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Speaking from experience as somebody who has done this sort of trip: Yes, it's hugely useful and there is a real business benefit. First off, we're probably t
by glenra 15y ago
Speaking from experience as somebody who has done this sort of trip: Yes, it's hugely useful and there is a real business benefit.
First off, we're probably talking about a time when there were only a few direct flights a day from SFO to the relevant airport so if he didn't go that afternoon he'd have to wait until the next morning so instead of flying through the night he'd be flying through the day - flying RIGHT THEN means one less day in which your product slips its schedule.
Now recall that Apple used to have trouble getting enough media attention so they would schedule product announcements around, say, MacWorld or the Superbowl. Big events that cannot be moved. Every day the schedule slips makes it that much more likely you miss the intended product launch window. For Apple, if your product isn't ready to ship, it's not ready to show which means you've wasted a lot of money - your next suitable launch window might be months later by which time the product no longer has a compelling story to tell. Missing the intended launch date can mean the difference between a successful product and a failure.
Conference calls are expensive and tend to involve both high-level people and lower-level people. If the schedule is slipping, the chinese engineers won't necessarily tell you the truth about why it's slipping in that sort of forum - there's a face-saving issue. There are also communications difficulties when people who don't speak english well just nod and say "yes, we'll do that" without really understanding what they're agreeing to. Email can clarify and puts things in writing but the time difference means most exchanges lose at least a day.
Another factor is "the squeaky wheel gets the grease". The same factory is trying to build products for you and a variety of other companies. When some other company's product totally unrelated to yours has a crisis, they might choose to rationally pull engineering resources away from your product to serve somebody else...if you're not there to nag and check up on the schedule.
The bottom line is that if you don't have at least one person there most of the time, your product stands a very very low chance of meeting your schedule or your quality targets.
- jarek 15y ago> For Apple, if your product isn't ready to ship, it's not ready to show Hm. I guess the iPad that shipped a couple of months after being shown is the special butterfly exception that confirms your nice fluffy rule.
- jballanc 15y agoReady to ship almost never means "in stores". Additionally, Apple trusts no one, even when NDAs are in place, so at the very least the product has to be ready to go to third-party partners by the time it's announced. Often, the partners may need some time before it's "ready to ship", which can account for part of the delay. That said, last minute bugs do happen and cause delays. Apple will ship late before it ships a known defective product (yes, it has shipped defective products, but not any that were known defective), but it doesn't like to do either.
- glenra 15y agoStandard exceptions to the rule in recent memory include: - products that depend on 3rd-party developer support. If the iPad 3 has a new form factor and new hardware such that developers will want to rewrite their apps to take best advantage, Apple might show it at the developer conference and tell everybody "you've got 3 months to get your apps ready" - products that get accidentally leaked or need to be leaked early due to regulatory requirements such as filing for FCC approval. What Apple doesn't do is float trial balloons just to have something to show. Lot of companies will mock up some design that is approximately similar to the expected final product and show/announce that, then finish figuring out how to build it. Apple's ideal is to make a big splash by showing something unexpected that you can buy in the very very near future so people run out and buy it, garnering additional publicity based on the big lines and big numbers of customers. Which is great if you can pull it off, though it seems inevitable that one of these days they'll guess wrong. If and when they do blow it, it'll be at least a billion-dollar mistake to have built up so much inventory in advance of finding out whether people like the thing.
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- jballanc 15y agoYes he would. Apple doesn't own any jets. Steve owns a jet, and Apple reimburses him when he's using it for Apple-related travel.
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- n3m6 15y agoAs a consumer of Apple products I can relate. Apple, has never introduced vaporware, and almost always ships on deadline. I think those little things goes a long way to establish credibility.