“Apple is making massive investments into R&D across a spectrum of technologies, from virtual reality to mobile payments to an electric, self-driving car. Not only is Apple investing billions, but the rate at which they are investing is accelerating,” Ophir Gottlieb writes for Capital Market Laboratories. “All told, the cash Apple is pouring into R&D is one of the world’s largest bets on future technologies.”
“$2.4 billion dollars per quarter,” Gottlieb writes. “Annualized, Apple will be investing more into R&D then the entire economic output of 60 different countries. What’s more, their entire $600+ billion valuation likely hangs in the balance.”
“The shadow hanging over Apple isn’t a question of whether the industries they are investing in will be successful – virtual reality, mobile payments, and electric cars will unquestionably each be massive – the real question is if Apple will be successful in them,” Gottlieb writes. “We see that Apple has a long record of creating sleek, fun, reliable, status symbols. This bodes very well for Apple’s future as it devotes its massive engineering and marketing resources to persuading customers to replace their wallets with their iPhones, and to trade in their gas powered cars for new, high-tech vehicles with Apple logos on the hood. After all, what is the ultimate, sleek, fun, reliable status symbol? The luxury automobile.”
Much more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take:
I believe Apple’s brightest and most innovative days are ahead of it. — Steve Jobs, August 24, 2011
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “David E.” for the heads up.]
I would have expected fantastic things when Steve Jobs was CEO and Apple spent $600 billion in R&D. Now, I only hope Tim Cook doesn’t squander the money and disappoint the faithful.
$2.4 billion a quarter actually. Try reading more than the title and first line.
What a relief! I feel so much better now that Apple only intends to spend $9.6 billion per year on R&D. My concerns still stand.
Except you are a troll so no people cares.
Silverhawk, you should look in the mirror before labeling anyone a troll. Your juvenile posts are NEVER worth reading. We can only hope that you win your Darwin award soon.
For your information Tim was running Apple operation wise when Steve Jobs was CEO since probably 2004. He was incharge or streamlining Apple Supply chain, this is how Apple manages to get the best prices for components and the reason where apple can design products like it can. Lets not also forget the Steve also made alot of mistakes like not wanting a App store for iphone!!!!
So, he’s doing the same thing now that he was then. Thanks for pointing that out.
Or the G4 Cube…. Which reminds me of the Mac Pro Cylinder.
I had a couple G4 Cubes, and supported two or three others.
They were trouble-free, and satisfied their users well enough. I doubt that they were near as bad as some critics said they were.
And when my Mac Pro cylinder fails spectacularly, I will be here with bells on, complaining loudly. People who don’t own them should shut up.
google did a $1.2 trillion gamble with investors cash and none of it paid off. After a decade of firehose spending, all they have to show for it are several warehouses full of spyglasses and pallets of unsold pixel chromebooks. And Eric T Schmdt’s private fortress island which isn’t at all visible on google earth.
Think different, this ain’t no google this is Apple.
Trillion? Oh god.
“All told, the cash Apple is pouring into R&D is one of the world’s largest bets on future technologies.”
OMG. A tech company investing in tech R&D.
“The shadow hanging over Apple… is if Apple will be successful in them,” Gottlieb writes.
You don’t say.
Is there a point to this article?
Well put. He must have had a deadline and there were no ideas for a story about puppies, monkeys or babies.
Scare headlines like this jerk our chains, raise high anxiety about stratospheric poker stakes, panick us into selling our stock, send us to our knees to pray for deliverance!
But this isn’t the Valley of the Shadow of Death; it’s the Valley of surreal Unmet Expectations, a place for the lowest life forms, a swale inhabited by crawlers and leeches.
But but….dontcha know…any and all business concerns…only apply to Apple? That each and every difficulty in product development, sales, profit…in fact anything about Apple – can only measured in degrees of failure?
Childishly absurd journalistic RDF nonsense pays well it seems.
This is a commercial.
Just think of how that money is stimulating economies all over the world. Well done Mr. Cook and Apple.
Who know what Apple are investing in: Cars, VR, fitness products. As the world changes maybe even things relating to clean non fossil fuel production energy even possibly space craft 30-50 years from now
Why not improve their software first before spending 2.4 billion per quarter on R&D?
Why not do both?
(Look up “false dilemma”.)
I agree that Apple must place as much emphasis on software, including the very basic ones used by many fields — especially the equivalent of MS Office — Word (Pages), Excel (Numbers) and Power Point (KeyNote). I use the “Apple iWork” right now simply because I do not want to buy anymore MS. But, quite frankly, for many more technical applications, especially in scientific research, Pages and Numbers (while have some good features compared to the equivalent MS), they are not suitable for use to prepare papers for scientific publications or for writing grants.
Just try to look at graphs for publication in scientific and technology journals, and the need for automated citation that would be consistent with the various conventions by different fields in science and technology. It is even more critical in review articles and research proposal applications, where one has to keep track of hundreds, if not thousands of applications, and the ability to automate the changes in the citations and the corresponding order, in case some are added or removed as various collaborating authors edit the paper or the research proposal. [If someone knows, a comparable “literature citation” app that will integrate with Pages, and a better graphing app compared to the primitive version of the latest “Numbers”, please let me know, even if I have to pay hundreds of dollars for them.]
Many in science and technology (people, companies and institutions) would have abandoned Microsoft and MS PCs a long time ago, had Apple spent the time to create Pages, Numbers and Keynote that is at par if not better than even the older MS Office (I prefer the older ones of MS Office, in fact.]
If I were Apple, or Tim Cook, I would not hesitate to spent billions and billions of dollars to create something better than MS Office (without the bloat). And, please bring back the “Manual” to learn the nuances of each of these Applications. All those general basic seminars will not solve the issues that confront new users (or even those, like myself). I used “One on One” at some point, but even that I thought was inefficient and will not replace a “Manual”. As Apple has found out, “One on One” is no efficient and very expensive (in terms of staff time usage).
Search is another area that Apple should focus on also. To those that say Duck, Duck Go is a replacement for Google Search, I doubt very much that you have the intensive search required in some research and technological disciplines. I like the idea of “privacy” and certain features of Duck Duck Go, and detest the “sponsored ad” prioritization and done by Google. I also detest the concept that Google search algorithm limits the search options based on my prior history or where I am located. [I went home for 6 months in 2014 to start a project, I was continuing searches that I started while in Boston, and the Google search results presented to me in my home country were different.]
Having stated the above Duck Duck Go Search is not Google Search — maybe for lay people purposes, Duck Duck Go will suffice, but not in more serious and rigorous searches required in science and technology.
Should Apple buy Duck Duck Go? Maybe, but there are inherent limitations in the search algorithm of Duck Duck Go, if Apple wants to compete with Google. Perhaps, it should buy others and similar Apps (but not Yelp).
Siri cannot replace the standard text search (unless Siri is morphed to include text search
Search is the bread and butter of Google. If Apple can provide comparable if not better search capabilities, it can threaten the very foundation of Google.
There are more that I wish Apple should be focus as much, like their Maps technology, a response to YouTube (in spite of all its faults, I am surprised how much I use YouTube for instructional videos, including inquiries about Apple issues I encounter).
Music? That was a billion dollar waste of money, if in the eyes of Apple, only Western perspectives in music will be the main focus. We are now a Global community, to treat Music and other arts and culture simply based on Western perspectives is rather very myopic.
Films and visual media? Why rely on the old sources? Why attempt to focus on a few (currently popular) talents that are also Western centric? Why not scour the talents from independent film makers (e.g., Sundance Festival and other local and regional festivals from all over the world.)
Apple should wake up that in a Global Community, other parts of the world are now becoming the major consumers of what Apple has and should offer.
CGC
So, 800 words to basically say that Apple should try and out_do MS & Gaggle in their core competency products? And that would be a good use of their $B’s …in a game of catch up?
Sweet Jesus no!
As for the rest, you’re either not paying attention or you have no clue as to the meaning of the word ‘secret’ R&D. Apple could – and likely ‘is’ doing everything you mention and a whole deal more than you could imagine.
Me? I would prefer Apple to carry on developing the best hardware and OS that developers can build on.
Oh..and any article that contains the word Apple linked to ‘status symbols’…is just jerking off.
So, what is Apple’s cash cache for?
CLUE: The future.
I do declare, you are one of the few who see beyond the smoke and the noise.
It’s folks like you we want beside us when the tsunami approaches.
Warning: When the tsunami hits, I’m likely to be shouting ‘Wheee!’ as the wall of water washes us away. Forces of nature impress me. 😉