London: When Apple’s Chief Executive Tim Cook takes the stage at the Moscone Centre in San Francisco tomorrow, he will face one key question: can Apple do it again? Can the company that upended the phone business with the iPhone in 2007, and made tablets an everyday item with the iPad in 2010, find a new must-have product — a fresh leap of innovation?
The audience, thousands of developers who write apps for the iPhone and Mac, will be eager to know: their income relies on Apple getting its products in front of people. But for Cook and his executives the mutterings are growing louder before the Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) that Apple just isn’t innovating any more, since the death in October 2011 of Steve Jobs, its co-founder and Cook’s predecessor.
To counter that, Cook and his team are expected to announce a “smart home” initiative, whereby an iPhone or iPad will be able to interact with lighting controls, heating systems, air conditioners and appliances, as well as a “Health Book” software for future versions of the iPhone that will gather personal health data — perhaps through some sort of unrevealed wearable technology.
But is that enough? Apple’s backers can point to its being the most valuable company in the world. Apple’s revenues and profits outstrip the combined totals for Microsoft and Google; and iPhone sales are nudging 10 percent of the mobile phone market (including even the cheapest handsets), just behind once-dominant Nokia, though some way behind South Korea’s Samsung.
Critics say Cook’s team still has big questions to answer. Where, for example, are mobile payments to compete with Google Wallet, so its 800 million iTunes account holders — the largest number of credit card accounts outside a bank — can pay for things with their iPhones? Where is a smartwatch, when Samsung has released two versions since September, while Google is pushing its “Android Wear” software?
Instead, critics argue, Apple has its $3bn purchase of Beats — which makes headphones and offers music streaming, both of which Apple does already. “It makes no sense,” wrote analyst Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry. “This deal stinks, but more importantly it reveals that Apple as we’ve known and loved it is gone — for ever.” Apple’s previous biggest purchase was of NeXT Computer for $400m in 1996 — a deal that brought Jobs back to lead the company.
The suggestion that Apple is wallowing in its success irks the team. But that was a year ago. And the pace of progress in the technology industry is relentless.
Apple’s top executives say they have plenty in store. Cook has promised “some exciting new products ... across 2014”, while Eddy Cue, who runs Apple’s iTunes, Maps and iCloud divisions, said this week: “Later this year, we’ve got the best product pipeline that I’ve seen in my 25 years at Apple.”
The Guardian
