chinacat
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AAPL Long since 2006
Posts: 4,425
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Post by chinacat on Jun 3, 2016 19:30:57 GMT -8
Once were the days where breaking into triple figures would have been enough to goose a little rally in AAPL, but alas, those days have not yet returned. Still hoping that this is just the pause that refreshes. Personally, I expected to see more WWDC-related FUD by now. Surprised by the Fadell news, but I don't really follow Nest that closely. As an unabashed Tim Cook fan, I recommend Inside Apple and Tim Cook's Operational Brilliance. I found this section particularly interesting: *** Niu: I think part of it is that in addition to the engineering talent thing I was talking about earlier, Tim Cook absolutely hates inventory. Setting up this model and supply chain, I've read reports where other industry executives look at Apple's supply chain and they're just blown away. They're like, "Well, we can't compete with this." You can order a custom-built Apple device like a Mac, or an iPhone or something. You'll get the tracking information and it literally ships from the factory to your doorstep, in a matter of days. They build it and they ship it directly to you. That's the kind of scenario when the purchase transaction goes like that. I mean, Apple does very little hands-on. Apple's not physically handling the product too much if you're ordering like that, and that's kind of a testament, because they still get to book all the revenue and the sales. It goes from a contract manufacturer, to a third-party shipping company, directly to a customer. With that happening all so quickly, their inventory turnover times are so insanely high, that it's comparable to fast-food restaurants and stuff like that. Instead of $600 smartphones, and I think that's been a huge boon to Apple, because that just makes the whole operation a lot more efficient. It's this huge trick because again, other companies have seen this and they're like, "We can't do that. We can't set it up this seamlessly and streamline to this point where is incredibly efficient and direct." Of course, they have to have a lot of inventory for retail stores and things like that. They're very good in inventory management, they keep it really lean. Otherwise, having a lot of inventory is not really a good thing, because it just sits there and risks getting written down; if you can't sell it, and if you have too much, it's just kind of a big pain. That's why Tim Cook has really pursued this path so aggressively. *** Tim also appears to have done a good job of keeping Jonny Ive happy (Apple Watch Edition, Marc Newsom hiring), so the current fly in the ointment seems to be software and services. Yet, Craig Federighi generally gets pretty high marks, as far as I have seen. Let's see what hatches at WWDC. Of course, we all need to see improved execution to follow whatever may be announced. A nice merlot perhaps has me feeling mellow. The bar is open. Opinions welcomed.
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Since84
Moderator
To infinity and beyond!
Posts: 3,933
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Post by Since84 on Jun 4, 2016 3:50:48 GMT -8
Thanks for the nice weekend read Chinacat.
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Post by rickag on Jun 4, 2016 7:02:00 GMT -8
chinacat, thank you for the link.
Oh and thanks for starting the thread.
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Post by rezonate on Jun 4, 2016 14:21:56 GMT -8
Drinking some nice white wine from Chile this weekend. How long before the laptop keyboard area is just an OLED screen that shows a keyboard (with Taptic feedback) when needed? I kinda thought the iPad Pro would already have Taptic keypress feedback already, but maybe Apple plans to bring it to iPhone 7 first, than scale up with iPad Pro 2. Having a force-touch screen under your hands could be made very useful, displaying widgets and useful for Apple Pencil input.
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JDSoCal
Member
Aspiring oligarch
Posts: 4,181
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Post by JDSoCal on Jun 5, 2016 0:36:36 GMT -8
The Fadell thing is hilarious, and his personality of 1980's Steve Jobs, without any of Jobs' talent routine has been well-documented by several blogs. Honestly, I am starting to believe that the smartest guys in the room who run Google are actually total, complete incompetents to 1) pay billions for this ridiculous Nest device with no apparent revenue stream and 2) hire a guy Apple showed the door because of his insufferable assholiness (and he went out the exact same way, an "advisor" to the CEO, LOL). Or course, Google loves wasting billions on nothing, as the Moto deal showed.
Money quote from the NY Times piece,
LOL! That's SV-speak (where non-competes are unenforceable under CA law) for "you'll remain under contract and sit at home in your jammies for a year, and yeah, your card key has been disabled." Same exact thing happened with Apple, except for the paying Fadell billions part.
Anyway, I've been ridiculously busy. What's the story on this three years between major iPhone refreshes rumor. That can't be a thing, right?
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bud777
fire starter
Posts: 1,352
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Post by bud777 on Jun 5, 2016 2:45:11 GMT -8
Nice to have you back, JD
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Post by tuffett on Jun 5, 2016 10:47:47 GMT -8
Looks like the 3 year cycle thing is true, at least for the 6-6s-7 group. Inexcusable to be this lazy at a point where growth is negative amid an incredibly tough environment. Only acceptable if Apple is working on something that they had to divert a lot of resources towards. But we are talking about impacting the iPhone here, so it better be absolutely huge and Apple needs to hint at it more strongly to appease worried investors.
I don't have high hopes for this year's iPhone. There will be some switchers and upgrades from the 5 series. The vast majority of 6/6s users are going to stay put, myself included (probably). With the subsidy model gone, there just doesn't seem to be enough incentive to upgrade. The iPhone 6 is a fantastic device. We are witnessing a very quick lengthening of the upgrade cycle, and having a stale model will only exacerbate it. I project 2017 to be flat or slightly negative.
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Post by nagrani on Jun 5, 2016 11:08:11 GMT -8
Looks like the 3 year cycle thing is true, at least for the 6-6s-7 group. Inexcusable to be this lazy at a point where growth is negative amid an incredibly tough environment. Only acceptable if Apple is working on something that they had to divert a lot of resources towards. But we are talking about impacting the iPhone here, so it better be absolutely huge and Apple needs to hint at it more strongly to appease worried investors. I don't have high hopes for this year's iPhone. There will be some switchers and upgrades from the 5 series. The vast majority of 6/6s users are going to stay put, myself included (probably). With the subsidy model gone, there just doesn't seem to be enough incentive to upgrade. The iPhone 6 is a fantastic device. We are witnessing a very quick lengthening of the upgrade cycle, and having a stale model will only exacerbate it. I project 2017 to be flat or slightly negative. If Apple provides details on next iPhone - it could help increase the qty of folks who defer purchasing an iPhone. As a shareholder - why would you want that? What exactly do you think Apple should do with the next iPhone to make it sensational in terms of feature set/new stuff? In the absence of having any concrete ideas - Wall Street and investors want Apple to do something new without really knowing what new is.
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Ted
fire starter
Posts: 882
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Post by Ted on Jun 5, 2016 12:36:31 GMT -8
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Since84
Moderator
To infinity and beyond!
Posts: 3,933
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Post by Since84 on Jun 5, 2016 15:10:05 GMT -8
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Ted
fire starter
Posts: 882
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Post by Ted on Jun 5, 2016 18:23:31 GMT -8
That link's dead, Since84. Try arstechnica.com/gadgets/2016/06/nests-time-at-alphabet-a-virtually-unlimited-budget-with-no-results/ edit: weird, mine doesn't work either - a pro boards issue? Well, copy and paste that link into yr address window - if interested. The article's conclusion: "No one ever said all of Alphabet's bets were going to be sure things. Alphabet is a company full of companies. Sometimes, companies fail." So then which company/project at Alphabet besides Google search hasn't failed? Maybe their fiber division, or boutique-quantity Nexus lines? OK, chromebooks are doing well - with no margins... But their fails include: glass, Motorola, the orb Nexus Q, Google TV, Android TV, robots, Nest, their balloon-based wifi project? What am I forgetting? They've sure got a lotta money and talent, but seemingly no one with vision or a plan, as JD was saying.
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Post by firestorm on Jun 5, 2016 18:29:16 GMT -8
Given that Apple is also pouring billions into R & D, without producing many innovative new products, I'm wondering if the low-hanging fruit of the digital world has already been harvested. Most of what we've seen have been incremental changes/improvements during the past few years. Nature produces peaks, valleys, and plateaus.
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mark
fire starter
Posts: 1,545
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Post by mark on Jun 5, 2016 19:54:24 GMT -8
Looks like the 3 year cycle thing is true, at least for the 6-6s-7 group. Inexcusable to be this lazy at a point where growth is negative amid an incredibly tough environment. Only acceptable if Apple is working on something that they had to divert a lot of resources towards. But we are talking about impacting the iPhone here, so it better be absolutely huge and Apple needs to hint at it more strongly to appease worried investors. I don't have high hopes for this year's iPhone. There will be some switchers and upgrades from the 5 series. The vast majority of 6/6s users are going to stay put, myself included (probably). With the subsidy model gone, there just doesn't seem to be enough incentive to upgrade. The iPhone 6 is a fantastic device. We are witnessing a very quick lengthening of the upgrade cycle, and having a stale model will only exacerbate it. I project 2017 to be flat or slightly negative. Mathematically, what happens about 1 year after the upgrade cycle has lengthened by a year?
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mark
fire starter
Posts: 1,545
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Post by mark on Jun 5, 2016 19:56:34 GMT -8
Given that Apple is also pouring billions into R & D, without producing many innovative new products, I'm wondering if the low-hanging fruit of the digital world has already been harvested. Most of what we've seen have been incremental changes/improvements during the past few years. Nature produces peaks, valleys, and plateaus. Maybe a lot of that R&D is 5-year R&D rather than 1-year R&D (i.e. the stuff being D'ed will show up in 5 years rather than in 1 year)? Isn't that quite possible?
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Post by archibaldtuttle on Jun 5, 2016 22:46:35 GMT -8
That link's dead, Since84. Try arstechnica.com/gadgets/2016/06/nests-time-at-alphabet-a-virtually-unlimited-budget-with-no-results/ edit: weird, mine doesn't work either - a pro boards issue? Well, copy and paste that link into yr address window - if interested. The article's conclusion: "No one ever said all of Alphabet's bets were going to be sure things. Alphabet is a company full of companies. Sometimes, companies fail." So then which company/project at Alphabet besides Google search hasn't failed? Maybe their fiber division, or boutique-quantity Nexus lines? OK, chromebooks are doing well - with no margins... But their fails include: glass, Motorola, the orb Nexus Q, Google TV, Android TV, robots, Nest, their balloon-based wifi project? What am I forgetting? They've sure got a lotta money and talent, but seemingly no one with vision or a plan, as JD was saying. YouTube. Huge ROI on that acquisition.
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