Before Huawei's three-fold model exploded with a starting price of 19,999 yuan, Apple took the lead in releasing new products in September.
In addition to the mobile phone series iPhone 16, Apple Watch Series 10 and AirPods 4, Apple still uses the artificial intelligence system "Apple Intelligence" as a selling point.
Is iPhone 16 an artificial intelligence phone or a more professional camera? This soul examination is a question about Apple’s new products, and it is also a question about Apple in the AI era.
This selling point is very un-Apple.
Through the display of “Apple Intelligence” at the press conference, it is difficult to see how competitive it is as AI technology. After all, competitiveness is a subversive software model, an imaginative space that allows consumers to see the future, a science fiction setting where dreams come true, and possibilities that competitors have not yet explored.
The only thing that shouldn’t be is the AI functions that most have been implemented on Android phones. It will not make much sense to launch a feature in 2024 that is badly played by other companies.
In the past ten years or so, Apple has been far ahead by relying on the ecological integration of software and hardware. As the “most watched technology company” in the mobile Internet era, its market value has long dominated the world.
From the leader of the previous generation of smartphones to a follower in the AI era, Apple's once-leading status has become increasingly blurred. In recent years, everyone has criticized Apple for its lack of innovation. The criticism surrounding the new iPhone products is that laymen always see bland designs, while insiders complain about the lack of functionality.
In order to catch up with market expectations, Apple has introduced generative AI, but it is still unknown how to improve Apple's specific functions and how to expand the user base through AI.
One step is slow, each step is slow. The faltering pace and hesitation at the level of AI development have led to endless voices of doubt. Previously, Apple's choice to cooperate with OpenAI on a large model was not seen as a sample of strong alliances. Instead, it was seen as a voluntary abandonment of core innovation capabilities to others.
Rather than saying that Apple’s advantages were diluted by its friends, it is better to say that the popularity of ChatGPT has shaken Apple at its peak.
The new round of artificial intelligence revolution has quietly eliminated the advantages of Apple's original ecosystem. Whether AI can continue to lead innovation is not only a proposition for Apple to defend Apple, but also a proposition for Apple to redeem Apple.
In Apple's latest financial report, Apple's most advantageous business is its iron-clad software services. The growth of the software business mainly comes from the accumulation of users and the increase in related user income.
In other words, the "Apple tax" can be collected forever, but there is a question mark as to how much it will be received. Once the closed ecology is torn open, software services will no longer be absolutely competitive, and the impact on Apple will be fatal.
In the Chinese market, the market crisis faced by Apple is also concrete. Not only the showdown with Huawei, but also the strong collision with many domestic brands. Huawei, Xiaomi, Honor, OPPO and other products are on the right track, and winning in the Chinese mobile phone market is no longer what it used to be.
What’s interesting is that on September 10, in this deliberate “crash” that had been warmed up for too long, Apple unexpectedly played the role of the king of cost-effectiveness, while Huawei had to go to the end on the road to high-end. Going back twenty years ago, the cost-effective king of the mobile phone market was still Nokia, which was defeated by Apple.