Newsletter Issue #744: The Growing Stature of Apple TV
March 3rd, 2014As some wonder just what new product categories Apple plans to enter in the coming year, assuming CEO Tim Cook keeps his oft-repeated promises, you wonder whether one of those products may already be there. But it is sort of flying below the radar, because Apple consigned it to hobby status.
But how can a gadget, with annual sales now hitting one billion dollars, be considered a hobby? A number of companies would only be delighted to receive that much revenue from most any product, and would praise the results to the skies.
Now Apple TV has surely become more mainstream in recent days, and now has a featured place on Apple’s online store, rather than being relegated to the accessory department. Based on the figures produced by Cook at last week’s Apple shareholders meeting, it’s been estimated that Apple sold 10 million units. I wonder, in passing, how many units Roku sold in the same year, or all years.
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This is completely off-subject (except it shows Apple moving into another technology). But over the past year or so I have repeatedly predicted that Apple is quietly moving into partnerships with various auto companies to improve the functionality of those communications/navigation/entertainment devices built into automobile dashes (most of which are terrible and some of which are downright dangerous to use while driving a car). Now read this news item on the MacRumors site: http://www.macrumors.com/2014/03/03/apple-announces-carplay/
It would be shortsighted to write these arrangements off as “mere licensing agreements”. Such agreements have the potential to be enormously profitable and there’s no reason why these partnerships may not eventually result in the design and manufacture of hardware devices, either by Apple or cooperatively.
This ought to put a definitive end to complaints that Apple has run out of innovative steam.
[…] “The growing stature of Apple TV: As some wonder just what new product categories Apple plans to enter in the coming year, assuming CEO Tim Cook keeps his oft-repeated promises, you wonder whether one of those products may already be there. But it is sort of flying below the radar, because Apple consigned it to hobby status.” — Read the article on technightowl.com > […]