“Two analysts have suggested a new idea that could re-energize Apple, proposing that the tech giant create a subscription bundling of hardware and content that they dubbed ‘Apple Prime,’ Aaron Pressman reports for Fortune.
“The theoretical bundle would cost $50 per month and include an iPhone and an Apple TV, with subscribers getting new hardware when Apple issues updates, Goldman Sachs analysts Simona Jankowski and Drew Borst proposed in a lengthy report on Monday,” Pressman reports. “On the content side, the offering could include the Apple Music service, access to the iTunes library of TV shows and movies (some for free), Apple’s forthcoming original content, and sports, the analysts said.”
“Apple could attract subscribers by developing exclusive shows for its service and getting exclusives on new movies and music concerts before they appear on competing services, the Goldman analysts predicted,” Pressman writes. “Apple could even partner with sports networks like Disney’s ESPN or Fox Sports to add live sports shows to its service. However, that would likely require a price point higher than $50 per month, the analysts speculated.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Yup. And, further, we’d really like to see a way to pay for all of the Apple services we choose for one price. Give us a bunch of tick boxes and let us choose our combination of iCloud storage, Apple Music, iTunes Match, etc. and let us pay a single price for all of our choices.
Apple should use their cash pile to create some much needed leverage to finally get their Apple TV subscription bundle(s) up and running even if all they do is flash their cash around. — MacDailyNews, January 14, 2016
Perhaps Cook should consider bidding for and winning NFL Sunday Ticket away from Direct TV, buying rights to Premiere League and La Liga games, etc. and making them Apple TV exclusives. Go directly to the sports leagues with boatlods of cash. Maybe that’ll grease the wheels. It’ll certainly move a bunch of Apple TV boxes around the world in short order. — MacDailyNews, May 6, 2014
Maybe it’s insurance in the face of recalcitrant content providers (“last chance: sign the deal or we’ll buy you with petty cash”)? — MacDailyNews, February 21, 2013
SEE ALSO:
Apple declines to place bid on NFL Thursday Night Football – March 3, 2016
The Super Bowl that killed cable: NFL streams the big game on Apple TV, no cable or satellite account required – February 4, 2016
Apple, Amazon, Google, Yahoo expected to bid on NFL Thursday Night Football – December 16, 2015
NFL Thursday Night Football rights could be worth a quarter of a trillion to Apple (or Amazon) – December 8, 2015
Apple could make $15 billion from winning the rights to NFL Thursday Night Football – November 27, 2015
This would go a long way towards customers feeling like they aren’t being nickel and dimed. I pay the $0.99 a month for 50GB of iCloud because what should be a 2GB backup shows up as a 13GB backup. It’s lame but no big deal. Give me a reason to want to buy into these services though, not because I have to. Subscription to HBO GO/Apple Music/iTunes Match and 100GB of iCloud for $20-25/month? I’d go for it.
I brought up this idea here and other forumes six months ago or so… wrote Tim and Team too about it.
I suggested price of 120 a month… which includes… new iphone at every release, new Applewatch , new Apple TV.. 200 gig icloud storage, Apple music! etc….
Ofcourse there can be different tiers of plans which can include different bundel of services and capacities and devices
Sounds like a no brainer to me. It gives Apple an option to offer services iCloud storage in particular to those who invest in the co system generally at lower rates or even free. It will help to push those otherwise stand alone services that people resist because the entry seems too expensive and offer endless flexibility and upgrade options which can only help the brand generally.
I rent and buy a lot of movies from Apple. I’d sure like to be able to rent a movie, and if I like it, buy it and have full credit for the rental.
Amazon Prime is the reason I don’t pay for Apple Music. I don’t have enough hours in the day to justify paying £9.99 for music, but getting a decent selection as part of the Amazon Prime delivery package is a nice bonus and frankly good enough if I want to try some new stuff.
Isn’t it nice to see that everybody and their dog knows how to run Apple (the world’s biggest company) better than Apple does. There isn’t a week that goes by and we hear of several “Apple needs to do X to survive.” Does anyone consider that Apple has a lot of very smart people who may have considered and discarded those ‘hey, I just thought of something’ ideas? Does anybody realize how much goes into making a business case for each of those ideas? People who give such advise to Apple often have no business sense at all yet think that they are brilliant. Something to think about.
Well, with respect to Macs, everybody knows how to sit on their butts and not update hardware. I could do that forever.
Exactly while I have over time generally agreed with the argument RC makes here the fact is that this past year+ the company has really crossed over into ‘sit back’ mode reminiscent of MS at its worst. Fine, new products may well change that in the coming months/year but presently they deserve the criticism you have made, the disinterest in the Mac line is becoming a disgrace even if new products come in a few weeks.
But not only that, the watch was hardly the hardware upgrade to gather even the most moderate of wows for a mk2 product, its the software that is stimulating that update. Active bands for example would have been the sort of thing to gather that wow, and now I don’t expect Apple to lead on that one.
The iPod has not been re invented, or even given any relevance in the product line yet with an intelligent base station (suitable or iPhones too) an Echo competitor could have produced without creating a stand alone product which may understandably be considered a dead end in the long run.
At present it does look like everyone at Apple is looking out of the windows for inspiration rather than stopping others looking in even if its purely perception. But as we know perception is half the battle for mindshare.
No! No! No! what is the profit for Amazon currently? Nothing…..
Amazon owns their market. And they keep it that way by reinvesting everything into the business instead of stuffing their money into mattresses in foreign countries.
Apple sales declined last quarter. Apple is friggen’ lucky that Samsung has a major problem right now. Otherwise, Apple might be sucking hind tit.
Look at Amazon’s share price growth over the last couple of years and compare it with Apple’s share price growth over that same period. What company is surrounded the most by doom and gloom articles? I can tell you it’s not Amazon. It’s good for a company to have profits but it’s another thing when those profits don’t contribute to the value of a company. Apple could have easily enjoyed both profit and growth if they really wanted to instead of just sitting on a gigantic cash pile.
Apple was once the respected 800 lb. gorilla in the room. Now it is one of the least respected tech companies around. Investors have been dumping Apple to buy Microsoft, Amazon, Tesla, Alphabet and practically any other tech company stock for the last couple of years. I can’t help it. Apple honestly seems like it’s just sitting back and coasting while Amazon is being predicted to hit $1000 a share next year. Apple stock isn’t going anywhere unless all of its smartphone rivals have major problems. Apple didn’t bother to diversify when it could have easily done so.
Amazon is always being praised for everything it does and Apple is never praised, only criticized for whatever it does. There’s something wrong with that happening. Apple should have easily been able to do anything Amazon could do whether it had been the cloud business or low-cost content to drive hardware sales.
Apple is a company primarily exist due to an iPhone. Amazon on the other hand does offer more. They’re kicking ass in retail, Prime services and they continue to get into many other things whereas Apple does not do the same. Apple is a great company but at the end of the day they really only have an iPhone. This is what the markets sees
With Anime being a major driver of video across nations Amazon’s newest content deals is going to push it faster.
http://www.theverge.com/2016/10/14/13285334/amazon-prime-studio-ghibli-ronia-the-robbers-daughter-miyazaki
Apple Prime Family Plan. 4 phones, Music, Video and Books for $99/mo.
That sound you hear is the river of cash flowing over Apple Falls.
If Apple offers Apple Prime, I will quit Amazon Prime instantly!
If Apple wants to unite into a strong self promoting platform of services/products as it and Cook so often promotes as the future, then surely something of this type is a pre requisite to re ignite its business plan and expand services as an overall contributor to the process, rather than a slowly growing add on to that iPhone prime mover to simply make that product more desirable. The physical product whatever it is, needs to become part of the whole platform rather than the other way round. This is clearly what Amazon sees while Apple is struggling with the concept, or certainly total commitment to it. It needs to rectify that, as it did belatedly, with Apple Music after years of telling us (as did MDN) that streaming wasn’t the way ahead. In that area it has been able to make up ground, in other areas it may have a far bigger fight on its hands trying o make up ground.