AppleTV, iPhone are game-changers, CFO says
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(InfoWorld) - Talk about the coming iPhone and AppleTV deviceÂ dominated the discussion with the chief financial officer of AppleÂ at an investment conference in San Francisco Tuesday. Peter Oppenheimer, appearing at the Morgan Stanley Technology Conference, declined to give specific unit sales forecasts for the new products but anticipated they will be strong. IDG News Service monitored the event via Webcast. "AppleTV will change the way people gather and purchase their digital content," said Oppenheimer of the $299 AppleTV, due out later this month. It is a set-top box that delivers digital content stored on a computer, including video purchased from Apple's iTunes online store, to a TV. However, the usefulness of the AppleTV may be tied to the amount of video content available on iTunes. Today, he said, 400 movies and 350 TV programs are available for downloads, with more added all the time. He said Apple recently reached agreements with film distributors Paramount Pictures and Lion's Gate Entertainment to sell downloads of their movies on iTunes. The much-anticipated Apple iPhone is scheduled to hit the market in June. The iPhone, which Apple CEO Steve Jobs introduced at Macworld in January, features anÂ innovative touch-screen interfaceÂ on a combination phone, iPod, and e-mail and Internet access device. It will sell for $499 or $599 depending on storage capacity, and will require a two-yearÂ contract with Cingular Wireless, the mobile division of AT&T. He declined to comment specifically on a March 1 report from Morgan Stanley analyst Kathryn Huberty, who interviewed him at the conference, in which she raised her forecast for 2007 iPhone sales to 8 million from an earlier forecast of 6 million, based on a survey of 2,500 U.S. customers. "Half the demand is coming from the traditional high-end handset market and half from Apple's customer base," Huberty said. While not commenting on the forecast, Oppenheimer said the iPhone will be a "breakthrough product." "Though Apple is new to the mobile phone market, we believe the addressable market will grow quickly," he said. In itsÂ last quarterly earnings reportÂ on Jan. 17, Apple posted net income of $1 billion, or $1.14 per share, on revenue of $7.1 billion for the three months ended Dec. 30, 2006. Analysts forecast Apple to earn $0.62 per share on revenue of $5.16 billion in the current quarter, according to a consensus estimate produced by Thomson Financial. In a 40-minute conversation with Huberty, including questions from other analysts in the audience, Oppenheimer did not discuss theÂ stock options scandal at Apple. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and the U.S. Attorney's Office in San Francisco are investigating whether Apple improperly accounted for and disclosed the backdating of options. No charges have been filed. Â
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Apple Inc.&#39;s  iPhone won  a strong endorsement from a key technology reviewer on Tuesday  when the Wall Street Journal&#39;s Walter Mossberg called it a  beautiful, breakthrough device.
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A New York Times story published yesterday cited a report from Forrester Research analyst Josh Bernoff, which inferred that since the ratio of iTunes songs sold per iPod sold has been steadily rising, a disconnect could be occurring between the two products in a changing portable media market.
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(InfoWorld) - With the release of Apple's iPhone on June 29, IT managers are hustling to find ways to support the devices, anticipating the moment when the CEO walks in with one and demands, "Give me my corporate e-mail on this gizmo." Analysts and IT managers said Thursday the iPhone will be popular among their workers who buy them for consumer uses, but the devices will certainly challenge businesses because of the needed support for e-mail, iTunes songs, and other applications. For example, at communications conglomerate ABC in New York, the official policy, for now, is not to support the iPhone at all, but there will be some exceptions for top executives. "At this point, with a few exceptions, the iPhone is not a supported device, but for one or two ABC presidents, we'll make the walls move to allow it because we're in the communications business" and they will want to see iPhone's capabilities, said Jeff Plotkin, an engineer for broadcast operations and a technology liaison at ABC. "We'll figure out how to allow them access to e-mail." Plotkin and other IT managers said there will be plenty of iPhone allure for their workers even though the multifunction device doesn't support Lotus Notes or Windows Outlook e-mail, which are popular in corporate settings. Instead, iPhone will provide a Web access client for e-mail access, analysts noted. "After it is out and the price point comes down, more people here might set up a business case for it, saying it could do this or that," Plotkin added. "I can see our policy changing eventually." Also, the iPhone will pose a nightmare for IT because it requires an iTunes music directory account for each user, IT managers said, putting IT in the position potentially of providing song storage capacity and justifying that the copyrights for the songs were not violated or that the songs were properly paid for. "How many enterprises want iTunes software running around in the enterprise?" asked Gartner analyst Ken Dulaney. Meanwhile, corporate policy at Marriott already prohibits iTunes registration on Marriott's systems by its workers, said Arnaldo Impelizieri, director of hotel technology for the Grande Lakes Orlando resort, which is run by Marriott. "We're worried about the size of iTunes files and also who is buying songs or not, and the huge concern about potential copyright infringements," he said. However, Impelizieri said the hotel chain faces a dilemma because it will want to support the iPhone, and iTunes, for its hotel guests. "If a customer has one, we'll do our best to support it, but that will require some sorting out. We have to get our hands on the iPhone and see if it's all that it's beefed up to be. When BlackBerry first came out, there was a wave of uncertainty at first." For months, industry analysts have warned about e-mail access, security, and whether the voice quality of the iPhone will be up to corporate standards. Dulaney is finalizing a report describing iPhone concerns but would not discuss it until its release next week. "Lots of Gartner clients are asking" about iPhone for business uses, Dulaney said. "They are scared of this device." Tim Ma, a biomedical engineer at the American Red Cross in Washington who also handles some IT planning, said he expects "pressure from users" to support the iPhone. "It's too early in the game to say if we'd support it. We'd need a proven track record before moving forward." He said he is personally curious about iPhone's features and potential benefits for a large organization and will eventually test it out thoroughly. For one thing, the iPhone will have a full-screen Web browser, an apparent advantage over what Reseach in Motion's BlackBerry offers the Red Cross. Meanwhile, he added, "We have a contract with BlackBerry for a long time." Jack Gold, an analyst at J. Gold Associates, said he doesn't consider the iPhone as currently envisioned suitable for business users unless they limit their use to functions like the phone. "IPhone doesn't have push e-mail," he noted. Early reviews from February that the iPhone's voice quality was not good have raised questions as well, he said. "Everybody assumes that because Apple makes it, the iPhone will be great, but it's hard to make a good phone, let alone pass data," Gold said. "Still, executives are going to come back from the store and tell IT to make it work."
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It is not just Apple that stands to make big profits from its effort to redefine the mobile phone industry.
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By Hiawatha Bray, The Boston Globe  Sep. 13--Apple Computer Inc. yesterday made its long-awaited move from  hip pockets to living rooms.
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Apple announced financial results Monday that were the corporate equivalent of a grand slam. With the iPod, iPhone, and Mac computer on base, the company hit a home run in its fiscal fourth quarter.
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Apple's winning streak continues, with the firm reporting its second consecutive quarter of record-breaking growth. Thank a bouncy Leopard, says CFO Peter Oppenheimer.
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Is Apple a Mac magnate or an iPod powerhouse?
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New talk about Apple's super-hyped iPhone, and an open-source video player aimed at toppling traditional TV.
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At event in S.F., company unveils new iPods, movies on iTunes, and device that links PCs to TVs. Photos: Showtime for Apple
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Finding it âa significant leap,â Steven Levy (Newsweek) calls  iPhone âa superbly engineered, cleverly designed and imaginatively implemented approach to a problem that no one has cracked to date: merging a phone handset, an Internet navigator and a media player in a package where every component shines, and the features are welcoming rather than foreboding.Â  The iPhone is the rare convergence device where things actually converge.â iPhone, he says, âfinally fulfills the promise of people-friendly palm-top communication and computing.â
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The company offers a range of predictions. Lots of folks are keying on the guess that Apple will double their U.S. share, but I'm intrigued by other predictions, including forecasts that we'll be traveling without laptops and renting our business software
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Next-generation Razr, smartphones, and combo devices will help firm rebound, CEO says.
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(InfoWorld) - Gartner, IDC, and 451 Group research analysts, this week warned IT administrators to keep iPhones away from their businesses. "We're telling IT executives to not support it because Apple has no intentions of supporting [iPhone use in] the enterprise," Gartner analyst Ken Dulaney said. "This is basically a cellular iPod with some other capabilities, and it's important that it be recognized as such." As if that will stop people from buying them anyway when they hit the market in the U.S. next week. The reality is that no matter how hard IT administrators try, the iPhone will be snapped up by their employees -- and not just the average Joes either. The device is a status symbol that will likely be snapped up by business leaders as the digital technorati. Try telling your CEO the iPhone doesn't play well with your IT systems. Dulaney and other researchers notwithstanding, this device can be good for the enterprise because of the business needs of smartphone users. It is an iPhone, after all, with an emphasis on phone. It offers e-mail -- currently the most popular means of business communications. There's an address/phone Book for quick access to contacts. It offers SMS, a quick way to contact other mobile phone users, and voicemail -- both useful to road warriors. There's a real Web browser -- by far the most underpowered and underappreciated part of a mobile phone. And it contains a slew of enterprise-worthy apps, including a calendar, access to maps, spreadsheets, and a document reader. All of these things are important -- and all can be done to a greater or lesser extent on most business-focused PDA phones. But in the business world, the mobile Web browser is the key to the future of business apps, and it is becoming a platform unto itself. One thing that Apple CEO Steve Jobs made abundantly clear at last week's Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) is that the iPhone would include a full browser. The Symbian and Linux platforms' best browser is Opera Mini -- which isn't that bad -- but it by no means constitutes a full browser. Windows Mobile's browser isn't bad either, but it also falls well short of Internet Explorer 7. Additionally, the iPhone browser has a lot of zooming and panning tricks that make it more usable on the relatively small screen. In that crucial area, advantage: iPhone. Why is the browser crucial? Because most new business applications are being built around it. AJAX and other browser technology innovations over the past few years have turned the browser into a veritable platform. Sure, a lot of legacy applications still require browserless, platform-specific client applications. But those days are numbered. It's not just the isolated applications that are moving to a browser. All of the stalwart office applications are also moving to the Web. With Google Office (which now works with Safari -- the iPhone browser), Soho Office, and even Web-centric versions of Microsoft Office applications, the browser is truly the new business platform. The iPhone is not without its business-use flaws. It doesn't natively sync up with Lotus Notes or Exchange - and Microsoft, at least, will most likely do everything in its power to try to keep it that way to protect its Windows Mobile business. It can, however, hook up to IMAP email, LDAP address books, and WebDav for calendaring; with a bit of tweaking, that will work well for Exchange-based companies. Microsoft SharePoint can also be browsed from the Web interface, but to what extent? Time -- and the work of apps developers -- will tell. A newly anointed relationship with Cisco on all things iPhone should also let the device into the VPN and might even let an iPhone play well with Cisco VoIP solutions. And of course, don't forget the arduous task of getting your conservative IT department to accept the idea of letting loose an Apple phone -- or even MacBook Pro -- into the office. Previews of the phone haven't yet touted an instant messaging client like Apple's iChat or AOL Instant Messenger. It is likely, however, that Apple will include something with instant-messaging functionality in the near future -- there are still four slots left in the iPhone's application window. It's also true that the first-generation iPhone isn't the raw specs winner by any stretch. That honor goes to the Symbian/Windows Mobile 6 Phones coming from Toshiba (the G900), Nokia (the N95), Samsung (the F700) and HTC (the Shift). AT&T's EDGE wireless network is slow by today's standards, and while Wifi connectivity will help, there are questions about why Apple has forsaken the HSDPA/UTMS component and when an update might occur. Given that battery life is a factor -- Apple this week released updated specs that go beyond what it touted in January -- EDGE makes sense because it's more energy efficient. Also, the 8GB max on storage is seems low. At a time when you can buy an 8GB SD card for less than $80, Apple likely looked to keep costs down with an eye on upping that storage when it's economically smart. Most users would likely be happy with a micro/mini/SD card slot now standard on most smartphones. There is, of course, the price. The iPhone's hefty $499 and $599 price tags, depending on which model you buy, is a definite disadvantage in business. With relatively comparable gear (from a corporate standpoint), such as the Motorola Q, which is almost free with a service plan, buying an iPhone requires serious justification. We're talking about spending the equivalent of a budget laptop. Of course, something that you spend half your day using should justify the premium that this delicious piece of hardware demands. And then there are at least two intangibles: Usability. Apple's legendary reputation for making painful tasks easy will totally transform the mobile phone industry. And remember, companies love productivity from their workers. Until now, the big players have been Microsoft Windows Mobile, Palm, Symbian, and Linux. They all had successes. But it's the last 10 percent of usability that Apple always manages to squeeze out its products will be the differentiator. Apple did the same in the computer industry until Microsoft caught up. Apple has learned from this and patented every minute detail of the iPhone, making it harder for copycats to appear anytime soon. The few seconds here there that the iPhone saves users will quickly add up. It's the little things that make for big savings across an entire enterprise. Business bling, baby. Everyone knows that this is the phone to have. Just look at the buzz ahead of the June 29 launch. Apple has spent the last few years building up its brand across all channels and is reaping the rewards like no other company in the industry. As much as the enterprise IT guys will want to recite better specs for rival Windows Mobile devices, nobody wants to hear that. I can imagine any number of CEOs saying, "I don't care! Just make the iPhone work on our systems!" And if it works for the CEO, you can bet the sales folk will want in on the action, too. Think they'll want to show up to a meeting with an important client and whip out last year's "hot" phone? They might as well wear parachute pants as well.
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Steve Jobs, Bono and the Edge Tuesday ushered in what Apple&#39;s CEO and the two members of U2 called a new era of digital music.
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Tech companies haven't had much success in the living room. Can the iPod maker do any better with its Apple TV?