Tim Cook Sends Email Highlighting iPhone 5s, iPhone 5c and iOS 7 to Employees

[paulsdenton]

I can't believe all the carping about the 5C and 5S on these fora.

The 5S at least is a triumph of engineering, design and technical skill that no other business on the planet could duplicate.

It looks like these phones weren't made for those of you who carp, but for the 250 million people across the whole world who will buy them.

I remember the same howling about the iPhone 5, which went on to set awesome sales records.

Buy something else!

 

[taptic]

Cool, now the Apple support dudes will be able to help me with iOS 7 instead of the other way around....

 

[doug in albq]

465.84 -28.80‎ (-5.82%‎)

 

[AppreciativeIA]

My concern is the non-U.S. market. $99 on contract is fine for Americans who are used to subsidized pricing models. $549 is entirely too much for most upfront buyers outside of the U.S.

$399 base and $499 32GB would have seemed more reasonable to me, but I guess Apple wants to boost its margins.

To quote Ben Thompson ( http://stratechery.com/2013/two-minutes-fifty-six-seconds/ )

and .... Apple is saying:

"No, we will NOT compete on price, we will offer something our competitors can’t match. No, we are NOT selling a phone, we are selling an experience.

[Moreover,] this solidifies our hold on the Mercedes-Benz/BMW portion of the Asian market. Is it out-of-reach for the vast majority of consumers? Yes, it is. But it will be aspirational, something you put on the table to show others you can afford it. In Asia it’s the Apple’s brand that is, by far, the biggest allure of the iPhone."

and one more thing:

"If you disagree, well, we won’t sell you an iPhone."

 

[JobsGang]

What do "haters" need to learn exactly? That Android is gaining more and more market share?

I want Apple to succed and that won't be possible just by being a "fanboy" but by them actually truly innovating.

Every new iPhone outsells the previous model.Record profits.I think that's success.

Every year "haters"predict the fall of apple.Apple ain't falling anytime soon.You guys throw the word innovation around too easily.

 

[kirk26]

Cool, my iPhone 5S gold color will match Lil' Wayne's grill.

 

[terraphantm]

Oh come one, none of these things are actually important. WiFi N is fine for most people, you don't use yur iPhone for connecting to a mass storage system wirelessly, do you? If they hadn't done the 5C, you would have gotten an iPhone 5 that only had WiFi N to. The iPad will be refreshed around October.

Don't forget that 802.11ac also allows one to get comparable performance to n with less power consumption. That's always nice for mobile devices.

I dont get why people are so upset over the 5S reveal, i think its a pretty dam ****ing good upgrade....

2x cpu speed, 2x gpu speed which will make the 5S with the fastest gpu in a smartphone on the marketagain

A 64 bit architecture

Fingerprint scanner which i think is amazing

A extremely welcome update to the camera, 15% larger pixels on the camera with a f2.2 aperature should alllow for much faster photos taken, and better low light performance which may be almost as good as the One in low light.

I feel like they could of made the screen a little bigger but oh well the i6 will change that

The CPU just about matches the latest releases in the Android world. If it's faster, it's a small difference.

64-bit means nothing in this context. Has no real advantages beyond allowing more than 4GB RAM to be addressed. It'll be a while before we get their; many macbooks still come with only 4GB RAM.

Fingerprint scanner could be useful, but as it stands now it's just a gimmick. Apple's not allowing 3rd parties access to it. If Apple included NFC and a Google wallet type app, it would have been perfect for payments -- online and off.

The camera is improved, but it's not that dramatic. They should have bumped it up to 12-15MP. Before someone says MP are meaningless, don't forget that downsampling a 15MP image to 8MP generally results in a similar (if not better) image to that of a native 8MP sensor. You can see this with the HTC One's so-called ultra pixels in comparison with any of the higher res sensors out there; the quality isn't any better when sampled to the same size. There are occasions where the extra resolution can be useful even with a quality hit, so it is worth improving the sensor.

 

[Colpeas]

Would people be screaming this was FAIL if Apple had done what they did last year and just kept the existing 5 but reduce it $100?

Well, they probably wouldn't. People are pretty much used to the iPhone's life cycle and that they can get last year's flagship for less money, but with all the perks of a flagship phone (such as aluminum finish).

The new 5C is basically the same device as the iPhone 5, true.
The new 5C costs as much as the iPhone 5 would probably cost, true.

However the 5C is not and has never been Apple's flagship model. It is made of plastic instead of aluminum (doesn't matter how excellent the plastic used on iP5C is, it's still plastic). So basically, you get less than you'd get if Apple ditched the iP5C project and kept the iPhone 5 instead. Yet, you pay the same price. In my eyes, that is a rip-off.

At very least, here in Europe, the "last year's models" very quite popular among corporate users. Companies were buying them because they were cheaper, yet representative and would serve its purpose more than well. I can't imagine a company buying 5Cs, though.

 

[paradox00]

.

Have you ever failed to read a thread in its entirety before looking foolish in your reply?



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Until you come up with a competent rebuttal for the iPod examples ("they're for kids" isn't even worthy of a response), people can feel free to bring it up again. Sorry I don't read all your posts, but I don't think I missed much.

 

[paradox00]

However the 5C is not and has never been Apple's flagship model. It is made of plastic instead of aluminum (doesn't matter how excellent the plastic used on iP5C is, it's still plastic). So basically, you get less than you'd get if Apple ditched the iP5C project and kept the iPhone 5 instead. Yet, you pay the same price. In my eyes, that is a rip-off.

You don't understand what rip off means. The 5C's never been a flagship model and it's never carried a flagship price, go figure. There's no sense in comparing it to what the 5 would have cost after the 5S launched, because that didn't ever happen anyway.

What did happen is they are launching the 5C with more LTE bands, an improved Facetime camera and a larger battery for $100 less than the iPhone 5 cost before it was discontinued. The 3G and 3GS launched at prices $100 more than the 5C (because they were flagships), yet were also polycarbonate. Were they rip offs too?

The funniest part of this all is that the 5C will probably sell incredibly well, so I doubt the market will consider it a "rip off".

 

[numlock]

You don't understand what rip off means. The 5C's never been a flagship model and it's never carried a flagship price, go figure. There's no sense in comparing it to what the 5 would have cost after the 5S launched, because that didn't ever happen anyway.

What did happen is they are launching the 5C with more LTE bands, an improved Facetime camera and a larger battery for $100 less than the iPhone 5 cost before it was discontinued. The 3G and 3GS launched at prices $100 more than the 5C (because they were flagships), yet were also polycarbonate. Were they rip offs too?

The funniest part of this all is that the 5C will probably sell incredibly well, so I doubt the market will consider it a "rip off".

the funniest part is you just pulled that last statement from your arse with nothing to back it up with.

the 5c can and will cost from $800 in countries where there are no contracts. for a year old device thats brutal.

apple will do nothing but decrease their marketshare

 

[macchiato2009]

AAPL -5% today

 

[paradox00]

the funniest part is you just pulled that last statement from your arse with nothing to back it up with.

the 5c can and will cost from $800 in countries where there are no contracts. for a year old device thats brutal.

apple will do nothing but decrease their marketshare

Funny you did the same thing. Except your reasoning is flawed. Even if they kept the iPhone 5, it would still be a year old device costing $800 (citation needed) in countries where there are no contracts. Why would that sell better? Because of the case? Really? Every report I've read says this case feels fantastic. I think the increased LTE compatibility, bigger battery and the new look of the 5C would be bigger sellers.

The iPhone 5C is not a year old device. It's a new device with year old internals. I'm sure you can find plenty of those in Samsungs lineup. This isn't an unusual strategy, it's actually quite common, because its effective.

Time will tell who's pulling things out of their "arse".

I feel like I just repeated what I said in my first post. Which I guess is true, since you actually never bothered to address any of the actual points I made.

 

[numlock]

Funny you did the same thing. Except your reasoning is flawed. Even if they kept the iPhone 5, it would still be a year old device costing $800 (citation needed) in countries where there are no contracts. Why would that sell better? Because of the case? Really? Every report I've read says this case feels fantastic. I think the increased LTE compatibility, bigger battery and the new look of the 5C would be bigger sellers.

The iPhone 5C is not a year old device. It's a new device with year old internals. I'm sure you can find plenty of those in Samsungs lineup. This isn't an unusual strategy, it's actually quite common, because its effective.

Time will tell who's pulling things out of their "arse".

I feel like I just repeated what I said in my first post. Which I guess is true, since you actually never bothered to address any of the actual points I made.

i wasnt bothered by the rest of your post but by your justification of your opinion by just making that blanket statement.

you are absolutely right that the situation is not very different from what it was before and offering a year old device (now you can pretty it up and call it year old internals) but thats part of the issue that has led apple to losing marketshare and offering pink colored plastic cases is not going to change that.

im not familiar enough with samsungs offerings but do they charge premium price for those devices? because to me when you are coughing up almost a $1000 you should be getting the latest

 

[Pro31]

Seems like too many people are just settling on this as being the maturity of a smartphone. With all of the smart people working there, and huge amount of resources, you can not tell me that this is all they can come up with. It isn't about building "insanely great" products anymore. It is about building good enough products that make lots of cash.

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I dont get why people are so upset over the 5S reveal, i think its a pretty dam ****ing good upgrade....

2x cpu speed, 2x gpu speed which will make the 5S with the fastest gpu in a smartphone on the marketagain

A 64 bit architecture

Fingerprint scanner which i think is amazing

A extremely welcome update to the camera, 15% larger pixels on the camera with a f2.2 aperature should alllow for much faster photos taken, and better low light performance which may be almost as good as the One in low light.

I feel like they could of made the screen a little bigger but oh well the i6 will change that

There is NO innovation that's why.

 

[bawbac]

It looks like these phones weren't made for those of you who carp, but for the 250 million people across the whole world who will buy them.

It's already been established that 90% of sales are those with iPhones upgrading for the sake of upgrading but these new iPhone offerings may not be enough to entice people to upgrade this time around.

*People are now more mindful & cautious after the iPad3 fiasco.

 

[Colpeas]

What did happen is they are launching the 5C with more LTE bands, an improved Facetime camera and a larger battery for $100 less than the iPhone 5 cost before it was discontinued. The 3G and 3GS launched at prices $100 more than the 5C (because they were flagships), yet were also polycarbonate. Were they rip offs too?

Well, I don't know much about prices of the 3G in the USA, but I remember that here in the Czech Republic I got my first iP3G, the 16GB variant, for 14100CZK (which is €550) off-contract. And it was the "expensive" model, the 8GB was like 11500CZK (~ €450). My next iPhone, the 4S 16GB, was 14500CZK (€560) and it WAS the aluminum/glass flagship back then. Now the least expensive (note that I don't say "the cheapest") plastic 5C is €599 (15500CZK)... In my eyes, that qualifies the 5C for a rip-off.

I'm not saying 5C won't sell, just that it's not quite the cheap iPhone despite the fact it looks cheap as *******. Now I know the C in the name doesn't stand for "cheap" of "classic" but rather for "crap".

 

[Colpeas]

The iPhone 5C is not a year old device. It's a new device with year old internals. I'm sure you can find plenty of those in Samsungs lineup. This isn't an unusual strategy, it's actually quite common, because its effective.

Sorry, but I don't see a difference between a "year-old device" and a device with "year-old internals".

I know that "new" Samsung phones are basically what 5C is to 5, and I know it's effective, but there's one BIG difference between how Apple and Samsung do it: Samsung puts the old guts in low-end phones, whereas Apple is trying to make iPhone 5C look cheap, yet genuinely new and hi-end. They wouldn't be able to do it if they kept the 5 in their lineup, because it would be a year-old phone for everybody.

 

[paradox00]

I'm not saying 5C won't sell, just that it's not quite the cheap iPhone despite the fact it looks cheap as *******. Now I know the C in the name doesn't stand for "cheap" of "classic" but rather for "crap".

Wow, I've never heard that before. The C stands for colour, not "crap" or any other "creative" term you can come up with. Anyone who's actually held one says it looks and feels like the premium phone it is.

Prices in NA are a lot more stable than elsewhere, so I can't comment on what you've experienced, but the iPhone 5 wouldn't have been any cheaper than what the 5C is.

----------

Sorry, but I don't see a difference between a "year-old device" and a device with "year-old internals".

I know that "new" Samsung phones are basically what 5C is to 5, and I know it's effective, but there's one BIG difference between how Apple and Samsung do it: Samsung puts the old guts in low-end phones, whereas Apple is trying to make iPhone 5C look cheap, yet genuinely new and hi-end. They wouldn't be able to do it if they kept the 5 in their lineup, because it would be a year-old phone for everybody.

The difference is in the sales potential. It's higher in the case.

 

[Macomatic]

And I don't know why you're still using iTunes to transfer anything to your phone. I don't remember the last time I plugged my phone into my computer to do anything but upload photos and videos, which I use image capture for, not iTunes. Music, Contacts, Calendars, Apps, Backups are all handled by iCloud pretty seamlessly now.

Easy answer: From my Macs to my iDevices I upload videos to watch, books to read, and music and lectures to listen to. I upload photos that I made with a professional camera to my iDevices to show to friends. Everything has to be funneled through the awful iTunes interface because you can't drag and drop anything into the iDevice's file system directly. Image Capture is just for downloading stuff from the iPhone/iPad, not for uploading stuff to it.

 

[PrometheusGeek]

What's new? The 5C is an iPhone 5 in a colored plastic case, nothing else. "All new" are not the words that anybody except for maybe Apple's marketing team would use to describe this refurbished phone from last year.

Even the 5S has nothing exciting to show. A 64-Bit CPU with less than 4GB RAM brings ZERO advantages to the mix; the CPU might be faster than its predecessor, but that's not because of the 64-Bit architecture. Also, there is zero software out there that was optimized for 64-Bit. By the time developers have adopted the new architecture, the iPhone 9s will probably be due for renewal. Short: At this point, "64-Bit" only looks good on the spec sheet. Just as "64-Bit" on the PowerMac G5 and Mac Pro 1,1 boxes only looked good in the brochures; there never was any software from Apple or others available that could actually use those CPUs. (Snow Leopard could not even run in 64-Bit mode on the Mac Pro 1,1.)

So what's left are two NSA sensors and an extremely hefty price. It's the year 2013. If Apple want to stay relevant in the smartphone arena, they have to do a lot better than this.

Ignorance+paranoia+arrogance=your post

 

[ultmtfloydian]

To be fair, Tim Cook was (and still to this day quite obviously) is an analyst. He is not a visionary like his predecessor, and only really knows how to do what he does. And from everything I've seen in the last two and a half years, has been nothing but trying to streamline and squeeze every bity morsel out of a product (to the effect of wasting time and losing ground competitively) to ensure continued profits. That sounds like a number crunching analyst if I've ever heard of one before.

The guy doesn't want a new model because that would mean more profits being lost. You ABSOLUTLY cannot be conservative in this market. But yet, you can't always be liberal either. Jobs overall goal was to embetter people's lives by making truly revolutionary products. Cook's goal is to continue crunching numbers and ensure that the company itself stays afloat by any means nessesary by making profits.

Ironically enough however, you need to have customers to make profits, and by their current over-conservative strategy, they may be gaining profits presently, however losing more and more profit down the line, and their customers (not to mention die-hard fans). I believe Cook is a good analyst, but simply not the visionary Apple desperately needs right now.

 

[doug in albq]

To be fair, Tim Cook was (and still to this day quite obviously) is an analyst. He is not a visionary like his predecessor, and only really knows how to do what he does. And from everything I've seen in the last two and a half years, has been nothing but trying to streamline and squeeze every bity morsel out of a product (to the effect of wasting time and losing ground competitively) to ensure continued profits. That sounds like a number crunching analyst if I've ever heard of one before.

The guy doesn't want a new model because that would mean more profits being lost. You ABSOLUTLY cannot be conservative in this market. But yet, you can't always be liberal either. Jobs overall goal was to embetter people's lives by making truly revolutionary products. Cook's goal is to continue crunching numbers and ensure that the company itself stays afloat by any means nessesary by making profits.

Ironically enough however, you need to have customers to make profits, and by their current over-conservative strategy, they may be gaining profits presently, however losing more and more profit down the line, and their customers (not to mention die-hard fans). I believe Cook is a good analyst, but simply not the visionary Apple desperately needs right now.

Great post. Tim is a "bean-counter" CEO...I do not think this will work for a company like Apple in the long run. He should be the CFO, Apple should get a new CEO...BTW, I am available for that position!

 

[joejoejoe]

Easy answer: From my Macs to my iDevices I upload videos to watch, books to read, and music and lectures to listen to. I upload photos that I made with a professional camera to my iDevices to show to friends. Everything has to be funneled through the awful iTunes interface because you can't drag and drop anything into the iDevice's file system directly. Image Capture is just for downloading stuff from the iPhone/iPad, not for uploading stuff to it.

Thank you, but I'm very well aware of what image capture does, as I use it every day, as I mentioned.

There are better ways to handle moving your files, as you find iTunes cumbersome, which I agree with. Books can be handled via iBooks, Kindle, or other ereading apps which all sync via the cloud, you can take that off your list. Photos from your professional camera can also be sent to your iDevice through photostream and iPhoto very easily. I'm a professional photographer and use the DropBox app, which is a very seamless experience. I haven't used iTunes for photo transfer in years.

The only one you mentioned which is more difficult is videos. That cannot be handled by iCloud, but presumably Apple will open AirDrop to work between Macs and iDevices which would basically eradicate all your issues above. Until then, you could use DropBox, or continue to deal with iTunes.

Still, videos aside, there are better ways to handle transferring data than it seems like you're used to doing, and by the sound of it, you're looking for better ways. I encourage you to use the methods above.

 

[karlwig]

There is only a 100.00 price differential between plastic and aluminum.

I see the 5c as holding little value, and the 5s a better buy.

Meanwhile, there is a much bigger difference between 5C and 5S than the plastic.

It's a very smart move though: Apple makes people think «from plastic to aluminium for 100 dollars less!» when in reality it's 100 dollars less for last years tech AND plastic.

Such a bad deal, especially when the iPhone 5 would have been sold as the same price point as 5C.