Last night, Apple held a press conference and launched a brand new product - MR Mixed Reality Head Display. Unfortunately, it didn't get much recognition because the price was too expensive, which showed that Apple's intention to get rid of Chinese manufacturing has suffered. Make it out of China and it may not be able to produce a reasonably priced product.
The MR released by Apple this time can be said to have set a new high in pricing. The expensive price is far beyond the price level consumers can accept. After the release, most consumers expressed no interest, even early adopters. Pricing is reasonable in stark contrast.
Looking back, one of the keys to the success of Apple's iPhone, iPad and other products is the price. The price of the iPhone is quite expensive for Chinese consumers, but it is actually not high for American consumers, as long as the monthly income of ordinary people is a few The success of the iPad is also inseparable from reasonable pricing, and the price of the iPad launched at that time was cheaper than the iPhone.
After the success of the iPhone, Apple’s current CEO, Cook, tried to make the iPhone a luxury product, and the price kept rising. As a result, the sales of the iPhone fell year after year, and even fell below the level of 200 million units. In 2019, Cook realized his mistake. The drastic reduction in the pricing of the iPhone 11 reversed the decline in iPhone sales; the iPhone 13 adopted a pricing method of increasing volume and reducing prices, which pushed the annual sales of the iPhone to a record high of 237 million.
Apple's products are reasonably priced, which is inseparable from the support of Chinese manufacturing. When Jobs developed the iPhone, Foxconn, which was not the world's top foundry at that time, came to the door. Foxconn took advantage of China's complete industrial chain and lower The cost of manufacturing created the iPhone, which quickly became popular in the United States and then went global.
For more than ten years, Apple and Foxconn and other foundries have cooperated closely, and Foxconn has gradually developed into the world's largest foundry. However, as the cost of manufacturing in China has risen, Apple and Foxconn have tried to replicate the success of Chinese manufacturing in India, but suffered. frustration.
Foxconn began to produce iPhones in India in 2019, and Wistron entered India to set up a factory to produce iPhones in 2020. In the past few years, Foxconn India has grown to 17,000 people, and Wistron's Indian factory has only 10,000 people, which is far from being able to compete with Compared with their factories in mainland China.
What's worse is that Wistron's factory in India has only grown to 10,000 people, and the Indian consortium began to be greedy and forcibly acquired Wistron's Indian factory. Wistron announced its withdrawal from the Indian market in a rage, and Apple's India manufacturing plan Therefore, it was hit hard; however, Apple did not learn a lesson from this, and announced that it would kick 13 Chinese suppliers out of the supply chain, trying to replace them with Japanese and American supply chain companies. However, the cost of Japanese and American supply chain companies is too high. It cannot be compared with the Chinese supply chain.
The high price of MR this time is inseparable from the high cost of accessories in Japan and the United States. There are even rumors that this year's iPhone 15 pricing may also increase due to rising costs, which will only lead to iPhone sales such as in 2019. It has been declining year after year like before, Apple is going to die.
Apple's board of directors has lost patience with Cook. Last year's iPhone 14 was overpriced and lacking in innovation, which led to a decline in iPhone 14 sales. The board of directors asked Cook to leave. Now MR has failed to attract consumers. If the sales of iPhone 15 also decline again, it is already Cook, who has been CEO for more than ten years, may also come to the end of his career.