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JM

macrumors 601
Original poster
Nov 23, 2014
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I'm looking forward to getting the X in 2020, when that beautiful design is closer to affordability (< $550).

I would love to have more gestures and no home button.....

Keeping the 7 I just got for ~3 years.

Why does the gestural interface of the X have to cost $999? It's really great....
 
It has to cost that much because a hell lot of time, money and effort has been put in to make it work the way it does and engineers like to get paid for their efforts and also the company wants to make profit to keep going.
 
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I'm looking forward to getting the X in 2020, when that beautiful design is closer to affordability (< $550).

I would love to have more gestures and no home button.....

Keeping the 7 I just got for ~3 years.

Why does the gestural interface of the X have to cost $999? It's really great....
If you meant 2nd or 3rd hand then yes..
Prices have moved to a higher plane and are not going to drop that much!
 
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Gesture control is just the beginning. These will continue to expand with more functionality and I also assume the sensors in used in for Face ID will offer more functionality with how we interact with our displays when looking at them.
 
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It has to cost that much because a hell lot of time, money and effort has been put in to make it work the way it does and engineers like to get paid for their efforts and also the company wants to make profit to keep going.

With 256 billion in offshore accounts they really need that 300% markup to keep going lol. They could have sold the X for the same price as the 8 and still recorded a very healthy profit. The marketed the X as premium because it was brought forward a year early and needed to be differentiated from the 8. If they continue with this pricing structure then I would expect their brand power to shrink over the next 5 years.

There’s a very good reason why the iPhone 7 is the biggest seller despite 2 new releases.
 
The X is never going to be <$550. It will be discontinued before they cut the price by $450.
 
With 256 billion in offshore accounts they really need that 300% markup to keep going lol. They could have sold the X for the same price as the 8 and still recorded a very healthy profit. The marketed the X as premium because it was brought forward a year early and needed to be differentiated from the 8. If they continue with this pricing structure then I would expect their brand power to shrink over the next 5 years.

There’s a very good reason why the iPhone 7 is the biggest seller despite 2 new releases.

Hard to imagine someone failing to grasp how businesses work by a wider margin.
 
With 256 billion in offshore accounts they really need that 300% markup to keep going lol. They could have sold the X for the same price as the 8 and still recorded a very healthy profit. The marketed the X as premium because it was brought forward a year early and needed to be differentiated from the 8. If they continue with this pricing structure then I would expect their brand power to shrink over the next 5 years.

There’s a very good reason why the iPhone 7 is the biggest seller despite 2 new releases.

Well we only know how it compares to the 8 currently as we don't have X figures. I agree though, the 7 is the better value right now between that and the 8.
 
Hard to imagine someone failing to grasp how businesses work by a wider margin.
Quite. In Apples case it’s bordering on greed with the operating margin here in Europe. The tax loopholes they are using right now mean they are paying just over a quarter of the corporation tax they are supposed to pay. Combine that with a £200 increase in price compared to the US and even an idiot can understand why their latest prices are going down like a lead zeppelin.
 
Well we only know how it compares to the 8 currently as we don't have X figures. I agree though, the 7 is the better value right now between that and the 8.

I think it’s safe to say the X is not going to break any sales records. It’s too expensive to be their mainstream seller. I still haven’t met anybody who has bought it yet.
 
Quite. In Apples case it’s bordering on greed with the operating margin here in Europe. The tax loopholes they are using right now mean they are paying just over a quarter of the corporation tax they are supposed to pay. Combine that with a £200 increase in price compared to the US and even an idiot can understand why their latest prices are going down like a lead zeppelin.
There is no point talking about tax loopholes - every company does it because the system is rotten...
As for prices, if the consumers are thrilled enough to pay for it, then why wouldn't Apple charge that much (I must admit where I get upset is when it makes 60% margin on a product like 8 with no development cost associated with it)?
Most of the innovations are going to come from the TECH companies and we will soon be seeing the advent of trillion dollar Apples & Alphabets
 
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There is no point talking about tax loopholes - every company does it because the system is rotten...
As for prices, if the consumers are thrilled enough to pay for it, then why wouldn't Apple charge that much (I must admit where I get upset is when it makes 60% margin on a product like 8 with no development cost associated with it)?
Most of the innovations are going to come from the TECH companies and we will soon be seeing the advent of trillion dollar Apples & Alphabets

Well those loopholes are about to close up in Europe in light of the recent scandal involving dozens of companies, celebrities etc. I don’t think people are thrilled to be paying sky high prices. iPhone sales wouldn’t be declining in Europe’s largest market if everybody was happy. Price is starting to become a major incentive for people keeping phones longer than 2 years.
 
With 256 billion in offshore accounts they really need that 300% markup to keep going lol. They could have sold the X for the same price as the 8 and still recorded a very healthy profit. The marketed the X as premium because it was brought forward a year early and needed to be differentiated from the 8. If they continue with this pricing structure then I would expect their brand power to shrink over the next 5 years.

There’s a very good reason why the iPhone 7 is the biggest seller despite 2 new releases.
It was not surprising when I learned the 7 is selling better than 8... I bought the 7 right after the keynote on a good sale and am very very happy with it (wanted faster phone and larger keyboard than 5s), because I wasn't going to drop $999, or DEFINITELY not $699.

It's like Apple again didn't know what was going to happen. Like when they released the 5c and that quickly went to the bargain bin, never to be updated.

Maybe Apple knew the 7 would sell better than the questionable 8...
 
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I think it’s safe to say the X is not going to break any sales records. It’s too expensive to be their mainstream seller. I still haven’t met anybody who has bought it yet.

We'll see. They didn't have the supply issues many anticipated and they were sold out in a few minutes and continue to be. They easily outsold the 8 already. I wouldn't be surprised at all if they broke sales records with it. It's not that much more expensive than an 8 Plus.
 
The 7 has gestures as well, so I am not sure that you are missing much. The 7 also has 3D Touch gestures they took away on the X.
I am missing the no home button navigation... That is what I am missing. The 3d touch task switcher is nice, but much more difficult to use than a simple swipe up.

But I do enjoy the 7's 3d touch :)
 
We'll see. They didn't have the supply issues many anticipated and they were sold out in a few minutes and continue to be. They easily outsold the 8 already. I wouldn't be surprised at all if they broke sales records with it. It's not that much more expensive than an 8 Plus.

Perhaps it depends what country we are comparing here? It didn’t and hasn’t sold out in the UK and that’s mainly down to it being $1315 equivalent for the 64GB X. It’s far out of reach for a lot of your standard iPhone users so I can’t for a second see it out selling previous iterations.

In my personal experiences I have never experienced an iPhone launch and not had a single friend, colleague of family member buy the latest iPhone. I don’t know a single person this time around and the iPhone is pretty much king with most people I know. I’m also surprised by how little marketing it’s received here? It may well be in huge demand in the US but that’s only one market.
 
Perhaps it depends what country we are comparing here? It didn’t and hasn’t sold out in the UK and that’s mainly down to it being $1315 equivalent for the 64GB X. It’s far out of reach for a lot of your standard iPhone users so I can’t for a second see it out selling previous iterations.

In my personal experiences I have never experienced an iPhone launch and not had a single friend, colleague of family member buy the latest iPhone. I don’t know a single person this time around and the iPhone is pretty much king with most people I know. I’m also surprised by how little marketing it’s received here? It may well be in huge demand in the US but that’s only one market.

Fair point, yea thinking worldwide in terms of sales, but I can only speak for the US. It's about $15 more a month than a comparable iPhone 8 Plus, so the price isn't that big of a deal here. Anyway, we'll see eventually how they do. The X has been a hit over here.
 
With 256 billion in offshore accounts they really need that 300% markup to keep going lol. They could have sold the X for the same price as the 8 and still recorded a very healthy profit. The marketed the X as premium because it was brought forward a year early and needed to be differentiated from the 8. If they continue with this pricing structure then I would expect their brand power to shrink over the next 5 years.

There’s a very good reason why the iPhone 7 is the biggest seller despite 2 new releases.

What they do with their money is not the concern here. Making profit is the main objective of any business. They’re not a charity. If their research shows that they can charge more and people will still buy it then they will do that. Any company for that matter will do that. It’s not illegal to make profit.
 
Fair point, yea thinking worldwide in terms of sales, but I can only speak for the US. It's about $15 more a month than a comparable iPhone 8 Plus, so the price isn't that big of a deal here. Anyway, we'll see eventually how they do. The X has been a hit over here.
It would be huge here if we had your pricing. We pay more for the 8 than you do for the X which is why the £550 iPhone 7 is suddenly doing so well. I don’t think the love affair with Apple is as intense here as it used to be and Apple need success in every market as it’s what they are used to.

Samsung really shook the market up last year and Apple needed to react. From where I am standing they’ve somewhat failed. They’ve delivered a decent product but structured it so it’s unaffordable to the majority of people who they need to buy it. They may be happy with the number of iPhones being sold here, but is it the right one?
 
What they do with their money is not the concern here. Making profit is the main objective of any business. They’re not a charity. If their research shows that they can charge more and people will still buy it then they will do that. Any company for that matter will do that. It’s not illegal to make profit.
It’s not illegal to frighten somebody’s gran into paying 5 times the actual price of a boiler repair either but it’s morally wrong.

I’d much rather Apple pay their fair share of tax and that goes for every company rather than starving our economy of billions of pounds.

I don’t take a lenient view when Apple are charging £300 more for the iPhone than in other countries. Apple are not a charity I agree, but they need us more than we need them, fact.
 
Perhaps it depends what country we are comparing here? It didn’t and hasn’t sold out in the UK and that’s mainly down to it being $1315 equivalent for the 64GB X. It’s far out of reach for a lot of your standard iPhone users so I can’t for a second see it out selling previous iterations.

In my personal experiences I have never experienced an iPhone launch and not had a single friend, colleague of family member buy the latest iPhone. I don’t know a single person this time around and the iPhone is pretty much king with most people I know. I’m also surprised by how little marketing it’s received here? It may well be in huge demand in the US but that’s only one market.

It depends on the locale for sure. I’m in London and in my circle a lot of people have bought the X.
 
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