IreneW

berndog said:

Tim, 
it took Google a long time to get onto the 10 (X) bandwagon. Samsung has been pushing 10 products for a while now too.
I do believe it’s time to turn everything up to 11! (Thanks Spinaltap)
In truth I like the idea that we force the rest of the world to a yyyy.mm.dd version tracking system. It will be a rude awakening for the android rank and file to see what’s being foisted on them.

flydog said:

rogifan_new said:

cornchip said:

gatorguy said:

AppleExposed said:

There's no evidence that Apple ever intended to compete in this market so I find these articles ridiculous.

So you think this is one of those one-off "fun" projects that was never intended on its own to be a competitive success? Serious question. You wouldn't be the first person to hold that opinion, tho Apple did go to a lot of effort in initially promoting it. 

Just guessing, but I think he might have meant Apple never intended to compete in the $50 end of the connected speaker market. I would agree. Just like Apple never intended to compete in the low-end computer, phone, tablet, ("smart") watch markets. While iPods did get fairly affordable over time, they were still more expensive than most competitors that arrived. As we all know, Apple mostly doesn't give a rip about market share but revenue per unit. Can they sell enough to recoup the cost of investment (including man hours) and then enough to invest in the next gen/variants? Then great. If not, it'll get axed.

I have a feeling HP will slowly to catch on. I know I'm chomping at the bit for a couple, but financially, I'm a couple years out. And that's fine with me, I'd rather pay a fair price for something high-quality than fifty bucks for a piece of junk. But that's just me.

PS I can totally see Apple going the iPhone route and continue selling the previous model when the new gen comes out. Boom there's your lower cost option.

This is complete bullshit. Of course Apple cares about market share. You don’t have an ecosystem and can’t sell services on top of it if you don’t have market share. Apple sells millions of Macs, iPads and Apple Watches each quarter. Are you telling me the wouldn’t love it if they were selling millions of HomePods too? Tim Cook doesn’t even mention it on earnings calls. I think it’s pretty clear the product is a failure. Mostly because Apple went after what people weren’t asking for. People that want a smart speaker care about price more than audio quality and people who care about audio quality have something better than HomePod. If Apple really is focused on sound quality and not voice then why not make a really great sound bar or home theater system? I would never replace my sound bar with a HomePod but if Apple made a superior sound bar I just might.

You have zero knowledge of how many HomePods Apple has sold or how much profit it has earned on them, yet you feel qualified enough on the subject to opine that "the product is a failure" simply because some third-party research firm (who is just as ignorant) declared that the HomePod has small market share of a market composed primarily of sub-$50 knockoffs.

Ok. 

avon b7 said:

rundhvid said:

"we continue to see phenomenal demand for AirPods, and when you tally up the last four quarters, our Wearables business is now bigger than 60% of the companies in the Fortune 500."

Hats off to all employees at Dell, Samsung and the rest of the tech-industry for staying motivated and performing their duties all day long, year-after-year, when the companies they work for are being embarrassed to no end by Apple and their highly successful way of executing product-design and manufacturing. It’s not like Apple is extraterrestrial or something—they have iPhones,  Watch etc. and the corresponding Android products are not that different—it seems like a fair fight. Yet it isn’t, because there are real differences between the products which translates into distinctly different user-experiences. 
I truly cannot comprehend how executives and managers involved with strategic decisions in Apple-rivaling companies (an oxymoron, perhaps...?), are able to fully commit to their new product with true belief in the claimed performance and predicted impact on the market—without feeling a little uneasy or outright thinking “why bother?“

I am not sure where you want to go with that comment. Tim was comparing the Apple wearable business in revenue terms to Fortune 500 companies.

I don't see a connection to Samsung, Android etc.

Android wearables sell in huge numbers and are growing thanks to the Chinese manufacturers.