I would have to disagree. I bought an ipad mini at launch and returned it due to the screen. Once you have a retina screen with an ipad and iphone it's hard to justify buying a new product with anything less.
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Phil Schiller Says Apple Wouldn't Sacrifice Quality for Market Share in a Cheaper iPhone
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I would have to disagree. I bought an ipad mini at launch and returned it due to the screen. Once you have a retina screen with an ipad and iphone it's hard to justify buying a new product with anything less.
I think he's either:
1)Twisting the words...nobody ever said "build us a cheaper AND LESS QUALITY phone"...folks asked for a cheaper iphone...period. By twisting the words, Apple may release a cheaper iPhone but keep the quality (quality meaning everything except for the capacity, for example)...and create and sell 8GB iPhones to be sold cheaper than 16GB iPhones.
or
2)Apple is giving the usual "my way or the highway" approach which in this case translates to "want the iPhone? Pay up chump"
I hope it's #1. But it would not surprise me at all if #2 pans out.
1)Twisting the words...nobody ever said "build us a cheaper AND LESS QUALITY phone"...folks asked for a cheaper iphone...period. By twisting the words, Apple may release a cheaper iPhone but keep the quality (quality meaning everything except for the capacity, for example)...and create and sell 8GB iPhones to be sold cheaper than 16GB iPhones.
or
2)Apple is giving the usual "my way or the highway" approach which in this case translates to "want the iPhone? Pay up chump"
I hope it's #1. But it would not surprise me at all if #2 pans out.
Taking iPhone hardware and cramming it in a plastic shell isn't going to drop the price tag to sub-$200 full retail.
Sure it's not, and that is why I have explained what Apple did in the past and what they'll probably do to make it happen. Think what they did with the iPod, the Mac desktops and the iPad. Then you'll have your cheaper iPhone.
But they won't have a choice really if they want to keep their revenues growing. It's that or enter a new segment with high growth and be successful in it.
lol...Yeah the antenna problem nearly destroyed apple. It affected so many millions it did, that antenna problem. Luckily apples customers are all brainwashed, so they ignored the problems
...
This forum is great for a laugh sometimes!
No, the antenna problem is fixed by a iPhone Bumper, not brainwashed
That is false. The iPhone alone represents over 50% of their revenues. Apple lives and dies by the iPhone at the moment. Combine the iPad, and iOS devices are 70% of Apple revenues. It's absolutely crucial they keep this side of the business healthy and growing.
Really? I've had my iPhone 5 in use since it arrived in November. Keep it in my pants pocket. No case. No issues for me.
This discussion would make more sense
if iPhone was a premium phone in a first place. The reality is that iPhone has the lowest BOM (Bill Of Materials) of all top of the line phones. It achieves this by using cheaper components and skimping on various features:
* half the RAM of the competition
* smaller and lower resolution screen
* LCD vs more expensive OLED
* no NFC
* no wireless charging
* no support for simultaneous voice and LTE data on CDMA networks - by using just one baseband chip (competing phones have two baseband chips)
* small battery
So the first thing Apple should do is to lower the price of existing iPhone to properly reflect its value.
if iPhone was a premium phone in a first place. The reality is that iPhone has the lowest BOM (Bill Of Materials) of all top of the line phones. It achieves this by using cheaper components and skimping on various features:
* half the RAM of the competition
* smaller and lower resolution screen
* LCD vs more expensive OLED
* no NFC
* no wireless charging
* no support for simultaneous voice and LTE data on CDMA networks - by using just one baseband chip (competing phones have two baseband chips)
* small battery
So the first thing Apple should do is to lower the price of existing iPhone to properly reflect its value.
Well, if they did make a completely different phone it would be cheaper to produce than the 4 and the 4S. Apples older phones would probably cost about the same to produce now as when they came out, which is why the price drops are so modest (coz Apple has to pay for it out of their margins). A new, redesigned low end iPhone however, would cost less to produce (as itd be optimized for low cost) so Apple would be able to sell it even cheaper than the 4/4S (thus reaching a bigger market) but still be able to mantain high margins
Not really.... in general, the older phones become cheaper because all the development costs are already paid off and in general the older technology used in those phones gets cheaper over time as their suppliers focus on more expensive new components.
Who cares what the "investors" think? I'm one of them and I don't need ridiculous growth to stay an owner of Apple. I need a dividend. If Apple keeps its margins and grows its sales, it could start kicking out $20 billion in dividends each year. A ridiculous number? Not at all. I bet that is going to be very doable if Apple's board will just accept that there is no reason to keep growing that cash pile to ever greater heights each quarter.
I think Apple has a method to bring cheaper phones to the market, it is last year's phone. They are already knocking down the price on those phones and they could knock them lower. I suspect that the iPhone 5 is going to be really easy to discount in a year. That could easily be a "free" phone in the US with a discontinuation of both of the glass iPhones at the same time. The only reason to make a mini iphone, I think, is to capture the market that wants a smaller phone. But it should have the best components in it and it should be priced at the high end.
Apple doesn't need 30% growth so that Wall Street can discount that back to 10% growth because it "can't possibly be sustainable".
Also the tablet market is a major growth area. It will be bigger than the smartphone market before the end of this decade. If Apple dominates there, then that is a decade of phenomenal growth that is almost certain.
Sorry, I was being sarcastic. Many here said that the retina screen was unnecessary and that the screen on the mini was good enough.
Development costs are a sunk cost and have little bearing on supply/demand which is what drives price. The consumer dictates if they buy or don't buy at the price offered. The consumer doesn't care how much it cost you to develop the product. The price on older technology decreases mainly because the demand for it decreases (mainly due to better substitute items for sale). The construction costs decrease over time, but if demand stayed the same and there weren't better or cheaper substitutes then price would not decrease. Apple is happy to take profits long after development costs are covered.
Is anyone really surprised by this?
As long as the iPhone/iPad remains profitable (and growing), why join the rest of the industry in a rush to the bottom?
Marketshare means little when the profits are still good. This may change but for the time-being how is Apple, or potential customers, served by making a deliberately low-balled product?
Doesn't "last year's" model accomplish the exact same thing for those who put a higher priority on value than on the latest and greatest?
As long as the iPhone/iPad remains profitable (and growing), why join the rest of the industry in a rush to the bottom?
Marketshare means little when the profits are still good. This may change but for the time-being how is Apple, or potential customers, served by making a deliberately low-balled product?
Doesn't "last year's" model accomplish the exact same thing for those who put a higher priority on value than on the latest and greatest?
I think what he means is, by making the shells with polycarbonate to the exact specs as the present iPhone, they will eliminate the need to machine and polish the metal casings right now which is time consuming and adds to the cost.
Same quality as in look and feel, but less costly. The innards will be the same of course if it has to function the same.
I would actually love to see such a phone. It can absorb shocks and drops better than a metal one.
Same quality as in look and feel, but less costly. The innards will be the same of course if it has to function the same.
I would actually love to see such a phone. It can absorb shocks and drops better than a metal one.
If Cook starts driving products based on the whims of Wall Street investors then Apple has really jumped the shark. Remember these same investors said Apple had to come out with an iPad "mini" to compete with the Fire HD and Nexus 7, then when Apple did they all shrugged their shoulders, saying it wasn't anything innovative, just a smaller iPad. They complained about it being too expensive while at the same time fretting over the mini cannabalizing the iPad and what that would do to Apple's margins. Fact is there's nothing Apple can do to satisfy Wall Street right now. They could announce 60M iPhones and 20M iPads sold in the quarter with a $15B profit and their stock would drop because guidance for the next quarter was light or whatever.
The market needs growth, that's how our economy works. Without growth, even if there is profitability, a company is not seen as being healthy.
Yes, it's twisted and most normal people don't think like that, but unfortunately, the people at Apple have no choice in caring for the investors because they are a publicaly traded company and as such must adhere to SEC rules (everything they do must be in the shareholder's best interest).
And let me tell you, most investors care greatly in the health of Apple and its continued growth. The last 2 "earning misses" despite Apple posting great profits and numbers should be an indication of that. It's a perverse economy with perverse effects, but it's what we live in.
Phil Schiller Says Apple Wouldn't Sacrifice Quality for Market Share in a Cheaper iPhone
But Apple would sacrifice the optical drive in the "all-in-one" iMac for the sake of "thinness".
Thats their trojan horse to boost sales from iTunes. They don't want you to go and buy those pesky DVD's/CD's from Wal mart or Best Buy. Its called "Locking it in".
The first iphone was metal then the 3G/3GS were both plastic.
You think they did that because Steve and Jony wanted a plastic phone? I don't remember Apple doing a product video with Jony waxing poetic about the design of the phone. Seems to me that was a stop gap for what they really wanted - iPhone 4.
No one said that they would or should. But the point remains, everything Apple does is in the end for one thing : growing their revenues/profits. That's what Wall Street investors want.
They do that by doing what they always say they do : "Making the best products we can and selling them with good margins".
A lot of you people think Apple is different from other publicly traded companies. They follow the same rules as everyone else. Pleasing investors and Wall Street people however does not mean driving products based on their whims, that's a ludicrous link to make.
No, the fact is, Apple has never had problems with Polycarbonite use in their products (their type of plastic). Apple uses what Apple wants to use. If it's aluminum now, it doesn't mean they won't go back to polycarbonite in the future (they still use it in the Time Capsules and Airport products, in their power chargers, in all their iPod/iPhone accessories).
Only the Apple forum community seems to have a problem with plastic. Does your 85W MacBook Pro charger feel cheap ? Plastic. Does your Time Capsule feel cheap ? Plastic. Does your Lightning cable connectors feel cheap ? Plastic.
Yet none of it feels cheap. That's because plastic in and of itself isn't a cheap material as its made out to be around these parts. Thank God Apple knows this and doesn't make their products based on the whims of a few forum goers with an anti-plastic fetish (even though they use and love plastic products from Apple everyday).