“Thanks to Apple’s famous secrecy, when it comes to the company’s plans for future products, there’s always more speculation than information,” Dan Mitchell writes for Fortune.
“That’s the case with whatever Apple might be cooking up for television. It’s obviously doing something, but nobody can quite tell what it is,” Mitchell writes. “Steve Jobs has publicly stated the company’s desire to “tear up the set-top box” and create something novel — which is what Apple does in all of the markets it succeeds in. And though reports that Apple is working on a major TV project are sketchy on details, there are enough such reports to make it obvious that the company has a specific plan of some kind, apparently involving Apple-branded television sets.”
Read more in the full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Readers “Fred Mertz” and “Edward Weber” for the heads up.]
the ipad wasn’t that revolutionary. big screen ipod that allowed better apps due to larger screen. tablets before that but it was only around 2010 when the costs came down where you can sell it with all the features to make it useful
same thing with the apple TV. at some point the costs will come down where apple can sell a TV with itunes inside and make 30% or so gross margin.
Alen, you either have no clue of the history of the iPad or are being intentionally oblique. Apple started developing a tablet in 1987 (newton) and produced several (flawed) models in the early 90’s (ARM RISC architecture BTW)
After Steve’s return, apple relaunched tablet development with iOS (a mobile optimized version of OS X) basically scrapping the newton OS platform. However they couldn’t get it perfect, and there were (by this time) plenty of half assed attempts at tablets currently on the market (basically keyboard-less laptops running windows). The iphone was actually just a small tablet, a “shrunk” version of the then in development iPad (the full sized tablet was delayed till after the iphone)
So yes the iPad was a revolution it was the first tablet that worked and was the result of literally decades of R&D at apple It becomes easy to see how to do it, after it’s been done (which is why samsung’s contention that they and google didn’t steal the design, it is “the only way to build a tablet” is so funny)
oblique >> obtuse
Not revolutionary? What planet do you live on? M$ tried for ten years to build a tablet. Apple came along, and in the very first model, hit a home run with consumers.
That had very little to do with the price of components and everything to do with the specific features, including software, that made up the device itself.
As for the Apple TV, same thing, it will have nothing to do with the relative price of its components, but with the services and content it comes with.
This “Apple’s gonna make a TV” meme will not die, for some stupid reason. Apple will never make a TV, the margins aren’t good enough, and the device itself will be too expensive. Too many manufacturers sell enough units to get massive breaks on component prices now, Apple would not see an advantage there at all, and Apple wants to sell devices with short life turn arounds – most people keep TVs for a decade or longer.
Won’t ever happen.
I think you’re wrong about a TV. It is too important a platform to ignore. The lack of margin issue is not an issue. It isn’t with wannabe iPad tablets which mostly sell at very low profit, or at a loss (HP). If Apple enters the TV market, it will redefine the high ground and claim its high margin reward for being the best. Right now there are premium brands selling pretty me-too, lacklustre RVs at VERY high prices – TVs that sell because of the name alone. Try searching for TVs by Bang&Olufsen and Loewe and you will see. If they can sell for 100%+ margins, Apple can certainly sell a true high-end TV/iDevice combo for up to 50% margin. Remember their purchasing power. Remember their investments into Toshiba and others.
I’m not saying it will happen. I am saying there is no reason it shouldn’t happen. It makes an awful lot of sense.
Don’t get me wrong, I’d love to see a true Apple TV too.
I just don’t think that it fits their lineup. Apple sells two kinds of products: Computers and computer-like products (and their peripherals). Both the iPhone and the iPad are actually computers. But all of Apple’s lineup are made up of products that people replace in two to four year increments, although some folks keep Macs longer. None of them are the kind of things that get replaced in a decade like TVs.
I just don’t see them selling TV’s. Selling appliances like the current Apple TV that serve content is more along the lines of what they are much more likely to do. Steve has already mentioned that the way we get content to the TV is broken.
That doesn’t mean that the TV itself is.
The rumor that would not die. Yes, Apple is obviously doing something with the AppleTV, but I’m not convinced it’s anything more than access to more content.
http://themacadvocate.com/2011/08/30/im-going-to-give-this-apple-hdtv-thing-one-more-shot/
What if apple becomes a TV provider? Television was OTA or cable for years, but now there are several technologies to deliver TV signals to the home. Why not bypass Comcast, Cox
and the others and bring the signals in through an Apple TV?
You might have a loss the first couple of years while you sign up customers, but I bet it could be a real money maker.
The idea of bypassing the Cox at Comcast is appealing.
If they can make it a la carte with access to live sports, I’m in. I already dumped Comcrap for DirecTV, but I would dump DirecTV in a heartbeat if I could get a la carte programming the Apple. I can get OTA channels with my rooftop antenna, would just need ESPN, Big Ten Network, Fox Sports Midwest, and I’m pretty much good to go for life.
I’m dreaming, I know.
Never gonna happen. Even Apple doesn’t have enough money to bypass the cable and satellite providers all across the country. Plus, most of those cable TV providers are also the high-speed data providers, so don’t think for a minute that they wouldn’t impose some new restrictions on streaming media to hurt Apple.
Not quite. About $12B would buy Sprint and Clearwire. That would give Apple wireless 4G licenses covering about 70% of the population of North America and Europe. Included in the bundle would be Clear, the 4G wireless ISP service, along with its infrastructure. All the cable and satellite providers can then talk a long walk on a short pier.
But where will they get any content, you ask? Disney can be bought for about $62B. That would give them all the Disney properties; ABC, ESPN, Pixar, Touchstone. Game, set, match!
Sprint owns a majority of Clearwire, all major cable companies own smaller pieces. But Clearwire is a money-losing disaster. Earlier this year they filed with the SEC that they might not be in business come the end of the year.
To which I say good riddance to bad rubbish.
And your point would be what? Apple would be buying licenses, primarily, and infrastructure secondarily. What does that have to do with how Clearwire operates? Do you think that Apple would just leave the same organization and personnel in place? Apple specializes in doing right what others can’t seem to make work.
It’s a mini-projection TV with an iTV interface. No big LCD or Plasma screen required, which is a commodity business anyways.
http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2011/08/apple-patent-projector/
Well, I hope whatever they’re planning guided by better thinking than the decision that led them to pull video rental from iTunes. They claim customers “want to own video content.” I just don’t get it. I cannot be the only one who doesn’t want my hard drive cluttered with random episodes of Lost and The Office that weren’t available to stream on Hulu, can I?
“Thanks to Apple’s famous secrecy, when it comes to the company’s plans for future products,”
What is so intriguing about keeping your lips sealed until you can deliver goods?
Oh, right…you don’t care about how much of an ass you look like when your product falls flat on its face after all of your big talk..
I’m looking at you MS, RIM…well…actually, all of you.
The real problem with large screen TVs is that the TV companies have done nothing but battle each other on who has the lower price to such an extent that there isn’t any profit to be made on selling TV sets.
Now Apple is just going to shove AppleTV into a large screen TV and sell it for a significant markup? Uh, no.
Apple’s TV (as in a large screen TV) would have to be something REALLY out of the box, and probably run some form of iOS. It would have to do more than be able to rent/but from iTunes, because that’s already available for $99 with the current AppleTV. It makes no business sense to go through all the production hassles, increase storage at Apple Retail Stores to handle TV sets, etc. just to cram an AppleTV in a set.
There’s one thing that has allowed the iPhone and iPad blow the doors off the marketplace at introduction, and continues to be the main differentiator from their competitors: A skilled and motivated developer community with access to a customer-focused app marketplace.
When Apple releases the AppleTV SDK, they will succeed in redefining and subsequently pwning another “set-top box” market (such that it is). It will have a disruptive effect on cable providers, content providers, the gaming market, and quite possibly event television manufacturers.
Before I’ll believe the idea of an Apple-branded TV, someone will have to explain to me how such a thing is better than plugging the convenient little Apple TV into your current set. So far, I’ve heard no such explanation. The argument that Apple is going to make a TV seems to be based on nothing more than the fact that the TV set is the one home media gadget Apple hasn’t yet tried to reinvent. (I mean, unless you count Apple TV.) So yeah, Apple must be doing TV next! That’s gotta be it. No explanation as to why it would be a good idea.
Mind you, this comment comes from the guy who consistently laughed off the rumors of a “touchscreen iPod” as a stupid idea, and who now never leaves the house without his iPod touch. So yeah, I could be wrong.
——RM
I completely agree. Apple won’t get into the TV manufacturing business simply because they never compete in low-margin marketplaces.
But if the AppleTV became an application platform (see my SDK comment above) and becomes a category-killer in the set-top box business (not a bad bet), then Apple could conceivably license an “AppleTV on a chip” to existing television manufacturers who will do anything for a value-added differentiator in a commodity market. Then there’s nothing left for Apple to do than to sell external AppleTV boxes for those with “non-AppleTV-inside” televisions.
Then, boom. Apple is making a buck or so on every “AppleTV inside” television sold globally, without lowering their margins, and without impacting their retail floor space.
“And though reports that Apple is working on a major TV project are sketchy on details, there are enough such reports to make it obvious that the company has a specific plan of some kind, apparently involving Apple-branded television sets.”
Yes… because if there are enough rumors about something then it must be true. [Shakes head in amazement at the irrefutable logic of this.]
They just need to get Samsung to include iTunes access into their televisions, just any net enabled television or dvd has right now.
Steer clear of this kimchee brigand and Apple would be for the better.
Apple is not going to build anything that it takes two people to carry the box. That would be way too uncool. Apple is a value symbol, not a status symbol. A premium TV market exists, mainly for insufferable twits. Apple exists for the best in everybody, to help them BE better, not just show off their superiority with stuff that anyone with money can buy. How much better at watching TV do we need to get?