Yeah and that is asinine. It’s the same philosophy as people walking into a car dealer and instead of negotiating on final price, they get suckered into payment negotiation. The 4 squares trick. It’s a bad idea financially. If you lease everything you never own anything. I just couldn’t imagine paying to rent a phone. I get a pretty good return on Apple products when I sell them, especially compared to I dunno, every other electriconics company out there.
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Other "We heard you" - said Apple never
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Yeah and that is asinine. It’s the same philosophy as people walking into a car dealer and instead of negotiating on final price, they get suckered into payment negotiation. The 4 squares trick. It’s a bad idea financially. If you lease everything you never own anything. I just couldn’t imagine paying to rent a phone. I get a pretty good return on Apple products when I sell them, especially compared to I dunno, every other electriconics company out there.
I dont know what more he needs to do for the board to notice??? Inflated prices across the board with no corresponding leap in innovation? Inflated product line causing confusion among customers? Nickle and diming the customer with unreasonable low storage entry levels and massively overprices simple peripherals?
The street has already noticed and is drawing parallels between this Apple now and the Apple of early 90s. Stock move downward matches as well. Tim Cook has been ridding the momentum that Apple has had from Steve's innovations. now its slowly being milked dry. That's what happens when you put an operations guys in charge of an innovative giant. ahem Sculley ahem...
The problem with being #1 is that you can only go downhill from there.
Apple at $230 was clearly overpriced. Whoever bought at that price should be hit in the head with an iPad Pro.
Do you think the board is concerned with how pro-consumer Apple is vs. how much money they're making?
This year, and next year, they'll sort this stuff out, and then we'll see.
Just curious, what other smart phone manufacters are _that_ far ahead of Apple in terms of ‘innovating.’ The way I see it, the competition is fairly close, but I don’t see the competition ‘leaping’ Apple either.
Did I ever say someone was ahead of Apple? My only gripe is the massively inflated prices across all product lines with no corresponding jump in innovation. For example, iPhone X jumped to $999 starting price when the iPhone 7 started at $649 a year prior. That over 50% hike in starting price for the "small iPhone". Not to mention the absurd price of homepod $399 and all the nickle and diming with dongles.... At some point, people will be tired of getting squeezed and will strongly affect your brand equity.
I mean you could’ve bought food for the whole week with £1 a few decades back. So yeah... there’s that.
I understand. But I asked you a question, what other smart phone manufacturer is ‘leaping’ Apple in innovation?
Ok, So, Face ID isn’t innovation? The first ever smart phone manufacturer to use 3-D facial mapping, and that’s not Innovation? What are you expecting a smart phone to do for you that Apple hasn’t presented themselves with yet? I get your complaint with the pricing, that’s been discussed many times over, but you specifically mentioned they lacked innovation, as in what exactly?
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They aren't inflated if you take the (justified, in my opinion, based on how Apple has marketed the phones) view that the XR is the "normal" iPhone for this year (as the 8 was last year vs the X) while the XS and XS Max are in a new premium tier above the standard phones. There's a fuller exploration of that here:
I think if you went back in time to 2007 and told someone that you could get a device with all the capabilities and form factor of a current-generation iPhone for what they cost now they wouldn't believe they would be so cheap.Daring Fireball said:
Are you claiming that inflation is responsible for a +50% price increase in one year?
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I disagree with that premise. The iPhone 4 was a massive jump in innovation compared to the 3GS with glass front and back, steel band around the edges, first retina screen, first dual core processor, first front facing camera, HD video recording, list goes on and on... You could argue that it was a bigger jump than the iPhone X was from the iPhone 7. Yet, it came all at the same starting price of $549.
We have to be realistic and accept that the new Apple pricing strategy is completely out of whack as indicated in declining iPhone sales numbers (which Apple wont even publish anymore).
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If you went back to 2007 and told someone that the newest iPhone would cost almost as much as a MacBoook, they would tell you you are out of your mind....
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I have a feeling further down the line Apple are going to have to amalgamate the two tiers as the XR line becomes established unless they make more of a physical difference between them. I think Apple were hoping the X line would capture the consumers hearts in regard to being accepted as the ‘normal’ iPhone but that hasn’t really worked out.
A massive problem all smartphone manufacturers have now is the fact the innovations they are bringing are not stand out jumps like we used to see. It’s all about cameras, screens and processors now but even those are almost invisible to the consumer year on year. I do think we are used to what a smartphone is capable of now and with that the need to upgrade as often has ceased.
I’m saying prices do go up. You can’t expect for the price to stay the same when there are so many moving variable in the industry. Price of the NAND chips used by apple for one, price of using 7nm processor die. A lot of it you can’t compare as an apple to apple.
prices did go up before over the years from $549 to $599 to $649 to $699 through the generations. But going from $699 to $999 in a year is unreasonable. there was always innovation priced in, no more or less than before. A 50% jump is unreasonable and just pure greed.
How can we say this without any quantifiable data?!
For example,
- we don’t know how much apple spent for the edge to edge display and Face ID tech while in R&D.
- We don’t know the changes in tax rules across the world.
- We don’t know the money spent for bringing 7nm processors.
- We don’t know the R&D cost for the A12 Bionic.
- We don’t know how much they spent for HomePod.
On top of all that, in general OLED panels cost more than LCD panels. Plus the other extra bits and blobs like the camera enhancements, the better shatter resistance. All these do take money to come about.
It’s very easy to make generalised statements like greed or whatever, at the end of the day I think we should focus on the profit margin on top of production cost and I think that has remained the same to a greater extent.
You could have said the exact same thing about the retina display in the iPhone 4 in 2010. Im sure it was considerably more expensive than the LCD in the 3GS. All the points you mentioned are attributable to every generation of iPhone. Yet again, prices did not jump by 50%. I find it hard to believe that all of the sudden, Apple had a 100% jump in costs which would needed for a 50% hike in retail price to cover.
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not it has not, its grown quite a lot in absolute basis vs 642$ net profit from the iPhone X vs 412$ for the iPhone 8
https://9to5mac.com/2017/11/06/how-much-iphone-x-costs-apple-to-make/
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Except they didn't go from $699 to $999 for the base model phone. 7 = $649 8= $699 Xr= $749
I don't see anything too unreasonable about this pricing. The Xr is a better phone than the base 8 although I think they could have kept it at $699. Expecting OLED, premium build, etc. for the same price or only a few dollars more than an iPhone 8 is what sounds unreasonable.....
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There’s more than one thing going on here. But I think a lot has to do with a saturated market. The first iPhone I got was an iPhone 4 and I’m a tech kind of guy. Many of my friends didn’t get an iPhone/smartphone until the iPhone 5 or even iPhone 5s. That wasnt that long ago. And some are still using their iPhone 5’s or 5s.
There also use to be much more iPhone hype in the media. I can remember the “excitement” when many thought that the iPhone 4s was actually going to be a complete redesign - ie an iPhone 5. Of course that wasn’t true. My sister in-law was hugely disappointed when the iPhone 4s looked like an iPhone 4. She wasnt interested in what the 4s could do. She just wanted something to look different, like a fashion accessory.
There also use to be much more iPhone hype in the media. I can remember the “excitement” when many thought that the iPhone 4s was actually going to be a complete redesign - ie an iPhone 5. Of course that wasn’t true. My sister in-law was hugely disappointed when the iPhone 4s looked like an iPhone 4. She wasnt interested in what the 4s could do. She just wanted something to look different, like a fashion accessory.
Then by your admission, Apple should have charged $999 for the iPhone 4 and 4S as well. They had premium materials and the best screen available at the time they were released.
The iPhone XR is a 2nd tier Apple release, akin to the iPhone 5C. We all know how that worked out for the 1st time...
No, but if that's the way you want to twist it to prove your point, have at it.
My point speaks for itself and sensible people get it. If you think the Xr is the equivalent of a 5c I don't even know what to tell you except you're incredibly wrong.
What do you determine as massively? They’ve gone from a $tn to a $760bn company. Peaking at $232 a share in Oct. They’re now at $160 a share.
A $240bn loss in worth is massive to the vast majority of the planet. And bigger than some countries GDP!
We will see who is wrong or not. History has proven that customers dont purchase 2nd tier colorful iPhones even at a lower price. Mulltiple reports are consistently pointing to lower than expected iPhone XR sales. Suppliers are closing down manufacturing lines dedicated to the XR. All things point to a disappointment...except your denialNo, but if that's the way you want to twist it to prove your point, have at it.
No, but if that's the way you want to twist it to prove your point, have at it.
Although @Ermir444 has got a point in terms of 2nd tier devices not selling well, by no means 5C was a failure. It was not successful in Apple’s standard. Samsung and other Android manufacturers will be delighted with those sells figures.
https://appleinsider.com/articles/1...indows-phone-and-every-android-flagship-in-q4
That is a big hit in terms of market cap but not a loss in PnL. The real selloff will start if Apple will announce lower than expected iPhoone revenues, which I suspect they will. This is anecdotal proof, but i dont know a single iPhone XS/+ user and all the people i know who were looking to purchase an XR have gone for last year's iPhone X even at a small premium.
I don't determine it, apple does. If we see changes going forward then you know apple see that as a massive loss, if we don't, then it's clear apple don't see that as an issue.
Your question assumes that your readers are adept at accurately predicting the future, which is simply an incorrect assumption. My question to you is.. who is forcing you to buy Apple products?
A rant is usually caused by a perceived injustice, and the quickest way to avoid these types of stress triggers is to either learn from a mistake or avoid dealing with the object which caused the perceived injustice. Which would be easier for you, learning from a mistake? Or, avoiding Apple products?
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