Search Results for assets

Disney completes $70B acquisition of Fox assets — What’s the impact on Apple?

Written by

Malcolm Owen, Apple Insider:

Announced in July 2018 following a bidding war with Comcast, the acquisition of 21st Century Fox completed early on Wednesday morning.

And:

Alongside ESPN+ and Disney+, Disney also increases its holdings in existing streaming service Hulu, combining Fox’s ownership stake with its own to give it a sizable level of control over the firm.

And:

While Apple has invested significantly into original content production, acquiring more content may be problematic if Disney extends its exclusivity policy to other content producers it operates.

The sheer size of both the firm and its content library will also give Disney more leverage when in negotiations with Apple concerning its online stores, which could allow it to gain more favorable terms for movies and TV shows offered to consumers.

This Disney Fox deal will have repercussions far down the road. Note that Disney CEO Bob Iger is on Apple’s board. At one point, Google Chairman Eric Schmidt was on the Apple board (from 2006-2009). A number of conflicts pushed him off the board.

Pandora acquires ‘key assets’ from Rdio, will launch on-demand streaming in 2016

Written by

Macworld:

The streaming music industry is about to lose a player and gain a platform. On Monday, Pandora announced plans to acquire “key assets” from on-demand streaming service Rdio, which is seeking bankruptcy protection and will wind down its current business.

The deal, for $75 million in cash, covers Rdio’s technology and intellecutal property, and Pandora says it will be offering jobs to many members of Rdio’s team. Pandora isn’t buying Rdio’s entire business for a couple of reasons.

First, to launch an on-demand streaming service like Spotify or Apple Music, Pandora will have to make its own licensing deals with the record labels, because Rdio’s deals aren’t transferable. Second, Pandora executives explained in a Monday conference call that Rdio is financially “challenged,” and would have been a drain on Pandora.

I wouldn’t take bets on Rdio relaunching. It’s also likely the first of a few more consolidations in the next 12 months.

OnLive assets sold

Written by

Dean Takahashi for VentureBeat:

The pioneering cloud gaming service OnLive confirmed today that its assets have been sold to a new company. The company will continue to operate its services during the transition and it is backed “by substantial funding,” said a spokeswoman for Steve Perlman, the chief executive of OnLive.“We can now confirm that the assets of OnLive, Inc. have been acquired into a newly formed company and is backed by substantial funding, and which will continue to operate the OnLive Game and Desktop services, as well as support all of OnLive’s apps and devices, as well as game, productivity and enterprise partnerships,” the company said in a statement.

Apple launches 2021 Holiday Gift Guide

Written by

Apple:

Starting today, Apple is celebrating the holidays at Apple Store locations and apple.com with the launch of the Holiday Gift Guide and personalized holiday cards from Today at Apple.

Here’s a link to the gift guide. Be sure to click on all five category buttons. The one labeled “All Gifts” is misleading, since there are things in other categories that aren’t listed in All Gifts.

There’s also this downloadable Keynote template you can use to make holiday cards, if that’s your thing.

And if you are in New York City:

Customers in New York can receive free, onsite engraving of new AirPods purchased or picked up at Apple Fifth Avenue.

Happy Holidays!

Coherence X4 lets you turn any website into an app on your Mac

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Thank you for sponsoring The Loop this week! Coherence X4 allows you to turn any website into a chromium-powered app on your Mac. Simply pick a site, enter a name, and pick an icon, and Coherence will turn the app into an isolated application separate from your main browser.

Unlike resource hogging Electron apps, Coherence apps are fully powered and completely customizable. You can use the vast majority of Chrome extensions, customize app assets, and even use features like whitelisting to turn websites like Gmail into an email client that will bump links to your default browser.

Loop readers get 20% off this week when you purchase Coherence X4 at or when you use the promo code ‘LOOPINSIGHT’ at checkout.

You can also try Coherence for 14 days absolutely free or use it as part of your subscription if you’re a Setapp subscriber!

Coherence X4 lets you turn any website into an app on your Mac [Sponsor]

Written by

Coherence X4 allows you to turn any website into a chromium-powered app on your Mac. Simply pick a site, enter a name, and pick an icon, and Coherence will turn the app into an isolated application separate from your main browser.

Unlike resource hogging Electron apps, Coherence apps are fully powered and completely customizable. You can use the vast majority of Chrome extensions, customize app assets, and even use features like whitelisting to turn websites like Gmail into an email client that will bump links to your default browser.

Loop readers get 20% off this week when you purchase Coherence X4 at or when you use the promo code ‘LOOPINSIGHT’ at checkout.

You can also try Coherence for 14 days absolutely free or use it as part of your subscription if you’re a Setapp subscriber!

.org just escaped being turned for a profit

Written by

ICANN:

On 13 November 2019, PIR announced that ISOC, its parent organization, had reached an agreement with Ethos Capital, under which Ethos Capital would acquire PIR and all of its assets from ISOC. Under the agreement, PIR would also be converted from a Pennsylvania not-for-profit corporation to a for-profit Pennsylvania limited liability company.

This was disappointing news. But yesterday:

Today, the ICANN Board made the decision to reject the proposed change of control and entity conversion request that Public Interest Registry (PIR) submitted to ICANN.

After completing extensive due diligence, the ICANN Board finds that withholding consent of the transfer of PIR from the Internet Society (ISOC) to Ethos Capital is reasonable, and the right thing to do.

Huzzah. And due diligence well done.

Apple and Hearables

Written by

Counterpoint Research:

Apple expected to lead the true wireless hearables market, selling more than 100m units in 2020. Competition for second place will remain fierce, especially in the premium market.

From the hearables Wikipedia page:

The neologism “hearable” is a hybrid of the terms wearable and headphone, as hearables combine major assets of wearable technology with the basic principle of audio-based information services, conventional rendition of music and wireless telecommunication. The term was introduced in April 2014 simultaneously by Apple in the context of the company’s acquisition of Beats Electronics and product designer and wireless application specialist Nick Hunn in a blogpost for a wearable technologies internet platform.

I read “hearables”, I think AirPods. Apple so dominates this market. If you’re interested in the history of the term and the market, the Wikipedia page is a fascinating read.

A tweet about Apple Card leads to a probe of Goldman Sachs

Written by

The internet is a fast acting place. This tweet appeared on Thursday:

https://twitter.com/dhh/status/1192540900393705474

It was a tweet. But it got the attention of the internet and, eventually, of New York’s Department of Financial Services.

From Reuters:

Hansson, who is the creator of web-application framework Ruby on Rails, didn’t disclose any specific income-related information for himself or his wife but said they filed joint tax returns and that his wife had a better credit score, the report said.

And:

New York’s Department of Financial Services confirmed that an investigation was being conducted.

Next up, this tweeted reply from Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak Woz:

The same thing happened to us. I got 10x the credit limit. We have no separate bank or credit card accounts or any separate assets. Hard to get to a human for a correction though. It’s big tech in 2019.

And, finally, this public response from Goldman Sachs:

We wanted to address some recent questions regarding Apple Card credit decision process.

With Apple Card, your account is individual to you; your credit line is yours and you establish your own direct credit history. Customers do not share a credit line under the account of a family member or another person by getting a supplemental card.

As with any other individual credit card, your application is evaluated independently. We look at an individual’s income and an individual’s creditworthiness, which includes factors like personal credit scores, how much debt you have, and how that debt has been managed. Based on these factors, it is possible for two family members to receive significantly different credit decisions.

In all cases, we have not and will not make decisions based on factors like gender.

Finally, we hear frequently from our customers that they would like to share their Apple Card with other members of their family. We are looking to enable this in the future.

  • Andrew Williams, Goldman Sachs Spokesperson

Thinking about this, it could be that there’s truth to these accusations, but it could also be the case that there’s logic to these assessments that we can’t see.

But even if the latter is the case, it does seem to me that Goldman Sachs could do a much better job communicating the logic of their assessments. I suspect, given the public scrutiny, they will reevaluate their process.

Apple Card agreement prohibits cash advances, gambling, cryptocurrency, and use on jailbroken iPhones

Written by

Considering signing up for an Apple Card? Read the Apple Card Customer Agreement, posted on the Goldman Sachs website (via Juli Clover, MacRumors).

A few highlights:

On the credit card APR:

13.24% to 24.24% when you open your account, based on your creditworthiness. After that, this APR will vary with the market based on the Prime Rate.

You may not use or permit your Account to be used for:

  • Any illegal purpose, including in connection with unlawful domestic or international gambling websites or to purchase illegal goods or services;
  • Cash Advances and Cash Equivalents;
  • Any purpose in any country or territory that is subject to economic sanctions administered and enforced by the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), or with any person or entity subject to these sanctions; or
  • Paying any debts to us.

That second one is subtle. Back in definitions, Cash Advances are defined as:

Any cash advance and other cash-like transaction, including purchases of cash equivalents such as travelers checks, foreign currency, or cryptocurrency; money orders; peer to peer transfers, wire transfers or similar cash-like transactions; lottery tickets, casino gaming chips (whether physical or digital), or race track wagers or similar betting transactions.

Got it? Good.

Farewell then, iTunes, and thanks for saving the music industry from itself

Written by

John Naughton, The Guardian:

The advent of the compact disc in the early 1980s meant that recorded music went from being analogue to digital. But CD music files were vast – a single CD came in at about 700MB.

And:

In 1993, researchers at the Fraunhofer Institute in Germany came up with a way of shrinking audio files by a factor of 10 or more, so that a three-minute music track could be reduced to 3MB without much perceptible loss in quality. They called their new standard MP3.

And:

In 1999, a teenage geek named Shawn Fanning created a neat software system that enabled internet users who had MP3 tracks on their PCs not only to find others with similar assets but also to exchange these tracks with one another. Fanning called his file-sharing system Napster, released it on the internet and in the process changed the world.

Nice little look back at the market forces that made the music industry ripe for disruption. Enter Steve Jobs and Apple. And iTunes of course.

Disney buys Fox. Fox lays off thousands. Huge opportunity for Apple to snap up top talent.

Written by

Variety:

Fox employees knew this day was coming. For over a year, the men and women who work at the Century City lot have talked of little else but severance packages and job searches. They knew that when Disney wrapped up its $71.3 billion acquisition of much of 21st Century Fox’s film and television assets, thousands of jobs would be eliminated.

But until recently, they just didn’t know the specifics. The ax officially fell yesterday.

Studio veterans such as domestic distribution chief Chris Aronson, president of product strategy and consumer business development Mike Dunn, worldwide theatrical marketing president Pam Levine, and chief content officer Tony Sella, who have decades of experience, were gone in short order, taking with them pieces of the institutional memory of a studio that has made everything from Shirley Temple musicals to “Avatar.”

Tough times for the people at Fox.

Why Apple is the future of capitalism

Written by

Mihir A. Desai, New York Times:

Sure, Apple produces innovative phones and laptops, but look inside its sleek exterior and you’ll find an elegant financial machine that has become the ideal for corporate America. Without investing significantly in hard assets, Apple spins cash and returns it to shareholders at a stunning rate. It’s difficult not to admire.

And:

Six years ago, the company owed no debt and had never undertaken a share buyback or paid dividends. Pressured by a shareholder revolt in 2013, it is now transformed.

And:

Apple has conducted its buybacks responsibly: It bought shares when they were relatively cheap, rewarding the patient shareholder. Other companies have not been so prudent, taking on debt to make ill-timed purchases of expensive shares rather than investing in growth opportunities. In some cases, they have done so simply to push up share prices so that management can meet goals for quarterly earnings or metrics that trigger compensation.

Good read. Apple is truly a remarkable company.

Apple is worth $1,000,000,000,000. Two decades ago, it was almost bankrupt.

Written by

Jack Nicas, New York Times:

In 1997, Apple was on the ropes. The Silicon Valley pioneer was being decimated by Microsoft and its many partners in the personal-computer market. It had just cut a third of its work force, and it was about 90 days from going broke.

And:

On Thursday, Apple became the first publicly traded American company to be worth more than $1 trillion when its shares climbed 3 percent to end the day at $207.39.

And:

Apple’s ascent from the brink of bankruptcy to the world’s most valuable public company has been a business tour de force, marked by rapid innovation, a series of smash-hit products and the creation of a sophisticated, globe-spanning supply chain that keeps costs down while producing enormous volumes of cutting-edge devices.

A nice little rags-to-riches appreciation piece from the New York Times.

I’ve bought Apple stock a few different times over the years, just trying to be part of the company to which I’d hitched my wagon. One particular investment sticks out.

Apple was valued at about $12 a share (I believe it was in the late ’80s or early ’90s) and their book value was about $16 a share. In other words, Apple had hit a moment in time where the shareholders valued the company as less than the value Apple would have if they completely liquidated all their assets.

What a turnaround.

Bloomberg: Adobe to launch Photoshop for iPad in strategy shift

Written by

Bloomberg:

Adobe Systems Inc., the maker of popular digital design programs for creatives, is planning to launch the full version of its Photoshop app for Apple Inc.’s iPad as part of a new strategy to make its products compatible across multiple devices and boost subscription sales.

And:

Adobe’s chief product officer of Creative Cloud Scott Belsky confirmed the company was working on a new cross-platform iteration of Photoshop and other applications, but declined to specify the timing of their launches.

Key here is the word “full”, as in, the same version of Photoshop on both Mac and iPad.

As to timing:

The software developer is planning to unveil the new app at its annual MAX creative conference in October, according to people with knowledge of the plan. The app is slated to hit the market in 2019, said the people, who asked not to be identified discussing private product plans. Engineering delays could still alter that timeline.

Big news for Creative Cloud users. Presumably, you’d be able to share assets between the two platforms. Being able to edit an image, seamlessly switching between the Mac and iPad versions of Photoshop, all while having access to the same color schemes, icons, brushes, etc., would be a huge win.

All about the Logitech Crayon

Written by

From Logitech’s official Crayon specs page:

Using the same technology found in Apple Pencil®, Logitech Crayon delivers sub-pixel precision, lightning fast responsiveness, and dynamic tilt to bring new dimensions to learning.

Not quite the same as Apple Pencil. No pressure sensitivity. But it also sells for $49 versus the Apple Pencil’s $89 (since Crayon is only sold through Education market, makes sense to compare to Apple Pencil education price). For students, I suspect the Logitech Crayon will be just fine.

iPad has palm rejection technology that ignores any touch that doesn’t come from Logitech Crayon, so students can stop worrying about their hands and just focus on the task at hand.

And:

A flat shape prevents Logitech Crayon from rolling off desks or getting lost.

Hmm. I wonder why Apple doesn’t consider this.

Logitech Crayon has almost 8 hours of writing time between charges — enough for a full school day. Additionally, a fast charging option provides 30 minutes of battery in 90 seconds.

Lots of good stuff here. One important thing to note: The Crayon does not use Bluetooth. Its wireless frequency is specific to the iPad announced yesterday. Just as Apple Pencil will not work with an iPhone, Crayon will not work with other iPads.

All told, this seems a great solution for the education space. And the way I read this, looks like Crayon is only available through the Apple Education channel.

How Apple’s pricey new iPhone X tests economic theory

Written by

Wall Street Journal:

Thorstein Veblen was a cranky economist of Norwegian descent who coined the phrase “conspicuous consumption” and theorized that certain products could defy the economic laws of gravity by stoking more demand with superhigh prices.

And:

Typically, raising the price of a good lowers demand for it. If beef becomes too expensive, people will buy more chicken.

Mr. Veblen’s theory posits that some consumers want a product even more when the price rises because the expense broadcasts status, taste and wealth.

And:

By unveiling the new iPhone X last week with a price of $1,000, Apple Inc. is pushing the envelope even further than Samsung Electronics Co., which unveiled the $950 Note 8 phone this year. Rather than trying to attract consumers with cheaper prices, the companies are fighting for customers with expensive price tags.

And:

The biggest spikes came for iPhones that were the most visibly distinct, such as 2014’s iPhone 6, the model in which Apple changed the shape, enlarged the device and raised prices by $100.

Big lesson learned for Apple with the iPhone 6. I hear a ton of discussion of the pros and cons of the iPhone X, with many opinions on the notch and its distinctive look. Can’t help but think of this as a bit of a badge for Apple, another play towards uniqueness that will mark the iPhone X as the new must-have shiny.

iPhone 8 can make Apple world’s first trillion dollar company

Written by

Economic Times:

Riding on the ‘better-than-expected iPad and iPhone sales’, the upcoming flagship device iPhone 8 could make the Cupertino-based giant the first company to reach and sustain a $1 trillion market cap, analysts have predicted.

And:

Daryanani said that Apple’s share price would have to rise from its current level (about $160) to about $192 to $195, depending on the rate of the company’s stock buybacks, to reach the $1 trillion value.

Astonishing rise from the ashes for Apple. I remember, long ago, considering an investment in Apple stock at $12 a share (long before the 7-for-1 split, and two 2-for-1 splits) about 43 cents a share adjusted for today’s pricing).

This was in the worst of Apple doldrums, before Steve came back. The smart folks I spoke with explained to me that, at the time, Apple had enough assets to pay more than that $12 per share if they sold everything they had, including real estate, desks, inventory, everything.

That was the thinking back then. Apple stock was bargain basement. And look at them now.

Apple backed Didi has opened a self-driving lab in California

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Didi, China’s largest ride-hail player, is getting serious about self-driving cars. The company, which acquired Uber’s China assets in August 2016, today is opening an artificial intelligence lab right in the backyard of many of its self-driving competitors in Mountain View, Calif.

They poached some good people from their competitors too.

Fitbit paid just $23 million for Pebble

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The price tag was just $23 million, according to figures disclosed Wednesday as part of Fitbit’s quarterly earnings report. Fitbit also spent $15 million on the assets of Vector Watch, another smartwatch company.

I’m not sure that Fitbit can do any more with Pebble than what Pebble did.