til 2026. That's the headline of the article currently running on the website. This (obviously) would mean an entire year of additional delay beyond a launch date that was already pushed out nine months from when A.I. Siri was first announced. My "Apple memory" goes back to roughly 1990 and I can't ever recall something like this happening before--a product announced for debut nine months later (that in itself is rare enough) and then blowing by that debut date by a full year. So I guess AI Siri now debuts in time for its sweet sixteen--but you really have to wonder if Apple is ever going to be able to fix Siri. smh. $166 billon in cash on hand and we can't do this? For context: just Apple's cash, if it were a separate company, would rank #90 on the list of the 100 most valuable companies.  

Tune in again in late 2026 when Kuo punts the release date to late '27 or early '28. This is a phone for a target market that doesn't exist--expensive folding phones from other manufacturers have already proven that over the past five years. Sure, "nice to have" a phone that can unfold to about the screen size of an iPad Mini for those occasions when you want that. But the price you pay to get it--in addition to the literal dollars--in size, weight, fragility and a small "daily driver" outer screen the size of the iPhone Mini's screen--will make it a small niche product for Apple, too. It will get a ton of press, no doubt--followed by predictably poor sales. 

DAalseth said:

If you keep your eye on the profit, you're going to skimp on the product. But if you focus on making really great products, then the profits will follow.

Steve Jobs

I have increasingly been feeling that Apple under Tim Cook has forgotten this. 

Well... this is a bit of fortune cookie "wisdom" from Steve that doesn't even reflect his own experience. Jobs v1.0 at Apple was arguably about great products and the sales/profits definitely did NOT follow. One main reason the board fired him was his insistence on championing the Lisa and Macintosh, neither of which were selling well. So there's that. And then sales/profits did not really follow Steve's creations at his next venture, Next. So there's that, too. Third time as CEO was obviously the charm for Jobs, when he sold Next to Apple and returned to helm what became a very profitable company. 

In terms of "skimping on products" under Cook, what would you cite as examples of that?