Apple’s newly announced iPhone “got everybody — from techie bloggers to late-night TV hosts — talking when it arrived fashionably late on the wireless communications scene. Would-be rivals are welcoming the challenge but questioning Apple’s claim that the iPhone is ‘revolutionary,'” May Wong reports for The Associated Press.
MacDailyNews Take: What did you think they’d do, come out with the truth and say, “we’re 5-10 years behind, Apple’s got the thing patented up the wazoo, and we’re screwed, so sell your shares and buy AAPL?”
Wong continues, “Apple’s competitors predict that even as the gadget will likely boost the company’s fortunes, it will have limited market share and fall short of the successes Apple has seen with its iPod portable music player. They contend some of the phone’s much-touted features — such as its touch screen, movement sensors and music player — are not innovative or new. ‘They’re just jumping into the party where everyone else is,’ said Peter Skarzynski, a senior vice president at Samsung Electronics Co.’s telecommunications unit in North America.”
MacDailyNews Take: In other words, they’re saying the same things that the MP3 player makers said when Jobs debuted the iPod.
Wong continues, “Apple is getting in at a time when competition in the cell phone business is, as ThinkEquity Partners analyst Jonathan Hoopes puts it, ‘as hot as Hades.’ Because nearly everyone already has a wireless device of some sort, the success of the iPhone will depend on whether Apple’s notoriously slick marketing machine can persuade consumers to replace their current phones with an iPhone that costs $500 or more. In some cases they’ll have to switch carriers as Apple’s gadgets will work only through Cingular Wireless.”
MacDailyNews Take: Hence the reason why Jobs froze the market by announcing iPhone 6 months early. Let’s see what At&T does to alleviate carrier switchers’ pain, too.
Wong continues, “Nokia Corp. Chief Executive Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo told analysts last week that he doesn’t think Nokia, the world’s No. 1 handset maker, needs to change its business approach because of the iPhone. But Apple’s entry ‘will stimulate this market, it’s very clear,’ he said. ‘The fact that we will see multipurpose devices from many manufacturers, I think it will be good for the industry. And in that way, I very much welcome (Apple to the market).'”
MacDailyNews Take: He sounds like Diamond Multimedia, makers of something called the “Rio,” circa 2001. For most info, please see related article: More blood on Apple iPod’s Click Wheel: Rio is dead – August 26, 2005
Wong continues, “Padmasree Warrior, chief technology officer for No. 2 handset maker Motorola Inc., posted a ‘morning after’ blog saying she’d always been a fan of Apple’s creativity. She called the iPhone a “compelling concept,” but she also outlined its potential shortcomings. ‘There is nothing revolutionary or disruptive about any of the technologies,’ she wrote.”
MacDailyNews Take: Again, saying the same things that the MP3 player makers said when the iPod steamroller arrived.
Wong continues, “With the iPhone still months away from the market, no one knows all its features or how well it functions in real life. Any criticisms leveled now — the high price, the exclusive distribution through Cingular Wireless, the choice to use the slower 2.5G data network, the apparent lack of support for Microsoft Corp.’s business e-mail programs, the lack of a traditional QWERTY button keyboard — could become moot or insignificant later.”
MacDailyNews Note: Apple’s iPhone supports MS Exchange via IMAP. There is still the question of whether iPhone will support Exchange Direct Push (Engadget has more on that issue here). The Chicago Sun-Times Andy Ihnatko actually spent time with the iPhone and reports, ” I think the iPhone’s virtual keyboard is a huge improvement over the mechanical thumbpads found on the Treo and any other smart phones of its size… After 30 seconds, I was already typing faster with the iPhone than I ever have with any other phone.” Why wait for “later” when many of Wong’s points are moot now?
Wong reports, “If the incumbents are nervous, they’re not saying it.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: If those in the path of Apple’s heavily-patented iPhone aren’t nervous, they’re delusional. We already smell blood.
Related articles:
O2, Vodafone, Orange, T-Mobile battle for exclusive rights to Apple iPhone in UK – January 26, 2007
Rogers to offer Apple iPhone exclusively in Canada – January 25, 2007
Research in Motion downgraded due to Apple iPhone competition – January 23, 2007
RealMoney: Apple just blew up the whole damn mobile-phone supply chain with its new iPhone – January 11, 2007
eWeek: Apple iPhone fallout: ‘They must be crying in Nokia-ville and other telephony towns today’ – January 10, 2007
Jefferies downgrades Motorola on fears of market share loss to Apple iPhone – January 10, 2007
The massive FUD campaign against Apple’s iPhone ramps up – January 10, 2007
Time: ‘iPhone could crush cell phone market pitilessly beneath the weight of its own superiority’ – January 09, 2007
Analyst: Apple iPhone should be given its own category – ‘brilliantphone’ – January 09, 2007
Apple debuts iPhone: touchscreen mobile phone + widescreen iPod + Internet communicator – January 09, 2007
Go get ’em, tiger! (Or, rather, Leopard.)
HERE HERE ‘His Shadow’.
Well said and Amen to all these zombies who can’t see it! It’s their loss and their humble pie that they wil have to eat!
“Nokia Corp. Chief Executive Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo told analysts last week that he doesn’t think Nokia, the world’s No. 1 handset maker, needs to change its business approach because of the iPhone”
The fact that Nokia is being asked questions like this should make them queasy.
Those guys are finally gonna back for having zip in the brand loyalty category.
I like how they imply the iPhone doesn’t use a standard QWERTY key arrangement.
Thay say it doesn’t have a “QWERTY button keyboard” but in fact it does have a “QWERTY touchscreen keyboard” so why not just say it doesn’t have a “button keyboard”?
Why because then how would people accidentally think Apple made up some weird new layout?
MDN: I have to disagree on these one! The main difference with 2001 is that then Apple actually created the market (nobody wanted those bloody mp3 players before), but now Apple has created a product for a market that already exists (and everyone already has a mobile phone, and most people are actually quite happy with them).
So no, i disagree, iPhone will surely not have the success the iPod had (but i will buy one anyways when it comes to Europe)… and Nokia will keep on top… telecom’s consultant word!
I’ll reserve my powder until I see the Phune, which will allow you to download/install third-party apps like the Prune, which downloads and installs porn as your background – whether you like it or not – all for $5.99 thereafter $3.99* a week with two free downloads and a ringtone.
*One-time cancellation charge: $168.
As cool as the iPhone is… I have no use for all its features. I just need a phone that dials and make connections to other phones. I don’t need games or an mp3 player or to browse the net.
“Usul, we have wormsign, the likes of which God has never seen.”
-stilgar
I once read a quote from Jobs regarding the Mac (which I’ll paraphrase becasue I’m too lazy to look it up): “We don’t want people to think like computers. We want computers to act the way people think”.
The Mac revolutionized computing (and you have to think back to what computers were like before the Mac to really appreciate this) because you could grab the mouse and click an icon and just intuitively understand how to work the thing.
There were lots of MP3 players on the market, but the Ipod swept them away because you could give it to your mother or even your grandmother and in 60 seconds she’d be able to play music on it.
Today’s mobile phones have tons of features that no one uses because the can’t understand them. You have to be a total geek or totally desperate to try to get web content on your phone. And you have to be a masochist or 15 years old to listen to music on your phone.
The analysts are just not getting it. It’s not the features, impressive as they are, that will make the Iphone go. It’s the benefit of having a device that will allow you to easily and intuitively use those features. If my mother finds it easy to use the Iphone, the competition will be swept into the dustibin of history.
The phone industry is delusional. Case in point, they think people want a mechanical QWERTY keyboard. That’s insane.
Once again MDN makes itself sound clueless with it’s rampant blinkered fanboi-isms.
The facts are simple. The mobile phone market is *huge*. The market for $500 subsidised contract-tied phones is however pretty damn small.
Apple may well gain a chunk of the $500 phone market, however that will not bother the likes of Nokia, Sony Ericsson, Samsung, LG, Motorola, or indeed most any mobile phone maker. Why? Well, most customers faced with the choice of paying $500 or $0 will choose $0.
Apple needs to seriously reduce the cost of the iPhone before they will threaten existing phone makers. The iPhone needs to be cheap enough to be offered for under $100 by phone networks in order to be competitive in the mass market.
As for the smart phone market, Apple will limit their sales as long as they prevent third party applications. Until they open up the iPhone the future for the likes of Palm is fairly secure.
The MP3 player market was immature when Apple entered it. For its comparative storage the iPod *wasn’t* very expensive. Those things aren’t the case in the phone market.
s for the smart phone market, Apple will limit their sales as long as they prevent third party applications. Until they open up the iPhone the future for the likes of Palm is fairly secure.
Bullshit. Plain and simple. The “third party application” market is a chimera, full of crap that is designed to make “smartphones” actually smart and PDAs function as they should out of the box. You don’t even know what the hell these “third party applications” are, given that the iPhone has a real browser, a real mail client, a full blown contacts program, real hooks to a real operating system and a software synchronization and software install ecosystem that is literally drag and drop.
Take your infantile regurgitations of empty rhetoric to the Microsoft fanboy sites. You can stroke each other good and hard about which crippled version of Vista you are going to buy.
The iPod is sucessful not because it’s just something you play music or video on really well, it’s because of the way it integrates with iTunes.
Every feature in the iPod has a counterpart feature in iTunes, such as music, video, contacts etc.
I expect the iPhone to extend this.
iChat will have iPhone integration.
Safari will have iPhone integration.
iPhoto will have iPhone integration.
We’ve already seen some ‘answerphone’ features leaked from Leopard, this is just the tip of the iceberg.
I expect the iPhone to be released at the same time as Leopard.
This is the thing we have over all competitors. The integration in the OS.
All they have is some half-assed ‘partnership’ with Microsoft that never really works very well, and is skewed away from the consumer and towards the provider.
Some competitors do get this, most don’t.
I can see the new list of “More blood on Apple iPhone’s touch screen” coming soon.
The real funny thing about all this is that the iPhone is THE type of device that microsoft tried to palm off to customers earlier last year.
Remember ‘Origami’??
It was supposed to be this ‘revolutionary’ handheld device.
In the end it sucked big time and did nothing that was promised it could do (as ALL M$ products – just look at Visa for example!).
Apple will eventually dominate the phone market, give it 10 years and everyone will be using Apple iPhones.
Also – Nokia, Sony Ericcson, M$ and ALL the other companies beware – APPLE WILL SUE YOUR ASS OFF IF YOU COPY MULTI-TOUCH!
It’s not about the technology, or the keyboard, or the network, or the battery, or any of the other issues that everyone is droning on about!
As with the Mac, “it is the software, stupid!” This thing is gonna do what no other phone can do……..and that is to be joy to use! It is a pocket Mac in every way that matters at this point in time. Mark my words. iPod revenue in the long term will be a rounding error compared to the revenue the iPhone juggernaut will be generating in 3 years time.
Can’t wait till they start selling them here in Asia!
Magic word = “why” as in “Why” can’t they see anything past their noses. The iPhone is going to turn the entire mobile phone industry upside down……….count on it.
@His Shadow,
I believe that you’re thinking solely as a consumer, and not from the business perspective. My concern is with the wider market, including businesses.
Apple has made it clear that the iPhone is a closed platform. Talk of “real hooks to a real operating system” is absolutely irrelevant if developers cannot program for that OS.
Citing “software synchronization and software install ecosystem that is literally drag and drop” is 100% speculation. By denying the ability of third parties to write applications Apple have told us that there will be *NO* “software install ecosystem”.
This is like saying that the iPod has a “software install ecosystem”. Absolute BS.
It is far from clear at this stage whether the iPhone will have the possibility of installing *any* new applications, and even if it does from what Apple has said they will be exclusively Apple approved. A healthy “software install ecosystem” requires multiple suppliers and competition. It requires being able to do things with the device that Apple never originally envisaged.
PDAs are used for lots of applications in business. Sure you can do many of these apps on the web, but businesses will not like the high data fees from mobile networks, and the users won’t like the slow speed and unreliable connections. PDAs in business run local applications so they don’t need to connect to the internet, and sync their data in bulk to ensure reliably operation.
I think this is a great shame. The iPhone has the potential to blow away all competition in the PDA market. Whilst development is restricted however it will remain an expensive mobile phone.
I personally believe that the iPhone will be very successful but my experience in building mobile applications for business tells me that the artificial limitations Apple are placing on software development will rule it out of many businesses. Its use will be limited to general consumers, and business users that need nothing more than a phone and simple PDA.
Finally, for the record, I am a passionate Microsoft hater and basher. The worst mobile phone experience I have ever had was with a Windows-based phone – exactly the kind of crummy design you expect of Redmond. Palm OS is clunky and in-ellegant.
I can’t wait to get an iPhone – but what I really want is to write applications for it. I built a successful business writing custom business applications for the Newton – I’d love to be able to do that again.
I believe that you’re thinking solely as a consumer, and not from the business perspective. My concern is with the wider market, including businesses.
Well, that was a far more civil reply than I deserved.
Citing “software synchronization and software install ecosystem that is literally drag and drop” is 100% speculation.
No, it’s not. The device will use the cradle sync to iTunes methodology already firmly established on the iPod. It will be as easy to get an application on the iPhone as getting a game on the iPod. And the iPod is a closed system, yet there is development for it, if you count games as development. It will be the same for the iPhone. There just isn’t anything to announce at this time, because it is initially hard to see what else the iPhone needs in it’s first iteration. But the mere fact that it is running OSX means that porting of existing third party Mac applications will occur.
…Apple has said they will be exclusively Apple approved. A healthy “software install ecosystem” requires multiple suppliers and competition. It requires being able to do things with the device that Apple never originally envisaged.
Yet that competition hasn’t really done anything for smart phones or PDAs. My Palm Zire has Solitaire, a power calculator, some databases and an app that converts ASCII to Hex and decimal codes. That’s it. I use the notes feature, the calendar and the contact manager that came with it exclusively.
That said, I truly believe that the third party applications that will be developed for the iPhone are going to exceed everyones expectations because OSX development itself is taking off. Yes an application will have to meet Apple’s standards. That is a Good Thing(TM).
Apple are placing on software development will rule it out of many businesses. Its use will be limited to general consumers, and business users that need nothing more than a phone and simple PDA.
Yet a full featured browser gives it something almost no other PDA has managed to do successfully. This alone will allow all kinds of possibilities that were half assed crippleware until now.
I built a successful business writing custom business applications for the Newton – I’d love to be able to do that again.
Well, Xan, I and many others truly believe that you will be able to do that for the iPhone.