“Apple CEO Tim Cook yesterday defended the company’s iconic Mac line, which saw a second consecutive decline in sales last quarter, and promised that Apple would continue to crank out personal computers,” Gregg Keizer reports for Computerworld. “‘I don’t think this [personal computer] market is a dead market or a bad market by any means,’ said Cook during Tuesday’s earnings call with Wall Street. ‘I think it has a lot of life to it. We are going to continue to innovate in it.'”
“Mac sales have been affected by many of the same factors that experts have cited to explain the poor performance of the PC industry, including longer stretches between computer purchases by consumers, a saturation in developed countries like the U.S. and — most importantly — a shift in dollars from computers, including Macs, to tablets and smartphones,” Keizer reports. “Even so, Cook stuck up for the Mac and gave no hint that Apple would abandon the market. ‘We’re going to continue making the best personal computers. Our strategy is not changing,’ he said. ‘We’ve got some more great stuff planned [and] so this is an area we’re continuing to invest in.'”
Keizer reports, “Analysts interpreted Cook’s defense of the Mac as a signal that, while sales have stalled, Apple plans to adapt its personal computer line as the PC market mutates. ‘The personal computer market is not dead,’ asserted Patrick Moorhead, principal analyst with Moor Insights & Strategy. ‘Apple can redefine the market by creating a device in between the iPad and the MacBook Air.’ … Riffing on the idea that consumers, but also businesses, are keeping their personal computers for longer periods — spending the money for replacement machines on tablets instead — [Ezra Gottheil, an analyst with Technology Business Research], argued that Apple is better positioned to benefit from the trend than most Windows OEMs. ‘That may be an opportunity, the pony in the manure heap,’ said Gottheil. ‘If consumers know they’re going to keep their computers longer, they may be more tolerant of the Mac’s higher entry prices.'”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Would you be interested in a MacBook Air with Retina display, running OS X, with a removable display that is actually an iPad running iOS when detached?
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Judge Bork” for the heads up.]
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