It was again Apple-time last week, with product presentations
on Tuesday, 10 September 2013. Rumour had it that one or more new iPhones in
the 5-series would be presented by the Cupertino (Ca) based brand Apple (AAPL).
This would not be a second too early: the competition of the
iPhone, consisting of the Android-driven brands Samsung, LG and the new Chinese
(!) luxury phone brand Huawei had not stood still.
During the last years, the aforementioned brands have turned
from trailers with a substantial technological arrears into the sweethearts of western
youngsters, with their enduring preference for the most advanced smartphone models.
The products of especially Samsung turned from phones that were ‘just not good
enough’ into larger, thinner and more technologically
advanced smartphones, with bigger and brighter led screens. On top of that… these
phones were sold at lower prices than the very expensive Apple iPhones, for
comparable models with an comparable amount of memory.
At this moment, Apple is yet the top-dog in the telephone
industry: the brand has still the highest margins in the business and it is steadily
turning from a hardware-driven ‘manufacturing’ company, into an apps-driven software
trading company.
The company earns container-loads of money, through its bestseller
iPad and its exclusive, closed operating systems for iPhone, iPod and iPad,
which forces customers to buy all software via Apple. The company’s iTunes store, with its exclusive
sales licenses for Apple apps is a real sales killer.
Reputedly, the company, with a stock value of about $350
billion, owns about $200 billion in cash alone. This money is waiting to be spent on innovation and new
products: truly amounts that some merchant banks would kill for in these trying
times.
At the same time, formerly important brands, like Sony
Ericsson and Motorola, have still not caught up their arrears upon Apple and
Samsung. And the new ‘Batman and Robin’ combination Microsoft/Nokia can only earn
back some of its lost credit through the presentation of telephone hardware, software
and apps(!), that are really new, good, innovative and competitively priced; when
they fail to do so, they should shut up and just fade away. For Blackberry, the
lights seem already to be dimmed forever, unless nothing less than a miracle
happens.
Nevertheless, Apple can certainly not rest on its laurels,
as its competition a. never sleeps and b. changes all the time.
Since the death of its founder, the company and its product
presentations have made a somewhat lackluster impression, as if the company is
still mourning about Steve Jobs’ untimely passing away. CEO Tim Cook seems more
like someone ‘looking after the shop’, than like an innovative and
uncompromising giant, who pushes the company firmly up into the 21st century. Although
nobody expected Cook to be exactly like Jobs, it seems that he is very much
unlike Jobs in his presentation and day-to-day leadership.
Still, maybe September 10 would be the date that Apple would
leave all these worries behind and strike back at its competitors with a grand
slam drive. Therefore, last Tuesday was a date that all Apple adepts and
gadget-lovers had written in their agenda’s with bold letters and three exclamation
marks.
It became a disappointing day, from my point of view…
There was indeed the long anticipated product presentation
of two new smartphones by Apple: the iPhone 5s and 5c. The iPhone 5s, with a
sales price of $199 (with a contract), must become the flagship of the company,
while the 5c is meant as an nicely priced, basic model ($99; also with a
contract): an iPhone for everybody who wanted to own an Apple, but couldn’t
afford it yet.
The flagship iPhone 5s is available in space gray, gold and silver
and it has a 64 bit processor, new state-of-the-art sensors and phone unlocking
/ iTunes ordering through fingerprint recognition.
The ‘cheap but classy’ iPhone 5c has a plastic,
damage-resistant cover, which can be purchased in a number of primary colours.
It virtually brings back the good ole’ days of Nokia’s classic 5110 phone.
 |
| Nokia 5110 from 1997 Picture courtesy of Nokia Click to enlarge |
But that was about it!
- No bigger screens with Ultra-HD graphics;
- No sexy, soft and slender look-and-feel, turning the phones of the competition into ‘refrigerator-like' antiques;
- No Sennheiser hifi, studio microphones and high-end Infinity surround speakers with built-in THX-system;
- No 30 mPix camera’s with continuous, ultra high-speed video of IMAX-quality;
- No anti-gravity stimulator, Enterprise warp-drive or any other gadget out of this earth, which would put Apple back where it belongs: lightyears in advance.
It all wasn’t there, while Apple’s would-be customers were
hoping and begging for gadgets like these and Apple’s competition was shaking
and tooth-grinding in advance.
Consequently, it was (again) a disappointing presentation.
So disappointing in fact, that it
even brought Microsoft in action, in order to put some salt in Apple’s wounds.
An action that would have caused loud, scornful laugther in Cupertino only
two years ago, but probably now will lead CEO Tim Cook to pull a wry face.
And then I thought by myself: will Apple become the
Blackberry of 2014?
A brand that had a headstart and had been leading the pack
for a number of years, but just lost its touch?! Trailed by a competition that
had been more eager, innovative, efficient and hungry, than the brand itself?!
Although I’m not a user of Apple products (except for an
antiquated iPod from 2004), I respected the boundless innovation, marketing power
and infinite smartness of the brand, brought to it by the
genius business-man and visionary Steve Jobs. The iPhone, which I
always considered to be too expensive ( I am a Dutch scrooge), was nevertheless
a sales monster that turned the whole telecom industry upside down. Just like
Blackberry did it in its days.
But it seems that Steve Jobs passing away at one hand, and
the enormous influx of cash flows from iPhones, iPads and the iTunes-store during
the last decade, has made the brand lazy, reflective and self-satisfied.
Of course, the influx of cash flows from the iTunes store
will remain for a number of years: people, who currently own an iPhone or iPad,
will continue to purchase new software for their devices. This will keep the
revenues in the green territory for at least two to three years.
Yet imagine: what will the 17 year-old, pimple-laden western
adolescent do, when he wants to purchase a new smartphone from his hard-earned
holiday-earnings?! And what will the Japanese and Chinese gadget-lovers do,
when they enter a telecom shop?!
Still, purchase an iPhone?! Or perhaps, look a little bit
further?!
That is the question that all owners of Apple stock must ask
themselves, this fall.
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