When Steven Jobs returned to the helm in Cupertino California for the then Apple Computer Corporation, he turned things upside down. Simply put, they had too many products. His first decision was to pare the company down to four products.
There is an underlying philosophy that goes with all Apple products: simplicity.
And the old saying, "the devil is in the details", is certainly a hallmark for the firm. From a technical viewpoint, most Apple products can clearly be called the most expensive circuitboard real estate of any consumer electronics device. The amount of money they pack in per square inch is nothing short of astounding. To top them you have to look at military projects.
Of course there expensive per square inch products certainly have a generous markup which keeps the company quite profitable. And a good number of people are just fine with that, because their stuff just works.
While some people criticize the 'walled garden' approach of Apple, it gives them an advantage over all their competitors. Unlike Windows Phone or Google's Android OSs there is no unused anything. The engineering teams can sit down and decide if a function is going to be accomplished in hardware or software. There is absolutely no overlap or unused components or code.
This gives Apple the best possible battery life for a given performance.
They also must be given credit for some serious long term thinking. Some years ago as they gazed into the future they realized competitive offerings would also improve. Apple's challenge was their competitors could be 'good enough'. To address this for a number of years they have embarked on buying up small companies with good ideas.
While at the heart beat of any iPhone or iPod, it is an ARM processor, it is unlike any you will find from Samsung or any of their competitors. ARM licenses a basic blueprint for the CPU which can be 'tweaked'during the manufacturing. And Apple tweaks them like no one else, because they have Intellectual Property that no one else has.
One of the areas where they leave the competition in the dust is the graphic display. Their GPU outperforms, full-stop. Just look at the excitement they created with the Retina Display. Yes Amazon is playing catch-up with the Kindle Fire. And Apple was their first. It is this type of hard work that makes consumers Apple diehard fans.
Certainly the Cupertino firm has some challenges lying ahead. Mr. Jobs did not believe in a 7 inch display. I for one, prefer the size because I can hold it in one hand, manipulating with the other. Obviously, Apple saw the handwriting on the wall and came out with a iPod mini.
The danger facing the firm is having to juggle too many product lines. Of course there is a danger in not having what people want as well.
Is just a matter of days now before Apple releases a wristwatch that will pair to the iPhone. Given the company's focus on simple elegance is fully expected that this new product will be a megahit.
This article was written by Ducan Smith on behalf of Ace Case who supply iPhone 5 cases and accessories to a worldwide audience. Their range also extends into the iPad and Samsung lines.
Jim
