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7s disaster?
- Thread starter ForumChick
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So disastrous Apple might go bankrupt
I was thinking about getting the 7S. Am wondering if it comes in red. Although I'll probably get black.
Since when is the s-line considered budget? I wouldn't call a ~650 phone a budget phone.
I would think looking at the relative success of the SE that there is a place for a cheaper iPhone in their line up.
It won't be a disaster but I have no doubts the 7S will be the mainstream iPhone due to its cheaper price if the rumours are to be believed.
It will be considered "budget" this year because of the existence of the 8 (or whatever that ends up being called).
Personally I think it's a mistake. I think they'll massively overestimate demand for the S models, while excluding many from the better phone they actually want. Most people don't buy iPhones, especially on launch day, in order to feel like they got second best (and that's absolutely what the S will stand for this year).
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I don't think that's the case at all. No phone costing upwards of £700 is a budget device despite there being a slightly more expensive option IMO. Even the iPhone SE wasn't considered a budget device when it was released as it's priced competitively within the market.
Personally I think Apple are making a mistake releasing a premium phone. I don't know why they don't release it at the consistent price point we've seen for their products. I think they are overestimating how many people these days who are willing to spend over £1000 on a mobile phone. I've lost count of the amount of iPhone owners I know who have laughed at the rumoured price and it's not always due to lack of disposable income.
The only disaster will be when Appple losses its case to Qualcomm hers a link to the details. Just read the patents very short you will see how Apple is furious they have to pay someone else in order for their iPhone to exists. Infact Apple agreed and were paying they just stoppped when Qualcommm raised its prices.
https://www.digitaltrends.com/business/apple-vs-qualcomm-news/
This is when the IPhone 8 and 7s and 7s Plus will have junky LTE Radios/ Modems from Intel.
https://9to5mac.com/2016/10/20/iphone-7-qualcomm-intel-modem-cellular-performance/
This is going to be much more of a problem that a lot of people are giving it credit for. I simply will not go and buy a second tier iPhone for £620 with a tired old design, an out of date LCD panel especially when apple are dangling the 8 in front of me saying "this is what we can make".
If you're not a tech geek do you think people really put that much thought into the spec? I think it's more a case people will want a new iPhone and price is more often than not the deciding factor. Look at the popularity of the SE with its 5 year old design. I don't think the hype is as big as it used to be.
What it boils down to - if Apple stand on the stage in September and flaunt the iPhone 8 and it has wireless charging, facial recognition (unconfirmed I know, but possible) an edge to edge screen, OLED display, 60fps 4K front and back - all with the usual Apple marketing magic splashed over them...tech geeks or not, that's what people will want.
There is nothing that Apple could do with the 7s to distinguish it enough from the existing 7 next to the iPhone 8 to warrant it being a full price, premium, new phone. The 7s would be a complete turkey, especially if it carried a price tag in line with the current models.
I've gone into it a lot on other threads but my own view on how it will pan out - based on my own belief that the price bump for the iPhone 8 is being grossly overestimated in the rumour mill - if more than one new iPhone launches in September at all, there will be be no 7s. I'm thinking iPhone 8, plus a remarketed version of the existing iPhone 7 - akin to Apple changing the casing and rebadging the iPhone 5 as the 5c with a different target audience when they launched the 5s.
It's not about spec though, it's about the fact that on launch day Apple will have a really shiny, exciting-looking all new iPhone that will inevitably be the centre of all the hype and praise, and then they'll have the 7S.
Nobody is going to be excited for the 7S. Everyone is going to have to decide between getting "the new iPhone" or settling for the 7S. Or, of course, looking elsewhere - if they can't buy apple's new flagship they can probably still get somebody else's.
Thats my point though. You go to buy a new iphone, you know how much it will cost because thats the price you have always paid for the new iphone and the staff say to you "heres the iPhone 8; its got a brilliant OLED screen, tiny bezels, the screen is the same size as the old + models, the battery life is better, its got advanced AR capabilities, faceID unlock".
Ooh that sounds like a great upgrade on my 6/6S. They then tell you its going to cost you £300 more than your old phone and you can't afford it. Thats OK though because we have a cheaper model you might be interested in. Oh OK, I'll have a look at that then. "Heres the iPhone 7S, its got the same screen as the last 3 iphones, same everything really but we have put a faster processor and a bit better camera in it". OK so thats cheaper you say? Well, its not cheaper, its the same price as always.
So now you have a customer who has seen the new iPhone they really want but they can't afford it so they will have to fork out a still very large sum of money for a phone that is almost identical to the one they might have bought 3 years ago. I can't see many people walking away from that happy.
If I was samsung and apple actually do what it looks like they will I would absolutely love it. Samsungs advertising would write itself.
I think that's quite likely. I think it won't make much difference immediately, Apple will sell lots of both but long term it chips away at the brand. Until now the non-premium ones have had a different name such as 5c and SE. Apart from that every iPhone was *the* iPhone and was the premium model. I fear it might see the brand downgrade from being something akin to Rolls Royce to being something like Mercedes - yes there are some nice models but they also make vans and city cars.
I can't remember who said it but someone once said the genius of coca cola was that the President of the USA drank the same coca cola as a factory worker - the implication being that they wouldn't compromise the quality for anyone. Until now Apple has stuck to that idea.
I think if it happens it is part of the shift to Apple being a luxury brand. The profit margins that luxury brands can achieve are incredible and Apple has a prestigious enough name to get away with it. I think this combined with the market maturing and Apple wanting to find ever more ways to make money means they will be wanting to have a "luxury" option. Let's face it if they made a special version with a diamond encrusted home button someone would buy it and it's hard to expect a company to not want to exploit such people. Of course under Jobs there was a different vision but today the company is run much more on the usual financial grounds (not a dig at Cook - any accountant put in his position would be doing the same, milking the cash cow for everything they can).
I'm still not convinced any of this will happen though. The new design means they can happily call the new one the iPhone 8 (simply moving to a new 3 year instead of 2 year cycle to match the slower upgrade cycles customers want) and the iPhone 7 can take up the spot currently taken by the 6s. Or if they insist on splitting it they might call the new one a one off Anniversary Edition, upgrade the 7 to a 7S and next year go back to "normal". The truth is nobody knows quite how they will handle this.
Luxury brands like gucci and co make their massive margins by selling something that costs very very little to make at a massive markup. Apple can't do that with their iPhones. As you said, part of the genius of the iPhone is that its a high end phone where you know that you are getting the exact same phone as someone else who gets the latest model. The 5C and SE are priced as a cheaper alternative which is fine. The SE sells so well in part because of the form factor as well. There are a lot of people who love the SE because its smaller than the 6 etc.
Selling a tired design missing lots of very obvious/nice features that are on the flagship phone for the same price as you have always sold your premium phone at is a slap in the face. If the 8 was some sort of revolutionary device with tech inside it that was unique, amazing and years ahead of the competition then fair play. Its not. Its a device that is roughly comparable to the S8 and Note 8. They aren't selling these devices for ridiculous money and for good reason.
I agree with what you wrote. I think one thing to bear in mind though can be intention. Many of us here look at Apple as meaning something special, we rightly respected Jobs for his unwillingness to compromise, we think decisions should be made in terms of doing the right thing, preserving Apple's purity, looking to how the company will be in the distant future etc. Cook and the new guys are different though. Their outlook, for which he has to answer to the board, is to make the maximum profit for the coming several years.
You can see them pushing different ideas with the various special versions of the apple watch. Luxury brands have a number of options. Part of it is as you said selling cheap stuff expensively. But part of it is adding $2000 of diamonds to a product and increasing the price by $10,000. Rolex for example remains a company dedicated to a pure vision of watchmaking and they favour elegance and simplicity. However they know some people want to spend untold thousands and they would be mad not to cater to them even if the engineers there probably consider them tasteless. The same thing applies to Rolls Royce selling cars to sports stars and actors who then have them painted hideous colours. I really think it must be frustrating to Apple's board knowing that a solid number of iPhone buyers every year would be willing to pay more, a lot more in many cases, to have something more flashy. Jobs' approach would probably have been to just not give a damn, pushing his own vision above all else and as you rightly point out the new features hardly merit a big price bump. But I think Cook will be maybe trying to figure out a way to have his cake and eat it. If for example Apple has done research and found a large number of people who are willing to pay $1200+ for a new iPhone the board will likely want to know why Apple isn't catering to them. Jobs would not succumb to such pressure but I'm not sure about Cook. Maybe he hopes with a clever marketing strategy to find a way to milk those cash cows.
Again, not bashing Cook - I think any accountant put in charge of Apple would do what he is doing. Just as with the mac mini for example - remove features, increase the price and people continued to buy it so why spend resources improving it? Of course Jobs would look at it differently but we have to face the fact that such men are a rarity. For years people said "the average Apple customer will pay whatever Apple ask even if the technology isn't updated". Well, Cook is in some areas putting that theory to the test even if it just means delaying new products a long time, selling old technology at premium prices and it must be said that however much people here complain Apple makes far more money these days than it did under Jobs. But Jobs was the kind of man who would have probably not accepted the idea of re-using the 5/5S design and some of the technology for the SE but Apple will have saved a fortune by not having to set up a completely new fabrication etc. On some of these issues there isn't a right answer really.
If the 7S is released at £619 and the iPhone 8 with all the Galaxy S8 features at £999, it would be a no brainier for me. I love iPhones but they are currently priced at the top tier of what I would be willing to spend on a mobile phone. I couldn't justify something that costs double the price of an iPad and know a lot of people who say the same thing.
I'd be happy for Apple to drop the 7S and release the phone that is already a year late at the premium price tag they've charged since the iPhones incarnation. I wouldn't be surprised if Apple brag about record profits as they always do but like the Apple Watch, not release any official figures for the device models that are sold.
In my part of the world the iPhone is so popular it's less of a status symbol these days. I see more older devices than new, so feel the hype has subsided in recent years. I'm sure some people like yourself are passionate about it and conscious of the admiration you think you're getting for having a new iPhone but I think that's more reserved for tech enthusiasts these days.
I think that the iPhone 7's sales numbers from last quarter prove that average consumers(not the techies on macrumors) aren't really tired of the old design. The exciting thing to see will be if OLED, wireless charging, a screen without bezels and more will push average consumers to shell out more for the premium model.