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60 percent of Apple’s sales are from products that did not exist three years ago
- mkr-hn 16y agoDo you mean didn't exist at all, or just hadn't been made by Apple? edit: Not sure why I'm being downvoted. The answer affects the whole tone and meaning of the article.
- brianpan 16y ago60% of current sales are from iPhone and iPad which were launched in the past 3 years.
- mkr-hn 16y agoThe question was what is meant by "didn't exist."
- tvon 16y agoas in "the Apple product didn't exist"
- photon_off 16y agoHe answered your question. "Products that did not exist three years ago" can be replaced by "iPhone and iPad." It would appear to mean "products made by Apple"
- derefr 16y agoThe iPhone and iPad are products. Smartphones and tablets are product categories. There's a clear (if unconscious) distinction in the usage of the two terms, at least in press-release-speak.
- ra88it 16y agoThe iPhone did not exist before Apple released it. Is that controversial?
- mkr-hn 16y agoThe wording could have been taken to mean the general product any of those are based on. I'm sorry for seeking clarification. Won't ever happen again. I was kind of hoping HN was the sort of place where I could ask that without being jumped on as some sort of anti-Apple instigator. Some people are upvoting, so yay. Maybe it is. :)
- jamesaguilar 16y agoTo be fair, it was a bit of a snarky question. You knew whether phones existed before the iPhone, so it's not like you could have been asking that in good faith. Similar with touchscreen tablets.
- mkr-hn 16y agoI should have put more time and thought in to wording, but the intent was positive.
- wtallis 16y agoSo, what general product do you think the iPhone was based on? The Blackberry, or perhaps the Treo, since that had a touch screen? In order to say that Apple didn't come up with the idea behind the iPod or the iPhone, you have to generalize the category to the point that it was painfully obvious to anybody even remotely aware of what's going on in the industry. MP3 players are an obvious idea to anybody who has heard of the Walkman and knows that computers can store and play music. The idea of using a tiny hard drive in one is similarly obvious. So is the idea of making a phone that can surf the web and also be an MP3 player. When people praise Apple's ingenuity with the iPhone and iPod, they are referring to the fact that almost everything other than the most fundamental idea was revolutionary or at least clever. In other words, every aspect of the product that actually affects its success in the marketplace was invented or re-invented.
- jfarmer 16y agoNobody is jumping on your because you're being "anti-Apple." They're down-voting you because you're being pedantic, whether intentional or not.
- mkr-hn 16y agoOne interpretation makes this a post about the success of an innovator. One interpretation makes this post one giving false credit for the creation of entire industries. It is something I've seen from a minority of Apple users. It's a valid question.
- derefr 16y agoOne interpretation is being charitable to the intelligence of the community who chose to upvote it; the other presumes they were either fooled, or that the minority you refer to has infiltrated HN and is on a mission to block-upvote Apple propaganda. A combination of the Principle of Charity and Occam's Razor makes the latter seem improbable.
- jfarmer 16y agoHe obviously meant that most of Apple's product line is less than 3 years old. The iPad, per se, did not exist three years ago, though of course the concept of a tablet computer is decades old.
- Herring 16y ago>the concept of a tablet computer is decades old And it's been dead in the water the whole time. There were many failed attempts at flying machines before the Wright brothes.
- pyre 16y agoTrue, but I think the people saying things like "Apple didn't invent..." are about spaces like the smartphone market, or the mp3 player market (or even selling mp3s online). While many might describe the iPad as "just a larger iPhone," I think that it's different enough from other tablet offerings to give Apple some amount of credit.
- ShardPhoenix 16y agoWow, the iPhone only came out in 2007? Somehow it feels like it's been around much longer.
- tvon 16y agoI'll guess that you're being down-voted because it's an odd question (seems obvious if you read the post), which by itself is no big deal, but one might think the answer is so obvious that perhaps you're just trying to make that tired "Apple didn't invent the phone/portable music player/touchscreen/etc" point.
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]
- mkr-hn 16y agoI like how I've lost 40 points just for having a disagreement. My tone and manner are no worse than anyone else who manages to stick around for more than a day without being downvoted in to oblivion. I haven't even called anyone names. I've even had deeper, more protracted arguments than this without losing any points.
- redstripe 16y agoWhat's also interesting about that chart is that software makes up such a small part of revenue. A bad CEO would see that and devote a similarly tiny amount of resources to software development because, you know, it doesn't make the company much money. Not to say that Apple software is all awesome, but at least they don't treat it as a cost center that has to be trimmed.
- flogic 16y agoTrue. Also to count software accurately you'd need to break each device sale into both a software and hardware sale.
- pt 16y agoAs per GAAP accounting rules, Apple is likely to be doing this separation already. Hardware and Software sold together on a device are supposed to be revenue recognized differently. http://www.cfo.com/article.cfm/14440468 http://www.cfo.com/article.cfm/14440468
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]
- andre3k1 16y agoYes, but generally accepted accounting principles do not dictate how to separate the two. What percentage of revenue should be classified as software? What percentage of revenue should be classified as hardware?
- andre3k1 16y agoWe must not forget that each and every Apple device also comes preloaded with Apple software. They don't sell OSX for non-Mac computers. Therefore jumping to such a conlcusion is unwarranted as every single sale of a product of theirs involves a sale of their software. When one tallies up the percentages, a sale of an iPod or iPhone is classified as a hardware sale though Apple is also selling iOS in the transaction. In other words, the only way to consume Apple's hardware is through Apple software. Therefore, every single sale of Apple's hardware also involves the sale of Apple's software. I find it a bit disturbing that the article does not mention this.
- petenixey 16y ago3M institutionalised innovation by enforcing a ratio like this. I can't remember the exact figures but something like 30% of every division's revenues had to be from products released in the previous 5 years. An "aged revenue" ratio might make a good performance predictor for a company: the proportion of revenues that comes from products designed in the last 5 years. GOOG:MSFT:FBK:AMZN - you could get some powerful performance indicators from that simple stat.
- eru 16y agoBut does it have any predictive power?
- aaronblohowiak 16y agoThis is called the Freshness index, and is vital for any company that wants to stay relevant and assure continued revenue.
- metamemetics 16y agoSeems to confirm the subthesis of Carl Schramm's The Entrepreneurial Imperative. That is, established firms are having to become increasingly entrepreneurial in order to compete. This is largely good news for those doing startups. Since the lifespan of profitability for any one business model is decreasing in the future, existing firms are going to be offering a lot of money to buy new ones or get pushed out of the marketplace.
- erikstarck 16y agoThis is cool and all but the company has obviously gone through a significant shift the last three years, with the iPhone and iPad. Comparing 2008 with 2005 does not give the same ratio.
- queensnake 16y agoWhat could they do next to keep it up? Dick Tracey watches? Augmented reality contact lenses? Brain implants? A flying robot personal assistant? None of these seems as plausible as a smart phone or a 'Dyna Pad'. Oh wait, there's Mistry's "Sixth Sense" setup still to go. Where is that thing, anyway? He promised to open source it, by around this last January. Someone's bought him, for sure. It'd be more interesting if it was someone other than Apple. I'm just amazed that it hasn't been on the radar, one way or the other.
- kokor 16y agoTablets - Existed Phones with applications - Existed Personal music players - Existed So what im missing besides biased marketing bullshit?
- johnglasgow 16y agoApple is one of the best companies at cannibalizing it's own products, which is mandatory to stay ahead of the competition. Example: Apple crushed iPod sales by releasing the iPhone.
- known 16y agoAnd it has also cost Ray Ozzie his job at Microsoft.