Has Steve Jobs left a Four Year Plan at Apple?
Steve Jobs famously was Apple. He ignored focus groups in favour of his own gut instinct and, as such, the latest rumour doing the rounds could well turn out to be completely true.
The Times newspaper in the UK has reported that before his death last week, Steve Jobs left a clear four year product roadmap for the company.
The newspaper claims that the next generation iPhone, due in late 2012 or 2013 will be a Jobs 'legacy device'. and that he had been working closely on Apple's next generation cloud services platform during his last few months with the company.
Of the products reportedly part of this four-year roadmap are a touch-screen television that would supersede the underwhelming Apple TV and a new iCloud to take on rivals Google and Microsoft.
It could turn out to be the iCloud that becomes Jobs' legacy however. Currently the cloud is owned by Microsoft with it's SkyDrive, Office Live, Office 365, Hotmail and Xbox Live services being the only truly connected set of cloud services available. Not even Google, with all of its experience and might in cloud services, has been able to produce something that comes close to rivalling them.
The popularity of Apple's mobile platforms however could mean that a revamped iCloud of music, photo, backup, sharing and communication, could very well be the next big thing for the company. It pretty much rests on how interconnected such services would be, how deeply integrated they would be with both OS X and iOS and whether they would be free. Apple's previous attempt to charge for their cloud services haven't proved popular.
Any rumours and speculation that Apple may in the next 12 months release a product with a name or branding specifically aimed at being a tribute to Steve Jobs, such as perhaps a special edition iPhone 4SJ, are just that, pure speculation. Apple will need to prove that the company is much bigger than one man, something the markets will have little doubt of given the strengths of individuals in the top team that Jobs put together including Tim Cook and Jonathan Ive. Consumers however might find a Jobs tribute product rather more an admission of how much the company really needed him.
It will be interesting to see where Apple take their products, not in 2012 as these would be things in which Jobs would have been directly and personally involved, but in 2013 onwards, and how they respond to competitors products such as Windows 8. Will the magic leave Apple with the death of it's co-founder? Probably not, but there will still be a fight on by the current top team to prove that this isn't the case.
Sorry if I come across as sounding cynical, but this story just strikes me as some preemptive spin doctoring in order to try to stave off the inevitable problem of people (notably the fanboys) thinking anything new that comes out can’t be “as good” as when Steve was at the helm.
Apple has rode to glory on the cult of personality they built up around Steve Jobs. Now they’re trying to write the musical and get everybody to sing “Don’t Cry for Me Cupertino…”
With Steve gone, Apple’s demigod is dead. Now it remains to be seen if Apple’s believers can maintain their faith in the absence of their leader.
In the first 24 hours, in US alone, more than 500,000 iPhone 4Ss were pre-ordered. On Apple site the iPhone is back ordered for 1-2 weeks already. For now, it seems the “faith” in Apple is still there.
“Currently the cloud is owned by Microsoft with it’s SkyDrive, Office Live, Office 365, Hotmail and Xbox Live services being the only truly connected set of cloud services available.”
You left out iTunes. Try it, then explain to me how those Microsoft services are cloudier than an iTunes Genius Mix.
Alright I will young grasshoper, MS is more cloudier because iCloud is powered by……..Windows Azure, mindblown? And since when did iTune a cloud service? You can’t even stream itune music on the iphone. Zune on the other hand can. BONUS fact, iTunes Genius Mix is a retaliation against Zune smartdj which has been around since the begining.
Apple works on a 6 year roadmap with it’s vendors, I’m sure Jobs left a much longer plan.