Apple Netbook Claim Chowder

Wednesday, 21 October 2009

Two days ago, Apple announced its financial results for the quarter ended September 26. The company sold 3 million Macs, of which 2.3 million were laptops, and booked $1.67 billion in profit. Not one of those 2.3 million laptops was a “netbook”.

14 October 2008, Doug Aamoth at CrunchGear: “Five Reasons Why an Apple Netbook Is a No-Brainer”:

When asked today about the possibility of an Apple netbook, Steve Jobs said something to the effect of, “The market is just getting started — we’ll see how it goes.”

Huh? Here’s how the netbook market’s going, Steve: pretty much every major computer company has a netbook but you. Apple’s a prime candidate for a netbook, too.

20 January 2009, Brian Caulfield at Forbes: “Apple’s Real Problem: Netbooks:

The real problem is how Apple’s portfolio of expensive gear — particularly notebooks — will fare as the recession starts to bite.

21 January 2009, Brian X. Chen at Wired Gadget Lab: “Apple Still Oblivious to Netbook Opportunity”. Amazingly, ten months later, they remain equally oblivious.

18 March 2009, Shane O’Neill at PC World: “Recession Breathes Life Into Windows PCs as Apple Gasps for Air”:

At this point, I’m going to stop asking when Apple will acknowledge these dark days we live in because I think the answer is never. Maybe Apple should just be a bull market company. When times are lean, it should pack up like a traveling carnival or disappear like a baseball team in winter and not come back until everybody’s rich and happy again.

24 March 2009, Scott Moritz at TheStreet.com: “Apple’s Netbook Foray Will Flop”

Nonetheless, design hubris and slumping sales will cause Apple to tap a hot segment of computer market.

So Apple will be forced to enter the “netbook” market due to slumping MacBook sales, eh?

19 August 2009, Charles Moore at The Apple Blog: “Lack of Netbook, Price Hurting Apple in This Year’s Back-to-School Market”. That would be the back-to-school period which just ended, with Apple selling 2.3 million laptops at an average price of $1,265.

As Jason Snell put it, imagine how much money Apple could have lost if only it had a netbook.