“Several factors have changed in both the internals of Apple and the overall market to re-position the company not as a monopoly on new technology, but as a pure competitive business wielding brand alone,” Damon Verial writes for Seeking Alpha. “AAPL is no longer a growth stock, but a value stock that should be restructured as a future dividend aristocrat.”
“It was the release of the iPhone and iPad that gave Apple its monopoly, as no products (successful products, anyway – there were previous attempts by other companies) offered what these devices offered,” Verial writes. “With iPhone 5 being the last product Steve Jobs touched, Apple has lost its innovation, now owning a brand that must compete with the likes of Samsung, Sharp, and HTC.”
MacDailyNews Take: Oh, no! How will Apple ever be able to compete with that triumvirate of low- or no-profit peddlers of iPhone knockoffs, wannabes, and roadkill? Apple’s iPhone already owns 94%, and can soon reap 100 percent, of the world’s smartphone profits. And, BTW, Sharp? Seriously?
“Apple lost its monopoly, the main catalyst of its growth. It might be pushing out new products, but whether Steve Jobs, whom many would agree was the driving force of Apple’s innovation, would be a fan of these products is arguable,” Verial writes. “Apple’s release of the Apple Watch polarized Apple fans. It brought the company in competition for expensive real estate (the wrist) against watch companies. But more importantly, it didn’t drastically change the way people lived.”
MacDailyNews Take: Drastically changing how people live is not the goal. Significantly improving daily life via technology is the goal. Apple Watch, as over 90% of users will gladly tell you, accomplishes this feat very well, thanks. Before Apple Watch, we depleted our iPhone’s battery by the end of a typical day. After Apple Watch, our same iPhones had over 50% battery left over each day. That actually is a drastic change. iPhone zombies no more are we, thanks to Apple Watch.
Verial writes, “Today’s Apple has lost its innovation.”
Blah, blah, blah, nothing new to see here.
MacDailyNews Take: Just getting this one on record for future reference.
Bullshit.
Band a massive one…
Monopoly? When , where,….. Maybe monopoly in profits. But not in marketshare or product choice in the market……..it not even close to a monopoly… Maybe the first year the differance of apples iphone blew the competition away… But monopoly? Idiotic .
Apple watch polorized fans…what the hell is that supposed to mean… ? Should all Apple fans love all apple products equality? if not the customer base is polorized?
Who is this moron writing this crap. ….
P.s. I LOVE my Apple watch and cant wait for version 2…
Meant …..and a massive one
“Who is this moron writing this crap.”
He’s a guy with an ambition, maybe someday, if he does really, really well in his current position, to write for the Forbes Walking Dead Network.
Is that your entire argument? I guess using a single polysyllabic word makes your thesis more intelligent. Bravo to you.
👏👏👏👏👏💩💩
Damon is smoking crack. Wait until the next big thing, and he’ll shut his pie hole.
Well, we’ve been waiting for the next big thing ever since Cook arrived and it still hasn’t arrived. I am sick of waiting for new Macs, and a real update to OS X.
BIG BULLSHIT ARTICLE.
Again – when these assholes start to see a bit of negative news they make shit up and try their hardest to pound the stock down for a better entry point.
SCAMMER: Damon Verial
Yes, it is gone. Only original owners care about what they build. Those that come latter have other agendas… usually their pocket and if others make a few pennies well ok.
“Only original owners care about what they build.”
I never realized until I thought about it how true that is. I have seen it dozens of times.
In family owned companies I have read that the failure rate is 90% in the second generation.
Not sure if its true about Apple, but the potential is there, and it doesnt have to be true.
Time will tell. (as always)
90% failure in 3rd generation FAMILY OWNED businesses. State your source. My source was Marcus Lemonis on, “The Pofit”, as I suspect, was your source, as well.
This statistic has been mis-used for a very long time. I think the failure rate for nearly any business (public, private, family owned, etc.) is nearly the same if you look at a 3 generation (60 year) time span. The world changes, and most companies don’t.
BTW, the failure rate is 90% for startups within the first 5 years, and the average lifespan of a fortune 500 company is between 40 and 50 years.
When the editor tells the pleebs to write an article no matter what, to keep up content for the advertisers, out comes the “Apple can’t make new blockbuster products anymore” stories.
Heard from the Editor’s office:
Editor, “Damon, it better get attention or it’ll be your last!”
Damon, “I’ll knock it out of the park…..”
Really!? What planet are you from. Seems to me, that as usual all the so called competition is still trying to be good at something, while good ole Apple continues to excel in multiple avanues… let’s see, Apple Watch, Apple iPAd, Apple TV, Apple, oh yeah! Apple iPhone. Every major player in these fields are scrambling just to stay alive, become relevant, or simply to make a profit, but you already know this, right? This is just another hit piece, or a blatant attempt to personify the word; CLUELESS, right.
That something is “Tim Cook”.
Apple needs a REAL CEO… as opposed to a gay activist/incompetent/attention whore!
Apple literally sucks right now. I know there are other people out there who also feel this way, and like me, no longer buy Apple products (aside from iPhone version upgrades).
Apple used to be a unique and special experience.
Now the products are rushed out the door half-baked, the prices have skyrocketed for no apparent reason, the new products are a joke, the software is terrible, but Cook always manages to keep himself in the spotlight. And we thought Lady Gaga was an attention whore!
those other people that you mentioned must be homophobes too.
“I know there are other people”
Yehhh, sure you do!
Classic troll sentence.
“and like me, no longer buy Apple products”
So why are you here, then?
Is your life that pathetically empty?
A classic case of Cranial Rectal Inversion! Feel bad for the boy.
That’s right. Play the homophobe card. Of course, that means you got nothing.
MDN: “Drastically changing how people live is not the goal.”
It was, and it should be, “How else do you ‘make a dent in the universe’?” You don’t make it by “Significantly improving daily life via technology…”
The author is right about Apple currently being more interested in “Apple, The Company” than in delivering breakthrough products. Everything has become iterative. The Apple Watch has not been a failure, but no one goes out and buys an Apple Watch unless they already have other Apple gear.
The iPod got people to buy Macs and other Apple gear. The same with the early iPhones and iPads.
I don’t believe Apple has lost its ability to innovate. What I do believe is that Apple is focusing on the wrong thing: the company and not users and products.
Saying that the Apple Watch is changing the way a few iPhone users are using their iPhones is not the answer. Apple producing an Apple Watch (or other product) that gets people to buy not only that product but other Apple products too in order to make the huge shift to the Apple world is what Apple needs to do. It has done it multiple times before. It needs to do it again.
“No one goes out and buys an Apple Watch unless they already have other Apple gear.”
Gee, that must be because an Apple Watch requires an Apple iPhone 5, 5c, 5s, 6, 6 Plus, 6s, or 6s Plus.
I may be drawing the wrong conclusion but I’d say most of Wall Street believes Apple has lost its mojo if you look at Apple’s current share value. The F.A.N.G. stocks are getting ready to roar and soar again and what is Apple doing? Almost nothing. Up a few lousy pennies. They’ve got the feds on their case and there appears to be nothing in the pipeline. Everything Apple does comes up craps for shareholders. Why is a company with $200 billion in the bank stagnating when it should be knocking down walls and kicking ass. How is Apple going to perform? Once a year when a new iPhone comes out the stock might go up for a month and then fall for the rest of the year. What other company performs like that? I realize the economy is weak, but can’t Apple find at least one other dependable product they can sell or service they can offer to offset all those lean months. I know it’s quite hard for Apple to constantly increase iPhone sales. Apple can’t even give away iPads anymore.
AAPL has been stuck in the mud for over a year. Doesn’t that indicate something is wrong whether it’s Apple’s “mojo” or not. How can Apple barely outperform a seriously struggling company like Yahoo for an entire year? It’s crazy.
Apple’s best days are behind it. Tim Cook is listening to what Goldman Sachs and Wall Street says, instead of creating insanely great products.
The Apple Watch is a flop. Making bigger version of Steve Jobs’ creations such as larger iPhones and iPad Pros is not innovation. The quality of Apple software has declined.
Apple will continue to turn profits for quite sometime. But it appears to have lost the momentum.
I don’t think a word you say is valid.
But even if it all were – SO WHAT!!!?
Apple is a COMPANY that makes PRODUCTS. That’s all it is!!!!
All this petulant, whining and bombastic negativity that goes on here!!! Jee-zus. If you think there are other companies that make better products, go away and buy them.
It’s just that simple.
Not quite, John. People have unmet needs in today’s complex society. An urgent unmet need is for personal validation, and that can be had in small measure through anonymous internet postings. The more lost the soul, the more numerous the opinionated messages, and the more ardent the defence of those opinions. A person wants to matter, and wants even more to be right, and will bravely take on the world from the seclusion of his basement.
It’s just that simple.
Here is an idea… Apple Pocket. Basically all the Apple Watch needs in a pocketed device, that is NOT an iPhone. No camera, just LTE and whatever else. Small, thin, hmmm…
Tim Cook has destroyed Apple . Period. He wasted 130 billion dollars on stock buy backs and dividends when that money could have been used to expand the range of products and services. For that much money he could have bought Tesla, NBC, Netflix and others. Tim made Apple stock a stock for the retirees. There is no future for Apple unless this guy is fired.
Apple sucks because they allowed some idiot PC programmers to take over. When you hit a button, ANY button, there should ALWAYS be an option to CANCEL. Because there wasn’t, my accidental upgrade of my iPad (usually I hit later, the only other way to avoid it) broke every app I have. I f’n hate it.
I will never buy another Apple product again.