Apple on Monday made history by becoming the first publicly traded company with a market cap of $3 trillion. It’s now peeking over and under that bar with the usual vagaries of the market. Apple’s journey to $4 trillion will be powered, in part, by its AR/VR headset and, later, potentially, the “Apple Car.”
Daniel Howley for Yahoo Finance:
So where does the company go from here? There’s the obvious — more iPhones that get people into the company’s ecosystem and accessories like the Apple Watch and AirPods to keep them hooked. But the company will also need to take big risks on its way to $4 trillion…
When it comes to headsets, however, Apple will not only have to improve comfort and image quality — it will also have to ensure plenty of apps can take advantage of the hardware. After all, while current consumer headsets are largely geared towards gamers, Apple is looking for volume sales, and that means offering apps that appeal to non-gamers too.
And even when Apple launches its headset, it might be some time before the mainstream gets on the bandwagon, if it ever does, according to Loup Ventures’ Gene Munster… However, the headset could evolve into an essential product. Apple has managed this before with the Apple Watch, which had a chilly reception before the company shifted its focus to fitness and saw sales explode. And if Apple can do the same with the headset, Munster explained, it could eventually rival the iPhone’s sales.
While it’s easy to see where Apple’s headset fits into its product portfolio, the rumored Apple car is about as far afield from its base expertise as it gets. But if Apple can pull off a car of its own, it could dictate the company’s future as much as the original iPhone did…
In 2021, the company spent a staggering $21.9 billion on R&D. For comparison, Microsoft, the closest company to Apple in market cap, spent $5.6 billion.
MacDailyNews Take: Apple’s $3 trillion market value is merely a waypoint, as will be $4 trillion in the not too distant future.
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