Taking a look back at another week of news from Cupertino, this week’s Apple Loop covers Apple's success in smartphone sales, replacing AT&T in the Dow Jones Industrial Average, Android Wear on iOS, a potential MacBook Air announcement, doubling the available memory in the next iPhone, iPad Pro delays, Microsoft Office's preview app, and the $75,000 Apple Watch.
Apple Loop is here to remind you of a few of the very many discussions that have happened around Apple over the last seven days (and you can read our weekly digest of Android news here on Forbes).
Samsung In Second As Apple Scores Smartphone Sales Win
Gartner's latest numbers for Q4 give Apple a small edge in the smartphone sales stakes compared to Samsung, but it's enough to take the top spot from the South Korean company. Amit Chowdhry:
Apple sold 74.8 million iPhones compared to Samsung’s sales of 73 million smartphones in the fourth quarter of last year. This is a dramatic change from one year earlier when Samsung sold 83.3 million smartphones against Apple’s 50.2 million iPhone sales. Apple’s win over Samsung in Q4 2014 is the first time that the Cupertino giant sold the most number of smartphones globally since 2011.
Samsung's phone division sells more than smartphones, with total handset sales in the hundreds of millions, but smartphone sales bestow a greater halo effect on a company. Apple might not have started a thermonuclear war over Samsung, but the effect has been the same.
AAPL And T To Swap Places
One interesting move confirming Apple's place in the financial space is the Dow Jones Industrial Average. Apple will be replacing AT&T in the index, to provide a better weighting to the technology side of the index. Maggie McGrath reports:
The change comes as a result of a number of stock splits, S&P Dow Jones explained Friday morning. It was prompted by Visa’s 4-for-1 stock split (which the payments company announced in late January) and made possible by Apple’s 7-for-1 stock split, which was announced last April and took effect in June. The post-split adjusted price of Visa — which is expected to begin on March 19, the same day that the Apple-AT&T switch will occur — will reduce the weighting of the Dow’s information technology sector, so adding Apple will help offset that reduction.
Android Wear Coming To iOS?
Monday March 9th will see an Apple event where it is widely expected that details on the Apple Watch will be released, including the available accessories, a multitude of apps, and the pricing. Naturally we'll have full details here on Forbes as the event happens, with a live-blog and analysis from the team.
In the meantime, the Apple Watch may be getting more competition. While the Pebble smartwatch already has an iOS client to go with its Android code, Google's Android Wear devices have been Android only... for now. John Fingas on Engadget:
Sources for French outlet 01net claim that Google is "preparing to launch" an iOS version of its Android Wear app. There aren't any other details, although it's safe to say that third-party app support would require additional effort -- it wouldn't be an Android-to-Android connection any more, after all. This is very much a rumor and may not pan out, so don't assume that you'll be strapping on a Huawei Watch any time soon.
Will The Air Join The Watch?
As well as the Apple Watch announcement, Tim Cook may take advantage of the Monday meeting to introduce some new products ahead of them reaching mass production. This way Apple can release the information in its own way, and reduce the possibility of leaks derailing its own storytelling process.
That means the new MacBook Air may be up on stage. Rumored to feature a 12-inch screen and a single USB-C port for power and connectivity, it's possible that the Air will be shown on Monday, with a roll-out to the Apple Store at the end of Q2 during WWDC. 9to5mac's Ben Lovejoy:
WWDC traditionally has been the end of Q2, so unless Apple plans another event specifically for the new model (not impossible but I’d think not), the most likely time to announce it would be during Monday’s Spring Forward event, expected to major on the Apple Watch. Since this is a new product, not an upgrade of a current product, Apple could use some ramping time between the announcement and the actual launch.
We’d caution however that supply chain sources, which is apparently the kind the WSJ is using, often guess early when it comes to shipping times.
Next page: Double memory, fewer screens, the most expensive Apple Watch, and Microsoft Paperclip will return...
Double The Memory, Double The Fun
Apple's next smartphone, the presumptively titled iPhone 6S, could double its memory to 2GB of RAM (reports Apple Insider). Apple has retained the 1 GB specification in its smartphones since it was introduced with the iPhone 5, and while developers have coped, there are situations where RAM issues are noticeable (such as having multiple tabs open in Safari and switching between them). That could change in the 2015 handset family, and bring it into line with the A8X powered iPad Air 2 which did ship with 2 GB.
Apple Insider's source also believes that the iPhone 6S could ship with the Apple SIM software, allowing users to choose a network out of the box. That might be a tougher challenge and I await news on that advance with keen interest.
iPad Pro Delayed By Screen Issues
Low yields on the 12.9 inch screens expected to be used in the iPad Pro has resulted in a delay on production, pushing the potential release date of the large tablet back into Q3 (or 'late 2014' as Tim Cook would describe it). John Ribeiro picks up the tale at MacRumors:
Apple has delayed the production of its larger-screen iPads, while it works out the final design and features for the product targeted at businesses. The company had earlier told suppliers that it wanted to mass produce the 12.9-inch iPad in the current quarter.
Given the lower sales expectations of large tablets this is unlikely to be noticed in Apple's financial results, but a larger iPad would certainly be welcome by niche group such as architects, designers, and artists, especially if it comes with support for a stylus.
I See You Are Having Trouble With A Word Document, Can I Help?
MacWorld has taken a closer look at the preview release of Microsoft Office for OSX, and likes what it sees, nothing that the final release will likely require an Office 365 subscription for anything more than 'read only' mode.
What’s key about all of these releases is what seems to be a significant philosophical shift at Microsoft. What was once a “PC first. Mac? Whatever…” way of thinking has now become, “All features, all platforms, all at once.” No half measures. No, “Our studies show that Mac users aren’t interested in those features.” Quite simply, Office 2016 is Office on the Mac, as it should be, without compromising Office’s features or requiring Mac users to conform to a Windows way of working.
Once more it emphasises Microsoft's new focus on the cloud and software that talks to it, rather than pushing the Windows platform as the only answer
A Preview of Office is free for anyone starting today, but Microsoft is quick to note that Office 2016 will not follow the same model that Office for iOS has. Which is to say that while the Preview is free, when the suite ships for real a little later this year, it will require an Office 365 subscription or the purchase of a standalone copy for anything more than read/print-only access to Office documents.
You can download your own copy of the preview release here.
And Finally...
The pricing of the Apple Watch continues to be argued over, especially on the price of the highest model. I originally expected a $10,000 price tag, but I'm tending towards the $20,000 mark - and yes you can come back after Monday and tell me how wrong I was. In the meantime, Brikk will be offering customised Apple Watches with price tags expected to be upwards of $75,000:
Courtesy of Brikk (the same company that cashed in on the $8,000 24-karat gold iPhone 6), an “Omni” version of the yet-to-be-released Apple Watch is available for pre-order that features multiple rows of diamonds around the face, buttons and strap clasp, and is available in 24-karat yellow gold, 18-karat pink gold and 950 platinum. In all, the company will offer 30 elevated Lux Watch models.
Remember what I was saying about status symbols?
Apple Loop brings you seven days worth of highlights every weekend here on Forbes. Don’t forget to follow me so you don’t miss any coverage in the future. Last week’s Apple Loop can be read here, or this week’s edition of Loop’s sister column, Android Circuit, is also available on Forbes.
