101–110 of 551 posts
Is this something that Apple can address with more competitive pricing in China?
Perhaps in small part due to recent FBI case?
I run a repair shop. We've repaired over 3,000 Apple devices for customers. We are always chatting with our customers, so we get a ton of feedback from them about what they're doing with their phones. We hear a few things consistently: 1) Providers have switched from "free upgrades every 2 years" to a plan cost and a monthly phone cost, so people now really know how much their phone costs--and many would rather save…
Incredible that this is the first time in 13 years that Apple hasn't posted quarterly growth. I'm sure there will be lots of "Apple has lost its ability to innovate" articles based on this, but growing for the last ~52 straight quarters is insane. And I don't think one quarter without growth is enough evidence to conclude "Apple may be reaching the saturation point among potential customers in some countries" or "oth…
I do think Apple needs to focus their money and efforts on improving their services and software integration. There's a lot to like in Apple services, but there's a lot of rough edges and weird gaps, and too often I feel like apps get written and then abandoned. If you bundle an app, it should have a dedicated team that keeps making it better, faster, easier to use all the time.
I also feel like Apple has a real chance to make a mark on the home automation market if they chose to do so. The best stuff out there is still pretty bad, and pretty much all of it spies on you. Based on how they've been adding context-aware features to iPhone in a very privacy-conscious way, Apple is the one company I would still trust to actually try to do home automation in a way that respects my privacy. And they have the money to invest in making it happen. But while I'm sure their hardware would be well-made, can they raise their software polish to the same level?
I'm curious what other people think about the ecosystem as a catalyst, in particular Apple Pay. It seems to be that squeezing between iPhone owners and everyday purchases would be very lucrative.
It seems to be that squeezing between iPhone owners and everyday purchases would be very lucrative And something that Banks will very strongly oppose. How many places can you use Apple Pay right now? I love Android Pay, but the only store I can use it at is Walgreens -- no where else I go takes it. Banks still hold a huge amount of power at the point-of-sale market, and they will not give up their margins to Apple.
>Apple said it would raise its quarterly dividend 10 percent to 57 cents a share and increase the amount of stock it buys back to $175 billion. Surely that's the NYT's typo and they mean million with an M, right? EDIT: Not a typo, see mbrubeck's reply below.
No typo. A year ago they had authorized $140 billion, and had already repurchased more than $80 billion. https://www.apple.com/pr/library/2015/04/27Apple-Expands-Cap... ($175 million would be less than three hundredths of one percent of Apple's market cap.)
Incredible that this is the first time in 13 years that Apple hasn't posted quarterly growth. I'm sure there will be lots of "Apple has lost its ability to innovate" articles based on this, but growing for the last ~52 straight quarters is insane. And I don't think one quarter without growth is enough evidence to conclude "Apple may be reaching the saturation point among potential customers in some countries" or "oth…
The era where cell phone companies offered phone subsidies as trade for a customer's long term commitment has ended. The impact this is having and will continue to have on smartphone sales is profound. It is much more likely that customers will upgrade their devices less frequently. We are already beginning to see the impact in Apple and Samsung earnings.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
now that phones are quite fast and have good cameras, what is the main driver towards upgrading? so that you go from 300ppi to 500ppi? not going to make much of a difference and for most people not worth the upgrade costs. The only issue is that phone manufacturers have even more of an incentive to bloat the OS more and more (and make it slower and slower on old models) and to deprecate it faster (on older models) so…
in general, hardware improvements will drive new swanky software, and make computing on smartphones closer to a first class citizen (remember motorola's laptop+phone dock, where the phone powers the laptop?). another big pain point is battery (and battery consumption). still waiting on hardware (and software in conjunction) to get more efficient. you'll remember how power hungry PCs were in the beginning and how much…