Apple is losing its luster
Forbes says that Apple is going the way of IBM — the once great technology leader that peaked and has slowly lost its market power. The evidence provided includes Apple’s rock star lead designer, Jony Ive’s departure last week. This follows Q1’s revenue decline of 5%. Apple did report a 16% increase in service revenue last quarter but its iPhone revenue, over 50% of its total revenues, fell over 17%. The company’s last megahit was the iPad, launched in 2010.
dis-rup-shun: Tech watchers will agree that a definitive mark of a company’s peak is the moment when it builds a lavish headquarters building. The completion of Apple’s ring campus was an indicator that the company was overly impressed with its own aura to the detriment of customer focus. Apple is the symbol of the post PC tech economy, and it is critical that the company continue to lead innovation, design and sales, despite the loss of key people including Jobs and Ive.
40th anniversary of the Walkman
Sony’s Walkman, released on July 1, 1979, created the first personal, portable music experience — enabling people to take their favorite music with them and experience it privately (the boom box had been around for nearly a decade). While Sony enjoys only a small share of the personal music player market today, the Walkman set the stage for the Discman and for personal music players, eventually perfected by the iPod. The Verge
T-Mobile joins the 5G fray
T-Mobile has now switched on its 5G network in 6 cities, joining Verizon, AT&T, and Sprint with some form of offering. The service results in speeds of 250 Mbps, or 5 to 10x the speeds of 4G. The service, however is not ready for prime time as it rides on spectrum not compatible with many phones. Gizmodo
dis-rup-shun: The 5G race is a reminder that competition is a great thing. 5G does not make economic sense at the moment, as great amounts of infrastructure, both handsets and network, must be upgraded and carriers simply wouldn’t do it if their competition wasn’t.
Fireworks — one of the few things you cannot buy from Amazon
Few things are not available on Amazon.com, but fireworks and other explosive devices are prohibited from the online retail system. Amazon has constructed special warehouses for handling hazardous goods and is building its own delivery network, but so far fireworks are not in the plans. Wired
dis-rup-shun: Fireworks stands may be the only mom and pop enterprises not threatened by the Seattle behemoth. Happy 4th of July.