The stock market has punished Apple this year for failing to offer a generative AI (GenAI) solution to help power its future growth. The shares caught a bid Thursday after news broke of AI-focused next-gen Apple Silicon.
Subrat Patnaik and Ryan Vlastelica for Bloomberg News:
Apple’s decision to overhaul its Mac computer line to focus on artificial intelligence, as reported by Bloomberg, struck a chord with investors, sending the stock up 4.3% and adding $112 billion in value in its best performance in nearly a year.
Before Thursday’s announcement, the stock was down 15% from its record high set in December, wiping out more than $460 billion in market value. Trading close to its cheapest level in about a year, bargain-hunters clearly could justify taking a chance on Apple’s latest stab at AI relevance.
Sustaining this momentum, however, will depend on Apple’s ability to deliver on the promise of growth. For the Cupertino, California-based tech giant, that likely means getting AI into the iPhone.
Apple has paid mightily for its recent stagnation. It’s one of the weakest performers among the so-called Magnificent Seven this year, trailing only Tesla Inc. That has made it relatively cheap.
The underperformance reflects the lack of a defined AI strategy and several quarters of weak trends, despite the company’s strong financial position and proven revenue generation.
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MacDailyNews Take: As we wrote on February:
Apple is clearly not as innovative as it was under Steve Jobs who even started the company’s work on Apple Watch and Apple Vision Pro, but the company — thanks to Jobs and Cook’s subsequent management of iterations of products and services conceived during Jobs’ tenure — now has more than enough money to make up for Cook’s lack of vision.
Until it gets another visionary leader (fingers crossed; Apple’s history has shown – cough, Sculley, Spindler, cough – that the next CEO could be far, far worse than the very competent caretaker Cook), Apple can afford to miss things like generative AI – which they clearly did – and then use its huge war chest to catch up – which they’re doing right now (fun times and 80-hour weeks inside Apple Park!) – and, hopefully, surpass rivals (or at least be as good). Apple will very likely unveil their catch-up work within months (this June at WWDC 2024) in iPhones (and iPads, Apple Watches, etc.) with built-in on-device generative AI and other new AI-driven features. – MacDailyNews, February 14, 2024
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Phew, that’s a relief, Apple must have temporarily gotten caught up in the eddies of some sort of truly scary distortion field or something.
Let’s hope Apple can keep it up.
Steve’s dead. Get over it.
Hmmm, I guess you are “free” of using historical figures as a contemporary reference…for your and culture’s betterment? Such a view, if true, positions you as a “progressive,” which is one that has no need for precedent, as the aim is to discard the past and forge to the “better” new.
I just happened to again listen to a number of YT vids of Jobs’ quips…including some from his Stanford U address (for the umpteenth time).
Thank goodness we have such figures to ponder…dead/not–theres no “getting over” such value.