Edible Apple

Not saying we ever perused Twitter for a pirate stream of an Apple media event, but suffice it to say that we’re glad to see Apple finally offering folks a live stream of one of their media events. Apple made an official announcement on the matter a short while ago.

Apple will broadcast its September 1 event online using Apple’s industry-leading HTTP Live Streaming, which is based on open standards. Viewing requires either a Mac® running Safari® on Mac OS X version 10.6 Snow Leopard, an iPhone or iPod touch running iOS 3.0 or higher, or an iPad. The live broadcast will begin at 10:00 a.m. PDT on September 1, 2010 at www.apple.com.

Bloomberg reports:

Apple Inc., preparing to announce a new set-top box that delivers video to consumers’ TVs, will include programming from Netflix Inc., according to three people with knowledge of the plans.

The streaming service would be available on the revamped version of Apple TV, due to be introduced tomorrow in San Francisco, said two of the people, who asked not to be identified because the plans haven’t been made public. Users would pay a subscription fee to Netflix for the service, the people said.

Programming from Netflix may enhance the appeal of a product that has been called a “hobby” by Apple executives and hasn’t resonated widely with consumers. The Cupertino, California-based company is due to release a $99 version of Apple TV, $130 less than the current model, people familiar with the plans said last week.

The New York Times reports:

In the latest sign of that comeback, Autodesk plans to announce on Tuesday that it is bringing its flagship AutoCAD design and engineering software to the Mac for the first time in nearly two decades.

The return of AutoCAD to the Mac could help Apple sustain its momentum in the competitive market for personal computers, especially with business customers, where Apple has made significant inroads recently. Autodesk estimates that 10 million people use the AutoCAD software around the world, and the company said that its customers had been asking for a Mac version with growing frequency.

“This is an endorsement from our side that design and engineering customers are taking the Macintosh seriously again,” said Amar Hanspal, senior vice president for platform solutions at Autodesk.

Users can expect to see AutoCAD for OS X become available by October.

With Apple’s stock price currently hovering under $245, Chad Brand of Seeking Alpha lays forth the argument that the stock is actually undervalued at the moment.

Despite my roots as a value manager, in recent weeks I have been a fairly aggressive buyer of Apple shares. Such an investment may not seem appropriate for a value investor but as the stock has steadily fallen, dropping below $250 per share, it has actually become quite undervalued. And not just relative to its growth rate, but the broad market as well.

Flush with $45 billion in cash and investments ($50 per share) and no debt, Apple sports an enterprise value of about $190 per share. Compare that to $15 of earnings this year and enough catalysts to make next year’s estimate of $18 seem easily attainable, and you have a stock that actually trades at a discount to the S&P 500. And therein lies the core explanation for my heightened interest recently.

CNET is reporting that the song samples on iTunes may double in length, from 30 seconds to 1 minute.

Currently, iTunes offers 30-second snippets of songs, a feature designed to give users a taste of the music to help them decide whether they like it enough to buy. Some users have long complained that half a minute isn’t enough time to really hear a song.

Numerous other digital-music services offer much more time, including Pandora and Google’s YouTube. Pandora has become a leader in digital radio, and while a user can’t pick and choose which songs they want to listen to, they do get to hear full-length songs free of charge. By contrast, YouTube users do choose which full-length songs they want to hear by picking whatever music video they want, but these songs can’t be legally captured or transferred to digital-music players.

I’d have to agree. 30-seconds is not always enough time to get a gauge on if a song is worth downloading or not. Sometimes I’ll happen upon a 30 second preview of a song that I know is great, only to find that the 30-second sample does it little justice.

Interestingly, Jobs will reportedly spend a good deal of time at Apple’s upcoming media event discussing the ways in which Apple is improving music discovery on iTunes.

It’s hard to believe that by the time Microsoft gets around to releasing Windows Phone 7, the iPhone will almost be 4 years old. Moreover, if and when Microsoft’s last gasp effort to reclaim any sort of relevancy in the smartphone market actually pays off, Apple will be just about ready to release the iPhone 5. And when you factor in the growing popularity of Android devices, it’s pretty clear that Microsoft is in a desperate game of playing catchup.

Having failed to evolve over the past few years, Microsoft has taken a backseat while watching its share of the smartphone market slide into irrelevancy. Now poised to enter the fray with Windows Phone 7, Microsoft is facing its toughest battle to date. Microsoft’s Windows monopoly has no bearing or influence in the smartphone market, and with users clearly enjoying their iPhones, BlackBerrys, and Android devices, it’ll take a lot more than Microsoft’s marketing muscle and deep bankroll to ensure a success for its smartphone entrant. Still, that won’t stop the folks up at Redmond from trying.

Kim-Mai Cutler, in a guest piece for TechCrunch, writes that Microsoft is prepared to spend upwards of a half billion dollars to put Windows Phone 7 on the best footing possible when it launches in a few months. Not only does Microsoft have a large cache of money earmarked for advertising, but it’s also planning on using its abundant cash resources to reach out to developers and bribe, uh.. persuade, them to code for the Windows Phone 7 platform.

The company could spend a half-billion dollars or more in marketing costs and payments to developers and handset manufacturers to subsidize the expense of building phones and apps, so that the Windows Phone 7 ecosystem is well-seeded at launch.

Jonathan Goldberg, a telecommunications analyst at Deutsche Bank, estimates that Microsoft will spend $400 million on marketing alone for the Windows Phone 7 launch. That doesn’t include the millions it has already committed to pay for “non-recurring engineering” costs that help offset development costs for handset manufacturers.

Meanwhile, another source reportedly familiar with Microsoft’s launch plans notes that all told, Microsoft may end up spending well over $1 billion in Windows Phone 7 related activities, with half of that figure devoted to advertising alone, and the rest to an assortment of development costs such as “convincing” developers to give WP 7 a try.

Indeed, Microsoft has in the past already contacted a number of high profile and successful iPhone developers asking them to port their apps over to a new platform. While it’s not clear how much Microsoft is willing to folk over, one anonymous developer who respectfully declined Microsoft’s offer said that it involved quite a substantial amount of cash.

The problem with Microsoft’s “let’s pay developers” strategy is that any successful developer on either the iPhone or Android platform is undoubtedly earning a nice monthly salary off of app sales already. That being the case, an offer to cross develop for Windows Phone 7 would have to be especially and unusually lucrative to even get developers to think about it.

And for a company that has historically boasted about its relationship with handset manufacturers, the $15 licensing fees for Windows Phone 7 seem quite high when measured against Android which is, of course, free. So even assuming that WP 7 is comparable to Android, it’s hard to fathom a scenario where handset manufacturers will be jumping at the chance to pay Microsoft licensing fees when it can use Android instead and save a buttload of cash in the process.

But putting things into perspective, Cutler points out that the 1-2-3 punch of effective Droid advertising from Google, Verizon, and Motorola totalled out at $100 million. If Microsoft is willing to spend 5x that amount on advertising alone, things are bound to get interesting. At the very least, people will be familiar with Windows Phone 7 - and given Microsoft’s near absence from the smartphone market as of late, that’s a lot better than nothing.

MercuryNews reports:

In its second major deal in just over a week, Intel has agreed to buy German-based Infineon Technologies’ wireless communications unit for $1.4 billion in cash, a move the Santa Clara goliath hopes will help get it into the fast-growing market for smartphones and other mobile gadgets.

The Infineon unit makes chips for smartphones including Apple’s iPhone. Intel, which has had trouble getting its chips into products other than personal computers, also agreed Aug. 19 to pay $7.7 billion to buy Santa Clara security software maker McAfee.

“We are committed to positioning Intel to take advantage of that growth potential in every computing segment, from laptops to handhelds and beyond,” Intel CEO Paul Otellini said in announcing the Infineon deal late Sunday night.

With Apple’s special media event now just days away, the rumors regarding what type of products has waiting in the wings are starting to get louder. Yeah, we’re all expecting to see a revamped iPod Touch with both a rear and front facing camera, and there have, of course, been no shortage of rumors pertaining to a refreshed Apple TV. But one product that has seemingly escaped the rumor mill up until recently has been the iPod Nano.

AppleInsider, citing people familiar with Apple’s plans, reported late last week that Apple is planning to announce a new iPod Nano with a completely redesigned form factor. The 6th gen iPod Nano will reportedly take on a more squarish look as evidenced by a recently leaked case design.

The new iPod nano is said to utilize a tiny 3cm-by-3cm display that was revealed in its bare form as unknown Apple-branded component earlier this summer. For comparison, the second-generation iPod nano had a screen that was about 3cm by 2.5cm.
AppleInsider was told that overseas manufacturers have been creating protective cases that will fit the new form factor since July. The cases seen this week appeared to indicate that the device will have buttons on its side, perhaps for volume control.

If AI’s report proves to be accurate, it’ll be interesting to see how the UI will shape up. Some reports have indicated that the upcoming Nano will support touch controls, though the device’s smaller form factor might make things a bit difficult.

Also worth mentioning is a speculative report, also from AI, that Apple over the past few months has been toying with the idea of releasing an iPod Touch 3G after witnessing how popular the 3G model of the iPad has been. And lastly, AI notes that Apple may use its upcoming media event to announce a new iteration of its iLife suite of software. AI warns, though, that these rumblings are extremely speculative.

For a company as keen on keeping things in-house as Apple, it might surprise you to find out that Apple has routinely worked together with outside design firms to help them create prototype devices for upcoming products and research purposes.
 
One of those design companies is SurfaceInk, a Silicon Valley based company who had previously worked with Apple on a number of initiatives over the past 10 years. But those days of cooperation have now come to an end as the New York Times is now reporting that the 2 companies have chosen to part ways.

[SurfaceInk CEO Eric] Bauswell declined to give details of its relationship with Apple, citing client confidentiality agreements. But he said that his company was let go because of “Apple’s growing awareness of our turnkey capabilities,” referring to SurfaceInk’s business of designing products for its clients. “I think they view our capabilities as an opportunity for competitors, “ he said.

While it’s not entirely clear what prompted the split, the Times article suggests that it most likely had something to do with the iPad and the slew of competitors looking to challenge iApple’s tablet dominance. Reportedly, SurfaceInk’s turnkey business, where it designs products and subsequently licenses them out to tech companies, is what ultimately irked Apple.

It was that latest part of SurfaceInk’s business, which the company began about five years ago, that apparently unsettled Apple. While SurfaceInk had gotten clients mostly through word of mouth, in June it publicized a prototype 12.1-inch tablet during an electronics trade show.

The device was meant to showcase SurfaceInk’s design capabilities to potential clients, Mr. Bauswell said. He said that Apple viewed those capabilities as a potential competitive threat.

Qualcomm yesterday put up an interesting job posting on its career board looking for an “iPhone Developer Guru.” The job description cryptically reads:

The iPhone has no secret for you? Well, that’s what you think… join us and develop the most challenging product of your life!

You are driven by a very strict development discipline, well versed in Agile, and your passion is to bring product in the hands of consumers. You have been exposed to application or game development on mobile for years and you have developed deployed apps on the iPhone. Join us now: we are small fast moving team working in a lab 24hrs/day!

Well isn’t that some curious timing. Qualcomm happens to design the CDMA chipset currently used by Verizon, and whadya know, rumors of the iPhone hitting Verizon have been popping up with greater frequency these days, and not to mention from more reliable sources. Most recently, a number of reports have indicated that we’ll see a CDMA capable iPhone on Verizon hit store shelves in early 2011.

Interestingly, AppleInsider notes that Qualcomm, in addition to developing chipsets, basestations and the like, also works closely with various companies to ensure that mobile platforms are are appropriately tweaked for Qualcomm’s chipset to ensure optimal performance.

With an overt interest in ensuring that mobile software runs smoothly on its hardware, Qualcomm’s sudden job listing for an iPhone guru is particularly suggestive, especially in light of all the iPhone/Verizon rumors that continue to sprout up.

Truth be told, Apple reportedly already has CDMA capable iPhones in its labs for testing purposes. A few weeks ago, well-connected Apple blogger John Gruber wrote:

But I do know that engineering-wise, the wheels are turning on N92, the CDMA variant of the iPhone 4. It’s certainly not in production yet, and hasn’t reached DVT status (device verification test — like Gray Powell’s infamous stolen unit), but it is, a few little birdies claim, at EVT (engineering verification test). That’s one step below DVT, which is one step below production. So it’s right about where you’d think it would be if it were scheduled to go on sale in January. The CDMA iPhone is no longer a cold storage, keep-it-alive-just-in-case-we-need-it project. 

Also of note are speculative reports that Verizon has begun upgrading its CDMA network to concurrently handle voice and data connections, a feature which Apple has touted in ads targeting Verizon.

With all of the problems associated with AT&T, the iPhone hitting Verizon has undoubtedly been on Apple’s radar for sometime now. And with this current job listing from Qualcomm, we have yet another piece of evidence hinting at the end of AT&T’s iPhone exclusivity.

A few days ago, erroneous reports surfaced that there were 104 million people using the Facebook app for the iPhone. This seemed a bit strange as it implied that every iOS device out there had the Facebook app installed given that there are, well, approximately 100 iOS devices out there in the wild.

Facebook has since clarified its iOS figures and released the following statement to Engadget:

There are currently 44 million monthly active users of the Facebook for iPhone app. We recently changed the definition of mobile active users to exclude those who have only liked or commented on stream stories. Instead we are counting “active” users as people who have taken explicit actions within an application. This practice is more aligned with how we count overall active users for the site.

Either way, that’s a helluva number, and there’s simply no denying that Facebook is fast becoming the default mobile app of choice for users on all sorts of mobile platforms.

iLounge reports on new photos which purport to show a new case design for an upcoming iPod Nano. Earlier today, analyst Shaw Wu noted that the upcoming Nano would come equipped without a clickwheel. If the photos below are any indication, he may be onto something - especially in light of the fact that when it comes to the Nano, Apple seems more prone to experimenting with unique form factors than it is with other iPod models.

The two supposed iPod nano 6G cases, on the other hand, appear to be made for a squarish device based on the 1.7-inch Apple-branded touchscreen seen in photos earlier this year, without any room for a front-mounted Home button. The nano 6G case features an open strip on the rear—perhaps for a camera or built-in clip—as well as what appear to be volume buttons and a larger button on the top side while a Dock Connector and headphone port are along the bottom. Text accompanying the image notes that it is unclear what a move to this small a form factor might mean for the future of the iPod shuffle, though the “nano 6G” device is more like a screened iPod shuffle than the nano, Dock Connector aside.