Bloomberg: ‘Apple Abandons Development of Wireless Routers’

Mark Gurman, reporting for Bloomberg:

Apple Inc. has disbanded its division that develops wireless routers, another move to try to sharpen the company’s focus on consumer products that generate the bulk of its revenue, according to people familiar with the matter.

Apple began shutting down the wireless router team over the past year, dispersing engineers to other product development groups, including the one handling the Apple TV, said the people, who asked not to be named because the decision hasn’t been publicly announced.

Not surprising, given that their current hardware hasn’t been updated in three years. Apple used to refresh its AirPort routers frequently, to keep up with the state of the art. They often weren’t first to adopt new standards, but they never sat still for three years.

The question is, are they really out of the router game (and will start selling Belkin or Eero routers in their stores), or are they working on something new, a HomeKit hub, that will include the functionality of a router?

Just seems like Apple is abandoning a lot of stuff without having replacements ready these days.

★ Monday, 21 November 2016