Class weblog
Posts tagged Apple
Room for Debate: Can Yahoo be Rescued
Nov 13th
I recently participated in New York Times’ “Room for Debate” series. The debate revolved around prospects for Yahoo’s recovery and was motivated by a recent article in which an analyst stated “We’ve never seen a turnaround of a fallen angel in the Internet space.” While some analysts were pessimistic, I was not willing to completely rule out the possibility of a Yahoo recovery. Specifically, I don’t see any reason why an Internet company is at a disadvantage in staging a recovery. A recovery should be just as possible in this sector as others. The bad news for Yahoo is that recoveries in general are rare so the odds apply for Yahoo as well.
Reviewing new mobile OS releases this past month
Oct 25th
There were major updates from Apple, Android and Blackberry in the past few weeks. So, what’s the most important update for each OS? Here’s my take:
iPhone 4S: The winning feature ofcourse is Siri, the personal assistant. It has some compelling voice recognition and AI capabilities.
Android “ice cream sandwich”: In terms of the winning feature, it is a tie between the face recognition based locking/unlocking feature and Android beam, the NFC-based technology to share info between phones by just tapping them.
Blackberry BBX: The ability to port and run Android apps on BBX is appealing. For developers, another nice announcement was that all BB devices will run BBX.
Overall, nothing revolutionary this month but Siri is definitely very exciting. Winner is Apple.
Amazon tablet is (almost) here …
Sep 7th
I have been saying ever since the iPad came out that an Amazon tablet is not far away. We have had several discussions on this in Enabletech although it’s never been an easy discussion to motivate. When I tried to compare the iPad & Kindle, some students dismissed the comparison. When I suggested that a tablet is a natural next step for AMZN, some students doubted if AMZN would ever venture down that path.
Techcrunch & a number of other sources are reporting that an Amazon Tablet is on the horizon. Given Amazon’s investments in hardware (Kindle), digital content & an Android marketplace, the Tablet is the most natural next step. And given how much I love Kindle, I can’t wait for the Amazon Tablet. I hope the product justifies my decision to not buy an iPad & instead wait for an Amazon Tablet.
Aug 24th
It’s a sad day for the tech industry to see Steve Jobs resign as Apple’s CEO. The last time this happened, Jobs made it back and was better than the first time. I hope that he has a third innings as Apple’s CEO and it’s even better than the first two.
Not much more to say except perhaps share the link to 1 of the best speeches I have ever heard (by who else but Jobs).
Why platform markets are dominated by large firms like Apple, Google & others
Apr 19th
A student recently asked me why platform markets are dominated by large firms like Apple, Google and others rather than small startups. Specifically, platforms have been the big story of the last few years and yet there are few dominant startup platforms. The answer is simple. It’s easier to produce eggs when you have the chicken!
Platforms are two-sided markets in which one side values access to the other (developers <=> users). This is why platforms have a chicken-and-egg problem. Developers will come on board only if there are enough users and users will come on board only if there are enough apps. A large firm with an existing installed userbase can easily enter adjacent product markets because it already has access to the user base. For e.g., consider Amazon’s recent entry into the App market. Developers do not doubt AMZN’s ability to distribute apps to lots of users. Thus, they are more willing to sign up than with an unknown startup. In other words, envelopment (entry to adjacent markets) is easier with platforms.
Of course, there are other factors (marketing resources, etc) and there are exceptions as well. But IMO the biggest factor is you don’t have to solve chicken-and-egg.
