iPhone 12 is gone, Apple’s most boring autumn conference is still a success

Under the "efforts" of Cook and , the annual "Technology Spring Festival Gala" Apple autumn conference is becoming more and more boring. At the press conference early this morning, Cook said straightforwardly that today's press conference only focused on two products, Apple Watch and iPad.

​​The most anticipated iPhone 12 for fruit fans has finally not come. According to analysts' estimates, the iPhone 12 series will be mass-produced in early next month at the earliest, and the official launch will have to wait until late October.

​​The time is uncertain, in short, it must be next time.

​​has no new love boom, and the market can't afford it. Yesterday, Apple closed up slightly by 0.16% to $115.54, with the latest market value of $1976.02 billion.

(Source: Flush)

​​But in my younger brother's view, the Apple autumn conference, which is called "the most boring and shortest in history", is actually not that unbearable.

​​New Apple Watch, iPad released, and Apple One Apple service package, now Apple is slowly "de-popping".

​​If Cook has been in charge of Apple for ten years and he has any achievements, the creation of an Apple company that integrates software and hardware will definitely be counted.

1. Hardware upgrade, software service package push

​​hardware, the new iPad and Apple Watch are both performance upgrades.

iPad Air 4 has the latest A14 processor, full-screen design, Liquid retina display, Type-C interface, and Touch ID integrated on the power button. The

A14 processor bionic processor adopts 5nm process technology and is the world's first mass-produced chip with 5nm process technology. It is said that compared with the previous generation 7nm A12 bionic processor, the CPU running speed has increased by 40%, and the graphics processing capacity has increased by 30%. In short,

​​is tough.

​​(Source: Apple's official website) The main update of

iPad 8 is that the processor has been upgraded from the previous A10 Fusion to the A12 bionic chip. This A12 chip is the industry's first 7nm chip originally released in the iPhone XS series and iPhone XR.

​​Apple Watch, Apple also released two new products this morning: Apple Watch Series 6 and Apple Watch SE.

Series 6 adds aluminum alloy version, ink color, golden stainless steel version, fashionable and most fashionable, built-in S6 chip based on A13 chip but has been specially optimized, the performance is 20% higher than the previous generation; SE adopts a full screen design and S5 chip , Which is twice as fast as the entry-level S3 chip and has cellular network functions. In short,

​​is still strong.

(Source: Apple's official website)

​​But the editor thinks that the performance upgrade of new hardware products is just a basic operation, and there is no need to go crazy 666. What's really interesting is Apple's Apple One package.

Apple One package, as the name suggests, is to bundle the previous Apple software services, mainly divided into three levels, namely personal, family and premium packages. The personal and home versions of

​​include Apple Music, Apple TV+, Apple Arcade (game subscription service) and iCloud cloud storage services; the premium version includes Apple News+ and Apple Fitness+.

​​(Source: The Verge website)

​​Among the above packages, except for the fitness service Apple Fitness+ with multiple sports training modes, which was released today, the rest are software services that have been released before.

​​If so, what is special about Apple One?

​​In fact, although Apple One may seem dull, there are many things hidden in it.

2. Apple, not only the service items in the mobile phone company

​​Apple One package, most of them were released at the spring conference last year.

​​Beijing time 2In the early morning of March 26, 019, Apple held a new product launch conference that could be called "the softest in history". In this conference, Apple did not launch any hardware products, but launched a long list of software services, including magazine subscription service Apple News+, credit card service Apple Card, game subscription service Apple Arcade, video subscription service Apple TV+, etc. The "softest in history" conference of

​​is also regarded as the beginning of Apple's comprehensive construction of software and hardware ecological transformation, but in fact, Cook has said many times that Apple is really not just a mobile phone company, it is a technology company . The software services released by

​​last year are basically covered in today's Apple One gift package. The company's goal is very clear, which is to increase the number of users of various services through bundling marketing.

​​From the price point of view, like the McDonald’s three-piece package, it is cheaper to buy a package than to buy it alone. According to Apple, the personal Apple One package will be cheaper than buying four services by 6 US dollars per month; the family package can save 8 US dollars per month; the six-in-one premium package can even save more than 25 US dollars per month.

​​To give a simple example, the monthly subscription price of Apple Music is $9.99, the price of Apple TV+ is $4.99, and the price of Apple Arcade is $4.99. If you buy a personal Apple One package, not only the total price is about the same, but also an additional cloud storage service (equivalent to the Coke delivered by the premium package). There are two advantages of

: one is to divert traffic between different services; the other is to reduce the user scale of competitors' benchmark products in disguise.

​​First of all, the original intention of users to purchase packages is likely to be just to save money. But after purchasing the package, you have to try other services that were originally bonus. For example, the user originally bought the package for Apple Music, but after binding the package, it’s okay to take a look at the Apple TV+ service. Apple Arcade can also be tried.

​​Amazon has used this trick very well, and its Prime members have bundled Amazon Prime Video and Amazon Music at the same time, and the result is that the two users drain each other.

​​Secondly, when users get used to Apple's software ecosystem, if Apple's software service quality is good enough, I believe most users will not easily make changes after establishing path dependencies. Once the sea is difficult to be water, all clouds except iClould are not clouds.

​​In this way, users who use Apple Music will no longer subscribe to Spotify. In other words, Apple has grabbed users from direct competitors.

​​Finally, another benefit of establishing a software ecosystem is that it will deepen fruit fans’ loyalty to the company’s hardware products. After a user gets used to Apple's software ecological products, if he needs to upgrade his hardware, due to his dependence on Apple's software, there is a high probability that the user will choose to upgrade Apple products instead of switching to the Android camp. The "predecessors" in industries such as Xiaomi and Huawei have been thoroughly skilled in the

​​product ecosystem marketing strategy, and the results have also been proven to be effective.

​​Cook is trying every means to bundle marketing, and his service software is rubbing traffic with each other. We not only need to see him as a "profite businessman" as a ubiquitous new method, but also see that he wants to transform Apple Determination.

​​From the data point of view, "businessman" Cook's Apple has been very successful for ten years.

​​At the 2017 spring conference, Cook boasted that Apple’s software service revenue in Haikou would reach 50 billion US dollars in 2020.

​​In the 2017 fiscal year, Apple's service revenue was close to 30 billion U.S. dollars, and Cook called for a three-year net increase of 20 billion U.S. dollars. In fiscal year 2019, the company's service revenue was 46.3 billion U.S. dollars; in the first three quarters of fiscal 2020, service revenue was close to 40 billion U.S. dollars. If nothing happens, Apple's service revenue in this fiscal year could exceed 50 billion U.S. dollars.

(Source: Straight Flush iFinD)

​​If there are no accidents, this year Cook will fulfill the goal he called out.

​​is not only software, but also Apple's sales of other hardware such as wearables and iPads. In the most robust wireless headset market, according to Strategy Analytics statistics, Apple’s AirP last yearThe sales volume of ods is close to 60 million, and its revenue accounts for 71% of the entire market.

​​From the perspective of revenue, starting from the 2018 fiscal year, Apple’s iPhone revenue has been declining year by year. During the same period, sales of software services and other products have seen a significant increase.

(source: Wind)

​​This is exactly what Cook wants. Apple is really not just a mobile phone manufacturer, it is a technology company.

​​Even though today's most boring autumn conference in Apple history does not have the new love boom that fruit fans are most looking forward to, what about?

3. Cook's ten years and Apple's two trillion market value

​​Some people say that the biggest difference between Cook and Jobs as the helms of Apple is that Cook is an excellent and perfect CEO, and Jobs is a genius, unparalleled, and unprecedented. Great product manager.

​​Cook’s Apple iPhone lacks innovation and has been left behind by its Chinese counterparts. But this does not prevent Apple's mobile phones from continuing to occupy the most profitable high-end mobile phone field. According to the statistics of Counterpoint, a market survey agency, high-end phones with a value of more than US$400 in the first quarter of this year accounted for 22% of global smartphone sales, and revenue accounted for nearly 57%. In the high-end mobile phone market, Apple's market share is 57%, Samsung is 19%, and Huawei is 12%.

​​At the same time, Apple continues to introduce cheap versions of the iPhone, squeezing out the mid-range mobile phone market with a larger user base.

​​During this year, due to the long-term epidemic blockade in Europe and the United States, Apple's iPhone sales have almost stopped growing (see the figure below for the second and third fiscal quarters of fiscal year 2020).

(Source: Straight Flush)

​​But this does not prevent Apple's stock price from hitting new highs this year, beating Nasdaq by a large margin and surpassing US$2 trillion at one time. The reason behind it is very simple. Apple’s current story line is not just limited to the iPhone. Its certainty also comes from other products such as wearable devices and software ecology. What's more, the entire mobile phone industry has declined this year, and Apple's iPhone, whose prices continue to fall, still has an advantage in the high-end mobile phone market. In the future, iPhone sales are likely to rebound with the industry. Although the Apple iPhone lacks innovation, its sales are actually not bad.

(Source: iFinD)

​​All this is actually due to Cook.

​​Cook has been in charge of Apple for ten years. Apple has bid farewell to amazing innovations, but its business has become increasingly diversified. After gradually getting rid of iPhone dependence, its performance has become more stable, and its market value has exceeded two trillion US dollars. Counted as successful?

​​is like today's boring autumn conference. It is not amazing and topical, but it does not mean that Apple's software service business, one of the protagonists at the conference, is not successful. The situation is even the opposite.

​​Only from the perspective of the CEO, the most boring autumn conference in Apple history under Cook's rule is ultimately considered a success.