“Apple sold 4.03 million Macs in the March quarter, a 9% decline from the same period in 2015. It was the second consecutive quarterly contraction for the personal computer line,” Dennis Sellers writes for Apple World Today. “The problem, according to Ezra Gottheil, an analyst with Technology Business Research, is that Apple is ignoring its Mac line-up. He’s right.”
“Gottheil cited the line’s lack of innovation on both hardware and the OS X operating system—and confusing customers with overlap between models, particularly the 12-inch MacBook and the MacBook Air,” Sellers writes. “Of course, just updating the Mac product line would be welcome. Last week’s refresh of the MacBook and MacBook Air was merely incremental (I expect the Air line to disappear and the plain ol’ MacBook to be available in different sizes a la the MacBook Pro). The Mac Pro desktop hasn’t been updated since 2013. The Mac mini hasn’t been upgraded since 2014. And the Thunderbolt Display, which needs a 5K display, hasn’t been revved in four years!”
MacDailyNews Take: When you’ve sold yourself on the idea that the iPad is the future of personal computing by swallowing your own marketing hook, line, and sinker, and then fail to deliver on that promise for too long (skimping on RAM, offering underpowered multitasking, etc. – now, finally, largely corrected with iPad Pro), you neglect the horse that brung ya (Macintosh is his name) and shoot yourself in the foot (Q216 results, Mac sales unable to make up for the continued iPad sales decline, and Mac’s streak of outgrowing the PC market shattered).
Mirror, Tim Cook. Tim Cook, mirror.
A big picture revision and course correction would be well advised. Perhaps some new blood — not stuffed quite so complacently with RSUs, perhaps? — high up on the food chain, as well?
Here’s hoping Apple has big plans for Mac (software and hardware) at WWDC this June.
Hey, in the name of bridging the gap between traditional computers while we wait for tablets that can really displace them, how about a 12.9-inch device that’s an OS X-powered MacBook when docked with its keyboard base and an iOS-powered iPad Pro when undocked?
How many of those babies would Apple have sold last quarter, had they been available?
Illustration from Apple’s hybrid Mac-iPad patent application
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