Motley Fool on Apple in 2012: Tim Cook CEO, iTunes Subscription Music, More
January 20th, 2009 at 4:45 PM - Apple Stock Watch by Bryan Chaffin
Motley Fool Rick Aristotle Munarriz predicts that in 2012 Apple will be headed by CEO Tim Cook, offer a music subscription service through iTunes after buying RealNetworks, have iPhone deals with multiple carriers in the U.S., will continue to ignore the netbook market, and return to Macworld after a couple of ho-hum appearances at CES.
The prediction piece is based on the artifice that Mr. Munarriz, one of the founders of The Motley Fool, has a time machine that he uses to report on how some companies are faring in the future, in this case, in the year 2012 (no mention was made of Quetzalcoatl). He first did with Apple in 2008, peering ahead to the year 2010.
His first prediction is that Tim Cook will have become permanent CEO of Apple after Steve Jobs fails to return to the company in the summer of 2009. According to his time travelling, it took some time for the markets to warm to Mr. Cook as CEO, but, "his operational prowess is delivering the financial performance that investors expect out of a maturing growth stock," and Apple is "firing on all cylinders."
He also predicts that Microsoft will reintroduce the Zune as a phone, music player, and handheld gaming device -- Microsoft "simply followed Apple's lead" -- and that the Zune and iPhone and iPod touch are eating into handheld gaming markets, and beating Research In Motion's BlackBerry, too.
With netbooks the hottest growth sector in PC sales right now, Mr. Munnariz said that Apple had to make a decision on whether or not to sacrifice the high end in pursuit of the low end, or "stick to its knitting," which he said Apple will decide to do. Eventually, according to him, Mac market share and sales will begin to recover as the economy recovers in 2010.
There's more in the full editorial, which offers an interesting way to look ahead at Apple's future.
6 Observer Comments
LOL!
The economy!? Recover by 2010?!
Good lord! What is this guy smoking?
2 things along with that though. Blackberry will always be a prominent phone, and the zune phone probably has a ten-ninety chance of becoming a phone. If microsoft made it’s own phone, it would be hurting it’s relations with other companies about windows mobile. and microsoft will not do that.
He is right that the iTouch and iPhone will cut into the gaming market, but only a little
As long as this guy is predicting that Microsoft is relevant in the same market with the iPod/iPhone, I know he’s talking out of his seat!
Also, getting into netbooks is probably more likely than apple wasting money on Real (my guess is that the doofus owns stock in RealNetworks), going back to Macworld (it’ll die with out Apple before they get a change to regret the decision), or offering a subscription model.
Apple makes the real money off of hardware. If netbooks turn into a market, even half the size suggested by analysists, Apple will need to get into it. They’ll still come at a premium compared to other netbooks, but they’ll have awesome integration with the rest of the Mac ecosystem and it’ll totally be worth the price
“As long as this guy is predicting that Microsoft is relevant in the same market with the iPod/iPhone, I know he’s talking out of his seat!”
I agree. I don’t know about Realnetworks, but Rick publicly states that he has a financial stake in Microsoft.
Tim Cook, yes
MS Zune, no
Subscription Music, No
Netbooks, Let’s hope not.
Agree with Tiger.
Except Cook is temporary, and Jobs will return like he said he would.
MS Zune is about to be discontinued.
Subscription, WHY? It has failed in every market.
Netbooks, NO, that’s what the iPhone is for. You can surf the net and get email and calendars from your iPhone, why lug around another box for?
Oh, and don’t count on Blackberry’s to be the prominent phone as they are losing market share to the iPhone like they are standing still. The Storm certainly didn’t help, more like The drip.
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