“I want to make an observation, which I feel is an important one. However, I don’t want it to be taken the wrong way. For the record, Apple is not doomed. What should be noted, is how fast the Amazon ecosystem is growing,” Ben Bajarin writes for Tech.pinions. “The critical point here is how consumer electronics vendors need platform partners. The question at hand is whether or not that platform partner can or will be Apple or not. As of now, the answer is no.”
“For many years, articles were published discussing how even though Apple was not present or participating in CES they were still one of the shows biggest winners,” Bajarin writes. “We would go to CES and remark at how Apple’s dominance loomed over the show. Vendors of all shapes and sizes were rushing to be a part of the Apple ecosystem. Apple’s ecosystem was front and center with everything from iOS apps, to accessories galore for iPhone and iPad, and even companies looking to copy Apple in many ways. The last year or so, things have dramatically changed, and that change is further evident at this year’s CES.”
“Gone are the days of Apple’s presence, or observably ‘winning’ of CES, even though they are not present. It was impossible to walk the show floor and not see a vast array of interesting innovations which touched the Apple ecosystem in some way,” Bajarin writes. “Now it is almost impossible to walk the floor and see any products that touch the Apple ecosystem in any way except for an app on the iOS App Store. The Apple ecosystem is no longer the star of CES but instead things like Amazon’s Alexa voice platform, and now Google’s assistant voice platform is the clear ecosystem winners of CES.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Among other things, there are plenty of smart home devices that work with Apple’s HomeKit and Siri. Of course, most of those also work with Amazon’s Alexa and other smart home ecosystems, too.
Exit question: How much would Apple Inc. be worth today had a Jeff Bezos-type CEO taken over the reins instead? – MacDailyNews, November 21, 2017
SEE ALSO:
Alexa is killing Siri at CES 2018, and HomePod, if it ever ships, isn’t going to make a difference – January 9, 2018
Vuzix to debut first Amazon Alexa-enabled smart glasses at CES – January 5, 2018
How Apple upstaged the tech industry at CES for fifteen years – January 15, 2015
As usual, Apple dominates the CES news cycle in absentia – January 7, 2015
Nobody cares about CES 2013 because Apple’s not there – January 8, 2013
There’s a scent of Apple in the air again at CES – January 11, 2012
Ben Benjarin is one of the good ones, so he’s not blowing smoke up our asses.
Instead he’s sending smoke signals to Cupertino warning them that danger lies ahead if they don’t get their shit together.
Agree with that. If you read his follow-up article to this post, which is behind a paywall (https://techpinions.com/apples-siri-microphone-strategy/52004), this is the premise of it:
“I want to make an observation, which I feel is an important one. However, I don’t want it to be taken the wrong way. For the record, Apple is not doomed. What should be noted, is how fast the Amazon ecosystem is growing. The critical point here is how consumer electronics vendors need platform partners. The question at hand is whether or not that platform partner can or will be Apple or not. As of now, the answer is no.”
This is in respect to automation of our daily devices via integration of Voice UI assistants.
The smoke signal has been sent for years now…by reviewers, and ‘in the know consumers’ and Apple enthusiasts.
In many many areas Apple’s ego gets in the way.. …..
And here we are !
Exactly so.
Cook far too busy being a presence on the Democrat fund raising circuit, being a social justice warrior, protecting cheaper imported labor instead of protecting American workers, supporting illegal immigration into the US, and carrying the water for every form of dysfunctional relationship among mankind. He has to go.
You’re just a broken record with no real solutions.
Apple is losing relevancy, thanks, Tim.
“Exit question: How much would Apple Inc. be worth today had a Jeff Bezos-type CEO taken over the reins instead?”
That’s the million dollar question isn’t it? Where you gonna find someone like that? They’re not exactly dime a dozen. And of the ones that do exist, how many would want to work at Apple as opposed to starting their own venture.
Closest person I can think that MAY fit the bill is Scott Forstall.
Wow. I was thinking Forestall, too. Have been for a while.
Forstall, without strong controls on his ego, would destroy a company like Apple. There’s a reason why he hasn’t hooked up with another firm since leaving Apple.
From Wikipedia:
” it is generally presumed that Forstall left his position involuntarily. All information about the reasons for his departure therefore come from anonymous sources. Cook’s aim since becoming CEO has been reported to be building a culture of harmony, which meant “weeding out people with disagreeable personalities—people Jobs tolerated and even held close, like Forstall,”
hmmmm, disagreeable personalities.
Isn’t he more like a M Dell/B Gates, who has a fine tuned business, marketing & operational savvy, but little evidence of the enduring effect of product excellence, or invention?
What did any of them produce that was a real market shaker? Alexa, Optima, Windows, or the Surface?
Amazon’s reach, power and presence seems to be a result of a powerful thrust enabled by a lot of $$ and for years, for some reason, stilted up by the market. Remember, it wasn’t that long ago their earnings reports were nary with a gain.
That’s what happens when you have “lots of products in the pipeline” instead of on store shelves.
Thanks Timmy!
Apple is not Amazon. Amazon does not make computers. Amazon does not make a phone that is highly desirable. Amazon does not develop operating systems or specialized software such as Final Cut Pro X. However, in the consumer world, the puck seems to be moving toward more home integration and Apple seems to be down at the other end of the ice.
Know what Amazon also doesn’t make? Money (or much of it).
Amazon doesn’t make much in the way of PROFITS but Jeff Bezos and Amazon shareholders do. I don’t know if you’ve sat down and compared Amazon’s to Apple’s share gains over the last five years or so, but you’ll see Amazon is totally smoking Apple in share gains and Apple, in theory, could be running rings around Amazon if Apple used its money properly.
Wall Street makes an assumption about Amazon and that is it would make profits if it didn’t keep using that money to continuing growing the overall business. What did Apple do over that same time period? Apple hoarded its overseas profits in a bank earning about 1% interest. You know how much Wall Street gives a damn about Apple’s cash hoard? Next to nothing. Amazon’s Echo Dots are worth more to Wall Street than Apple’s $200B cash pile. I think that’s the way the big investors see it.
At the slow rate Apple’s share price is moving higher, Amazon will likely pass Apple to the $1T market cap mark in 2018. Apple can’t even solve a simple battery problem without turning it into a huge mess for the news media to feed on.
Siri was the first on the block and now she’s nothing but Alexa’s biatch. Apple, with all that money, decided not to let Siri become educated over all these years.
Profits are all that actually matter to rational folks. Unless you are a day trader share price is a con. Stock market crashes happen when Wall Street runs out of lies and reality forces market corrections, share prices are re adjusted. Who survives a “correction”? Profitable companies. Im over 50 and have seen Wall Street and others push “new economies” at least 3 times that always end with a market correction. Good news for real investors is the rules haven’t changed in over 3,000 years. People invest in companies that return profits. During market corrections profitable companies survive, then thrive while “share price” companies implode and are “reabsorbed” into the economy through layoffs, bankruptcies, and acquisitions.
Don’t believe the “New Economy” mumbo jumbo that Bezos and other like him spew. When the correction hits and Amazon (or Uber, or Tesla) actually have to cover their costs from their revenues and not “stock price” folks like Apple, Microsoft, and GE will be laughing all the way to the bank and likely getting ready to buy up a lot of distressed assets.
“Apple seems to be down at the other end of the ice.”
Doesn’t matter where on the ice you are, if you know where the puck is going to be.
Apple AI and Siri are in a dismal state! Even at the most basic level as spell check and contextual understanding,…( been saying this for years now, while recieving quite bigoted responses )
Every time one leaves Apple ecosys sys and resorts to another platform … Apple loses…….( i wonder how often do other platform users resort to Apple’s platform….. )
Alexa has leapfrogged Apple in a major way… Google AI is so far ahead and so much more capable. Even MS is ahead…
Apple privacy moto is no excuse or justification! A way has to be found ( differential privecy or whatever …. )
Without a robust AI sys… there is no robust future for Apple.
Apple’s ego and fanboys constant cheer and spiteful reaction towards those who criticize is a huge hurdle.
Go ahead line up to shoot.
Spite wont get the real problems solved.
(My prediction.. tons of negative spitful reaction to this post )
25 stars to you as you couldn’t be more right
“Apple privacy moto is no excuse or justification! A way has to be found ( differential privecy or whatever …. )”
Apple needs to solve this problem, or the HomePod’s expense will not warrant purchase for many. Another brick in the Wall.
This is an alarming development for more than the obvious reasons. I’ve been watching CES all week and noticed that Apple has had virtually no presence, no buzz like they used to. All we’ve heard about Apple is negative news. It seems clear to me that there is a coordinated effort with the heavy Samsung disparaging advertising, Google’s SEO, Google News, complaints by so called investors about parental controls, etc. Its a tsunami of negative news for Apple during a time when they seem more vulnerable than usual. I’m not sure Apple is keeping up with it.
That Amazon and Google are doing what Apple did with Airplay and hardware partners many years ago, only on a much larger and significant scale, is concerning. And then there is the transition to the new building, which I wonder if that is a distraction. The only thing I can hope for is that Apple has big surprises for February and that they have learned their lesson about announcing new products before they are ready. Otherwise I feel like they have been badly ganged up on and beaten on an important business.
Just the same, I’m sure Apple had a great quarter and the ramifications of the latest troubles remain to be seen.
The companies exhibiting at CES are desperate to get publicity, that’s why they are going to that dismal place at this time of year. Apple doesn’t need to do that.
When Apple has a product to announce, it will call the press to it’s very own conference centre and show them what it wants, at a time of it’s choosing and on it’s own terms. In the run up to that announcement and in the immediate aftermath, the world’s press will be talking about Apple on a massive scale.
Apple chooses not to sell low-end phones or computers and chooses not to exhibit at low-end exhibitions. Apple’s absence from CES is no more worrying than their absence from the sales figures for low-end phones.
Be careful what you wish for.
The danger does not lie ahead, ITS AT THE DOOR. Just like they belatedly rethought the Mac line last year, Apple had better seriously rethink their “we’re above it all” approach to CES and other such consumer shows and do it STAT. They had better rethink the “Home POD” right NOW, and make a smaller version that’s cheap cheap and good. They need to re-enter the home Wi-Fi market pronto and make the best, most secure Wi-Fi devices for the home on the market. Come on, guys, you are at the precipice of ceding leadership, and therefore the market, to Jeff Bezos and Amazon!
Plus the fact that @ only 18% Amazon ownership, Bezos is the richest man in the world! Not bad for a company that’s…ya know, not making much money…
I’ll stick with Apple inc., their products, their security and their privacy; where their focus is me!
If I want em”mental” (get the pun on Swiss cheese with holes in it !), as clearly any vendors at CES are desperate for products that reach mass audiences, not giving a stuff about whether their end users are being spied on, their data being collected for nefarious reasons, then go with Google or Amazon products!