iPhones stay a vital a part of Apple’s enterprise — arguably the one product above all that individuals affiliate with the Cupertino firm. However there could come a day when Apple’s smartphone is not a part of the image.
That is not the evaluation of some random observer, both — quite, it comes straight from a high-ranking Apple govt.
“You could not want an iPhone 10 years from now as loopy because it sounds,” stated Eddy Cue, senior vice chairman of providers for Apple, throughout testimony in a U.S. Justice Division lawsuit towards Alphabet, the father or mother firm of Google.
In accordance with Bloomberg’s report on the testimony, Cue made his feedback about the iPhone in the context of explaining how shifts in expertise could make at present’s killer merchandise tomorrow’s after-thoughts. Particularly, Cue famous that the rise of synthetic intelligence — presently, the fascination of the tech business — could wind up producing one thing that takes the iPhone’s place.
“The one manner you actually have true competitors is when you may have expertise shifts,” Cue stated. “Expertise shifts create these alternatives. AI is a brand new expertise shift, and it’s creating new alternatives for brand spanking new entrants.”
It is not simply telephones that could lose floor to AI. Cue stated in his testimony that Apple is wanting into revamping Safari to depend on AI-powered search engines like google and yahoo — a growth that could be a possible blow to Google’s search enterprise.
For now, although, the iPhone stays Apple’s dominant product , particularly with instruments like Apple Intelligence nonetheless of their nascent levels. For the 2024 fiscal 12 months, iPhones gross sales introduced in $201.1 billion, round 51% of Apple’s complete for the 12 months. In the simply introduced March quarter, that proportion is now 49%, as areas like providers accounting for a rising portion of Apple’s gross sales.
You do not have to look too far in Apple’s historical past to see a once-dominant product fall out of favor over time. Cue himself alluded to the iPod, the music participant that revived Apple’s fortunes 20 years in the past solely to fall by the wayside as the iPhone took over.
Apple discontinued the iPod contact in 2022, marking the finish of its music participant merchandise. However at its top in 2006, iPod gross sales accounted for 40% of Apple’s income, in keeping with knowledge posted at Statista.
“You could not want an iPhone 10 years from now as loopy because it sounds.”
— Eddy Cue, Apple
Cue is not the first tech govt to muse about smartphones going the manner of the iPod, not even at Apple. Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg has been making the rounds touting good glasses as a possible phone alternative, coinciding together with his firm’s work on the Orion AR glasses. And studies that Tim Cook dinner is focusing his time practically totally on good glasses as an eventual follow-up to the Imaginative and prescient Professional headset that marked Apple’s first steps into spatial computing.
Ten years is a very long time, so do not count on Apple to again away from the nonetheless profitable iPhone enterprise simply but. However Apple’s WWDC 2025 convention is a month away, and whereas iOS 19 will definitely get its share of consideration, potential bulletins about visionOS and AI must also be of curiosity. If Apple does see a restricted future for iPhones, we might get our first inkling of what the firm has in thoughts for an encore in a few of these previews.
