Tag Archives: Apple Inc.
Apple Expected To Sell 1 Billion Apps By 2009
Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) is seeing tremendous sales through the App Store. So far Apple has sold over 100 million apps – 70 million in August alone. Given the current rate that Apple is selling applications, they are expected to sell over 1 billion applications by 2009. This is much faster than the time Apple reached 1 billion in music download sales. It took Apple 2 years to reach that landmark.
Apple increased a new line of iPods at their latest “Let’s Rock” event. By giving consumers additional choices for music players, it is likely that they will see an increase in sales of their music player. By increasing the sales of music players, Apple will more than likely increase the rate of applications and music sold.
During the holiday season, it is expected that the download rate will surge. However, Apple will have to remain extra-competitive with new services starting to appear. Amazon recently restructured their video download service. MySpace Music will be launching later this week with free music streaming and paid downloads.
Electronic Arts Inc. (NASDAQ:ERTS) distributes Spore, the number one application selling at $9.99 per download. The current top 10 paid applications are:
1. Spore Origins
2. PocketGuitar
3. Koi Pond
4. Asphalt 4
5. Air Hockey
6. Ambiance
7. Where To?
8. What’s On?
9. iMprint
10. Election 08′
Categories Apple Inc., Electronic Arts Inc.
Leave a comment
How Apple Can Mitigate Developer Frustration
Several developers have been getting their Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) applications banned and they aren’t too happy about it. Some of the applications that have been banned so far include the I Am Rich application, a tethering application, Pull My Finger, and most recently: Podcaster. Podcaster was rejected because it was an application that competes with iTunes itself.
“I wouldn’t invest in or develop an iPhone app because Apple could decide not to approve it, and if they don’t approve it you can’t sell it,” stated Dave Winer on his blog. “You can’t even give it away. You don’t find out if you’ve been approved until the last step, after you’ve fully invested, so you could lose, totally, if Apple says no.”
How will developers know whether their app is good enough for Apple? I’m thinking that one approach that might be beneficial is have an idea submission page. Before the developer takes the time to code around Apple’s APIs, he or she submits the idea to Apple. And if they get the approval, then they are good to develop the application.
People pay to get applications built from developers on eLance.com and several other contracting websites. Other developers spend days trying to build an app. The idea submission idea would save these people time and money.
How do you protect your idea from Apple stealing it? Integrate some sort of TOS agreement that they won’t steal your idea after submitting it or create a product that directly competes with your idea. Facebook has created features that competes directly with some of their application developers in the past. This is why the terms of service agreement would be integral for submitting the idea to Apple.
What are your thoughts? Leave them in the comments.
Categories Apple Inc.
1 Comment
“Let’s Rock” Didn’t Help The Apple Stock
Today Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) held an event called “Let’s Rock” in California to announce their new product line-up. The event started at around 10AM Pacific Time earlier today.
The first thing that Jobs talked about was his health. “The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated,” stated one of Jobs’ slides. This slide was in reference to Bloomberg accidentally publishing and retracting an article with Steve Jobs’ obituary. Jobs then started talking about iTunes.
iTunes
iTunes is still #1 for music distribution in the world. There are about 65 million users on iTunes. iTunes also started TV shows in HD and this includes shows provided by NBC. iTunes 8 has also been released. iTunes 8 has music album and song browsing in an iPhoto style. There is also a “Genius” feature that creates suggested audio and video playlists to iTunes users.
New iPod Nanos
The iPod has a 73.4% market share in the U.S. Over 160 million iPods have sold so far. The Classic iPod is now available at 120GB for $229. The iPod nano was redesigned. The new nano has a bigger screen and is the thinnest iPod Apple has made so far. One of the most interesting features on the new nano is “shake-to-shuffle.” This shuffles to a random song just by physically shaking the device. The new nano is also the most toxin-free iPod, making it environmentally safer than before. The new nano is available in 8GB and 16GB and will start selling in stores immediately. They come in 8 colors too.
New Headphones
Apple has released two new types of headphones. The first is similar to the regular iPod headphones, but has a volume control switch connected to the cable. The second type of headphones is also in-ear, but looks more comfortable.
New iPod Touch
The new iPod Touch is thinner, more stable, has Genius-support, and also still has access to the App Store. Jobs added that over 100 million applications have been downloaded so far.
Games
Phil Schiller, SVP of Product Marketing at Apple showcased Spore on the iPod. Spore is a video game that was developed by Maxis, the company that is famously known for it’s Sim game series. Spore uses the iPod accelerometer to travel throughout the universe. Another couple of games that were showcased at the event was Real Soccer 2009 and Need For Speed.
The 2.1s
Jobs talked about the iPhone 2.1 and iPod Touch 2.1. These new devices have less reception issues and less dropped calls. These new devices also have less issues interacting with App servers.
Wall Street
Despite the product line-up, Apple’s stock dropped by almost 4%. The stock opened at about $157 per share and then closed at about $152. Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) is expected to release a fresh line of Zunes to match some of the new iPod features within the next month.
Categories Apple Inc.
Leave a comment
Apple Turns Down Pull My Finger App Due To “Limited Utility”
Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) has always been able to maintain a certain image. They are a media company that also happens to make great products. So when a developer submits an application that just makes farting noises to their App Store, wouldn’t you reject it if you were the company?
The developer of the iPhone application, Pull My Finger does not believe Apple should have. Below is the video of the app being used by the developer:
And below is the message that Apple sent to the developer of Pull My Finger:
(more…)
Categories Apple Inc.
Leave a comment
New Apple Product Line-Up Coming: “Let’s Rock” On September 9
It’s official! Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) has just confirmed an event set for September 9th. Apple is expected to unveil a line-up of new products at the event which is themed “Let’s Rock” such as a new line of iPods or Macs. Since the iPhone 3G was recently released, I don’t expect a new line of iPhones to be announced.
An e-mail was sent out by the company to reporters and bloggers inviting them to the event.
Categories Apple Inc.
Leave a comment
Eight Million iPhones Manufactured In The Last Year
This past Saturday, an iPhone was bought in the Sunnyvale, California Apple store. What made this iPhone special was the IMEI number printed on the back. The number on the back was 01 171400 6049xx x (last 3 digits edited out).
MacObserver and Investor Village takes these IMEI numbers, puts it in a spreadsheet, and deciphers the meaning of them. Using this number, it was discovered that Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) manufactured over 5.65 million iPhone 3Gs on top of the 2.4 million first generation iPhones. This makes the number of manufactured iPhones at 8 million in the last year.
Given the current production rate of the iPhone 3G, it is expected that 10 million iPhones will be manufactured by the end of September. This is well ahead of investor expectations.
Related Link:
1. Fortune
Categories Apple Inc.
3 Comments
Rumor: Apple iPhone To Be Subsidized In China
Peter Sabilla, an adjunct professor of Operations and Supply Chain Management at the Marriott School of Management at Brigham Young University runs a blog called shmula.com. On that blog, I found an interesting article that has a high-level map of the Apple iPhone supply chain.
Many of the iPhone components are built in Shenzhen, China and in Taiwan. Below is the high-level image:
So the materials built for the iPhone by the suppliers and sub-tier suppliers are relatively cheap. The reason why Apple is a large company today is because of the profit margins made by products like the Mac, iPhone, and iPod in the U.S.
In order to make even more money, the iPhone needs to go global but must be affordable to make sales in other countries. This is why the rumor that China Mobile Ltd. (NYSE:CHL) subsidizing the Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) the iPhone makes sense. Many of the components that are being built for the iPhone is already being done overseas already.
According to the JLM Pacific Epoch, “The would-be mobile partners are nearing the end of talks that aim to
avoid passing on the relatively high price of iPhones to Chinese consumers by having Mobile subsidize the phones, said the insider.” The source of the news is a China Mobile insider.
Related Links:
1. PacificEpoch
2. MacDailyNews
Categories Apple Inc., China Mobile
2 Comments
Psystar Responds To Apple’s Lawsuit by Suing Them Back
About a month ago Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) decided to sue a small computer company in Florida called Psystar for selling hacked versions of Apple’s operating system. Apple filed the suit one day after Psystar sold modified copies of the Mac OS X 10.5.4 Leopard updates to their previous customers.
Townsend and Townsend and Crew LLP led the case for Apple. The lawsuit was filed on the basis of copyright infringement according to AppleInsider. Psystar sells a desktop for $400 that has PCs running a Mac OS X operating system. Later a representative from Psystar taunted Apple to try and sue them… If Apple did attempt to sue them, it would be in violation of antitrust laws. Apple responded to the challenge.
Today Psystar plans on filing a lawsuit back to Apple with the allegations that Apple is engaging in anticompetitive business practices. Psystar claims that the OpenComputer product sells with a licensed and unmodified copy of the Mac OS.
“My goal is to provide an alternative, not to free the Mac OS,” stated Rudy Pedraza, owner of Psystar. “What we want to do is to provide an alternative, an
option…It’s not that people don’t want to use Mac OS, many people are
open to the idea, but they’re not used to spending an exorbitant amount
of money on something that is essentially generic hardware [CNET].”
More details to come on Pulse 2.0 as this news fleshes out further.
Related Link:
1. AppleInsider
2. Psystar
Categories Apple Inc., Psystar, Psystar Corporation
2 Comments
Polish Actors Hired To Stand In Line For Apple iPhone 3G
Consumers of the Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) iPhone lined up in front of stores by the hundreds when the original iPhone and the iPhone 3G was released in the United States. However, in Poland several actors and actresses are being paid to line up in front of the stores that will start selling the iPhone tomorrow.
“We have these fake queues at front of 20 stores around the country to drum up interest in the iPhone,” according to a spokesman with Orange, a subsidiary of France Telecom SA (ADR) (NYSE:FTE) in an interview with Reuters. In the opening weekend, telecomm provider AT&T (NYSE:T) did not have to worry about whether it would the iPhone 3G would sell on the opening weekend or not. On the opening week, one million iPhone 3Gs were sold in the U.S.
There weren’t any lines at the T-Mobile Era stores. Should Apple be concerned? Probably not. Consumers will probably wait till the stores open and then start crowding.
Related Link:
1. Reuters
Categories Apple Inc., France Telecom SA, Orange, T-Mobile
Leave a comment
Apple Updates Software To Mitigate Connectivity Problems
Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) has updated the software that runs the connectivity of the iPhone last night. This update should be able to resolve some of the connectivity problems that many Apple customers have been complaining about.
“We have had complaints about connectivity in the Netherlands but have not had more complaints than usual for a 3G phone in Germany. Our technicians said today Apple has issued a software update but it is too early to tell if the problems are solved,” mentioned a spokesman at T-Mobile. T-Mobile is a subsidiary of Deutsche Telekom AG (ADR) (NYSE:DT). AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T) also confirmed that Apple made the software update.
Although the iPhone is selling by the millions, many users have had problems with dropped calls and slow Internet speeds. The iPhone 3G handset will be launching in another 20 countries in two days.
Related Link:
1. Reuters
Categories Apple Inc.
2 Comments