discountopinion

Have gotten Series 9 for every elderly member of the family. Slowly but surely everyone has iPhones and Apple Watches and HomePods and hand me down Apple TVs.

The screen is very good for people with eyesight issues and also the sense of assurance and safety that they feel that the Watch has their back, should they fall or be in an accident. Overall also the heart health features, oxygen tracking etc give a sense of comfort albeit with the knowledge the features are not perfect. They also find using Siri on the Watch very freeing. Also they feel cool wearing it.

Series 9 is an absolute slam dunk as a gift for loved ones. If only Apple knows how much comfort and coolness it gives people who feel a bit more vulnerable.

The clear signals from this saga is that AI professionals are the superstars of tech and trillion dollar CEOs will create new business divisions overnight to retain them and others go public with a serenade and aggressively pitch for them to defect (hello salesforce et al).

Much of the superstardom of these people is due to the work being done in public with a lot of experimentation going on.

So what to do if you are Apple's AI people? If any good then likely they may defect or renegotiate packages.

The whole event may catalyse side tremors in other businesses like Apple as people re-evaluate the landscape.

MS is now doing their own server side AI silicon, Google has done it for years, AWS as well, Tesla is... Meta and others may as well?
Apple - where you at? Relying on enthusiasts to highlight how good client side silicon is can be useful very short term. Not a strategy though and also does not solve Siri is a green screen CLI.

I upgrade iPhone every year and this year it felt somewhat different than others. IDK why but it felt less incremental and more of a solid upgrade given the step changes in silicon capabilities and also usb-c port. The USB-C port simplifies several use cases for me and also reduces the number of cables when I travel.

Judging from my few visits to the Apple stores then iPhone 15 Pro Max is a barn storming success with many people opting for the top of the range model.

Now if only Apple did software as well as they do hardware.

tht said:

Seems crazy?

Is it really a strategic technology for computers? For cars, most certainly at this point in the EV adoption curve, but computers? Isn't a battery like the 3rd or 4th, or higher, most expensive part of mobile computer?

Display, SoC, cellular modem, then the battery?

Does not seem crazy to me at all for Apple to actively pursue this field with great interest and investment.

Why? Future Products and current small devices portfolio.

Vision Pro needs a separate battery via cable at the moment. This is clearly not what they want. Higher capacity, lower weight and fast charging seem core to the pain point at the moment to remove the need to tether a power pack. Remove it and lower the overall weight of the device is critical after the early adopter stage.

AirPods. Can't do a long haul flight on one charge. Would be greatly improved with longer battery life. Longer battery life will also unlock further assisted hearing and med tech use cases. Mission critical to get this done in the medium term to unlock further growth.

Apple Watch - can always use more battery life and may unlock new use cases for on device compute boosts in particular the neural engine for more advanced onboard Siri.

Nvidia will make oodles of cash as everyone is playing catch up on AI. It is a war of attrition in terms of capex. $5B costs that likely will increase dramatically year on year for an unknown period of time.

Now Apple just happens to sit on one of the world’s best silicon teams. Apple may want to do a Tesla like Dojo sprint and roll their own server side AI silicon or even license/partner with Tesla on it.

If they can pull this off then it feels like the sustainable move. Nvidia needs a strong counter weight.