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All iPads What could or should Apple do to iPad to increase revenue?

M

MisterK

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Jan 9, 2006
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Ottawa, Canada
I know it's a strange way to frame the question, but it's deliberate.
Selling more iPad units is easy... lower the price and more people will buy them (but revenue likely goes down).
Just asking "what should Apple do?" is just going to bring comments to turn it into a keyboard-less Mac (have it run macOS).

So what can Apple do to the iPad to keep it a compelling product for everyone from 2 year olds to 99 year olds AND keep interest up? How can they keep getting people to upgrade?

I ask because it's not an easy question. I usually have a quick answer for what they can do to their other product lines, but I'm pretty stumped on iPad. iPhone, they can just keep putting in better cameras, a faster processor, and have a cosmetic change every 3 years. Does that work for iPad? Not as many people use it as their camera. It's plenty fast for the games that are out... anyone who wants more AAA-level games than a current iPad Pro can handle likely has a console or games on PC. The cosmetic changes likely help.... but that's about as far as my guesses go.

I think this question is better than "what should Apple do to the iPad?" because it's more likely to answer what they *will* do.
 
This is a question better asked after chip shortages ease up, because it is pretty hard to find several models right now, but I think I want to join the "add proper external monitor support" crowd, at least for the USB-C models. I feel that Apple is missing an opportunity there.
 
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Hardware unit sales on both iPhones and iPads have been going down for a while now. There was a temporary surge due to COVID but I don't believe it's sustainable.

For Macs, Apple Silicon chips are giving an extra boost in sales.

However, hardware is way more than capable enough that most customers will likely be keeping their newly purchased iPhones, iPads and Apple Silicon Macs for years. I doubt there are many who upgrade their Macs every 2-3 years. Expect the same on the iPad.

Heck, if not for carrier subsidies and installment plans on iPhones, I doubt they would be selling so much every year.
 
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rui no onna said:
Hardware unit sales on both iPhones and iPads have been going down for a while now. There was a temporary surge due to COVID but I don't believe it's sustainable.

For Macs, Apple Silicon chips are giving an extra boost in sales.

However, hardware is way more than capable enough that most customers will likely be keeping their newly purchased iPhones, iPads and Apple Silicon Macs for years. I doubt there are many who upgrade their Macs every 2-3 years. Expect the same on the iPad.

Heck, if not for carrier subsidies and installment plans on iPhones, I doubt they would be selling so much every year.
Click to expand...

Apple just had their biggest quarter in the company’s history. Nothing is “going down” about iPhone sales. iPad sales were hit by a significant supply shortage, as Apple shifted certain components from iPads to meet iPhone demand. iPad sales will pick back up in 2022.

And your last sentence about carrier subsidies is sort of a … well, duh. And if the sun didn’t shine, then plants wouldn’t grow.
 
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MisterK said:
lower the price and more people will buy them (but revenue likely goes down)
Click to expand...

sracer said:
A. Reduce costs and increase prices.
Click to expand...

(Hi, I'm KaliYoni and I have a finance and accounting problem...)
Lowering prices, if it increases the number of units sold, will increase revenue but decrease gross profit per unit (and possibly income and earnings).

Now, if Apple wants to grow unit sales of iPads past the historical average, I think there are three main paths it could follow:
  1. Lower the price (least likely, given Apple's historical and current marketing strategy)
  2. Identify and target new market segments for tablets
  3. Develop new use cases for tablets
The second and third paths will be difficult as long as Apple is concerned about cannibalizing iPhone and Mac sales. I wouldn't be surprised if Apple is content to give iPads a minimal amount of attention and to just milk the product category for whatever profits are available from the existing market.

----------
ETA: another relevant factor is that Apple's annual revenue is in the hundreds of billions. That means it takes a lot to move the needle on any of its financials. Apple needs to sell millions more iPads to get even a 1% increase in annual revenue. At the moment, I believe the tablet market is mature and would require a big investment to get any kind of meaningful growth.
 
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MisterK said:
I think this question is better than "what should Apple do to the iPad?" because it's more likely to answer what they *will* do.
Click to expand...

Keep the entry level model storage at 16 or 32GB. The next upgrade option to 512GB is $512. Classic Apple strategy. Oh yeah, then put a lot of new undocumented new features / changes into the OS. :):):apple::apple:
 
A pro iPadOS will not move the needle as the iPad is for most users and gateway to internet, media consumption, note taking, and gaming. If they want to sell more iPads they need to improve the software features so much so current iPads are unbearable slow to use. Then people will switch. Considering M1 works well in Macs and the A14/15 are real monsters - we will not see any slowdown due to software improvements anytime soon.

As suggested lower the prices for the base iPad, pencil and keyboard cover and assume people buy services.

For me to switch from 2017 iPP 12.9? Hmm, 15+ inch and a really good camera system. Likely when the M3/M4 version is released.
 
turbineseaplane said:
Improve the software so much that it makes current iPads unbearably slow?

Like -- what does that even mean?
Click to expand...
Do you remember the years around the millinum shift in the PC World? OS and software rapidly got so complex so 3 year old computer could not run them.
 
turbineseaplane said:
Improve the software so much that it makes current iPads unbearably slow?

Like -- what does that even mean?
Click to expand...

I'm not sure improve is the word I'd use for making iOS more bloated but I get the concept. Just look at iPad 2/3 on iOS 9. Super unbearable to use.

With that said, A12 onwards are very fast that I don't see them slowing down apart from artificially lowering performance which is a class action lawsuit waiting to happen.
 
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MisterK said:
I think this question is better than "what should Apple do to the iPad?" because it's more likely to answer what they *will* do.
Click to expand...
It’s basically the same question though.

Apple is already maximising its revenue from iPad sales (within the context of everything else it’s selling, and whilst also adhering to whatever philosophies and future plans it has devised).
turbineseaplane said:
Work. On. Software.
Click to expand...
They did this already. It‘s called MacOS! You just have to buy a Mac to use it is all.
 
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KaliYoni said:
(Hi, I'm KaliYoni and I have a finance and accounting problem...)
Lowering prices, if it increases the number of units sold, will increase revenue but decrease gross profit per unit (and possibly income and earnings).

Now, if Apple wants to grow unit sales of iPads past the historical average, I think there are three main paths it could follow:
  1. Lower the price (least likely, given Apple's historical and current marketing strategy)
  2. Identify and target new market segments for tablets
  3. Develop new use cases for tablets
The second and third paths will be difficult as long as Apple is concerned about cannibalizing iPhone and Mac sales. I wouldn't be surprised if Apple is content to give iPads a minimal amount of attention and to just milk the product category for whatever profits are available from the existing market.
Click to expand...
Apple doesn't care about units sold. They're about net profits. In that respect they are doing just fine.

They do exactly what I suggested they do.... decrease cost and increase price. But it isn't the simplistic formula that one might assume when they hear that. They don't simply go with the lowest cost vendor for a component and then increase the price.

What they do is to add features that cost pennies (or might even cost them less) and increase the price. This is why the iPad gen 1 started at $500 and (except for the entry-level iPad) iPad prices have increased dramatically. It is why they sell a $2000 iPad Pro configuration. The profit margin on those iPads is larger than on the entry level and they're making a boatload of money.

For example, they add a feature that costs them $10 to add, and they charge an additional $100.

Please note, I'm not complaining or criticizing Apple for doing this. It's smart. It works. But that's what they do.

This is why the base iPad 9th gen at the base storage capacity is the best value for the money.
 
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rui no onna said:
Hardware unit sales on both iPhones and iPads have been going down for a while now. There was a temporary surge due to COVID but I don't believe it's sustainable.

For Macs, Apple Silicon chips are giving an extra boost in sales.

However, hardware is way more than capable enough that most customers will likely be keeping their newly purchased iPhones, iPads and Apple Silicon Macs for years. I doubt there are many who upgrade their Macs every 2-3 years. Expect the same on the iPad.

Heck, if not for carrier subsidies and installment plans on iPhones, I doubt they would be selling so much every year.
Click to expand...
I agree with you on this. 5 or 6 years ago, devices were gaining a lot of power yearly (at least, iOS devices, as Intel macs were a bit stagnated), but now, I think we can easily assume that current devices have 8 to 10 years of use ahead. Well, maybe most will replace the devices after 5 or 6 years, but still, it is a lot of time, and just like you said, sales are going to go down slowly. And this is especially true with iPads and iPad pros
 
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Educate Developers better on how to make apps that will play well on the iPad (Look at Filesystem—gate issues), and get more premium AAA+ developers and apps to come to iPad. Probbably actually provide more of the full MacOS APIs on the iPadOS so bigname developers can easily port their apps to iPad as well. Make that process as painless as possible.

This is the single most important thing Apple needs to focus on.
And theres 10 empty places after it.
 
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MisterK said:
I know it's a strange way to frame the question, but it's deliberate.
Selling more iPad units is easy... lower the price and more people will buy them (but revenue likely goes down).
Just asking "what should Apple do?" is just going to bring comments to turn it into a keyboard-less Mac (have it run macOS).

So what can Apple do to the iPad to keep it a compelling product for everyone from 2 year olds to 99 year olds AND keep interest up? How can they keep getting people to upgrade?

I ask because it's not an easy question. I usually have a quick answer for what they can do to their other product lines, but I'm pretty stumped on iPad. iPhone, they can just keep putting in better cameras, a faster processor, and have a cosmetic change every 3 years. Does that work for iPad? Not as many people use it as their camera. It's plenty fast for the games that are out... anyone who wants more AAA-level games than a current iPad Pro can handle likely has a console or games on PC. The cosmetic changes likely help.... but that's about as far as my guesses go.

I think this question is better than "what should Apple do to the iPad?" because it's more likely to answer what they *will* do.
Click to expand...
Interesting question. I think (albeit with a lot of caveats) that with the gradual maturing of foldable phones, the dedicated tablet scene would transition into a specialised space. This would likely mean that the cost per unit would go up while the market size would shrink. The smaller iPads would probably be the first casualty to this. Indeed Apple may itself develop and release a foldable phone in their characteristically slick way to address the market.
 
If you call the hardware “Pro”, make it run Pro software.
The fck are you asking us what the folks in Cupertino should do, they have years of comments and ideas to sort through and integrate, thousands of feature requests from normal people that see that the iPad is limited only by their stubborn developers to actual professionals noticing the same thing but with more pain in their demands. This thread ain’t gonna change anything, especially if it’s titled that way.
The ideas are out there and have been since Steve walked on the stage, Apple just chooses to ignore them.
 
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turbineseaplane said:
Work. On. Software.

As it now stands, iPads will never be more than an internet and media consumption device for me.
Click to expand...
I think people are using their stuff wrong when I hear this.

I’m running my entire life off my iPad. Literally everything. Including work now. I only ever use the mac to torrent the odd thing and run backups.

I cover hundreds of use cases with it absolutely no problem with no compromise.

Just yesterday I was sitting in a London station with it fixing a broken kubernetes cluster control plane with three other people on zoom. I spent the evening on the same device editing some photos and doing some drawings with procreate. It’s 100% productive and creative not consumption oriented.
 
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Apple seems to see Chromebooks and Android tablets as its immediate competitors in the tablet space. It smokes them both in CPU power, interface, software support and app eco system.

I would like Apple to think about the low-end Windows laptop market. Some people really do weigh up a base iPad against a £/€/$300 Windows machine when considering purchases. I would like Apple to make iPadOS more compelling when consumers are factoring in iPadOS vs Windows.

Apple could find a balance between ease of use and OS complexity, to make its OS more compelling. Also given we are talking about the low-end there is no question of confusing the MacOS and iPadOS marketplace.
 
Attract more developers.... I mean the OS is one part of the issue, the lack of must-have apps is embarrassing!

Love Affinity and Luma, but other than that there are a few drawing app.

We need more professional app on the iPad.
 
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