Apple is rumored to be teaming up with a major TV maker to sell Apple-branded TVs in the fall.
According to DailyTech, citing a former Apple executive, Apple’s TVs will be sold through Apple’s retail stores and will “blow Netflix and all those other guys away.”
We’ve heard this one before. So often, in fact, I’m inclined to roll my eyes. The TV business is hyper-competitive and hard.
But Apple has a big new technology that might make all the difference:
AirPlay.
According to DailyTech, the iOS-powered displays will combine the Apple TV + iTunes in one box — a television set.
Apple has been rumored for years to be making a TV — it’s a major industry set to be disrupted. Apple’s latest Apple TV has done failry well, selling millions of units, but Steve Jobs still describes it as a “hobby.”
Regarding the TV industry, here is what Steve Jobs said last year at AllThingsD:
Q: Is it time to throw out the interface for TV? Does television need a new human interface.
A: The problem with innovation in the TV industry is the go-to-market strategy. The TV industry has a subsidized model that gives everyone a set top box for free. So no one wants to buy a box. Ask TiVo, ask Roku, ask us… ask Google in a few months. The television industry fundamentally has a subsidized business model that gives everyone a set-top box, and that pretty much undermines innovation in the sector. The only way this is going to change is if you start from scratch, tear up the box, redesign and get it to the consumer in a way that they want to buy it. But right now, there’s no way to do that….The TV is going to lose until there’s a viable go-to-market strategy. That’s the fundamental problem with the industry. It’s not a problem with the technology, it’s a problem with the go-to-market strategy….I’m sure smarter people than us will figure this out, but that’s why we say Apple TV is a hobby.
The big difference now is that Apple has a killer technology that allows Apple to bypasses the cable carriers: AirPlay.
AirPlay is Apple’s go-to-market strategy. AirPlay could be the value-add that convinces consumers to buy an Apple-branded TV.
Apple will continue to distribute content through iTunes and The App Store. Customers’ iPhones, Macs and iPads will be the portals to content (bypassing the cable companies’ set-top boxes), allowing them to play their own content — or Hollywood’s — on the big screen via AirPlay built in.
The App Store will serve up TV shows, movies, videos and music, as well as new classes of apps like games and living-room oriented stuff we haven’t seen yet.
Apple already has a huge entertainment ecosystem. With this in place, an Apple-branded TV doesn’t seem so farfetched. Anyone disagree?
Leander Kahney is the editor and publisher of Cult of Mac.
Leander is a longtime technology reporter and the author of six acclaimed books about Apple, including two New York Times bestsellers: Jony Ive: The Genius Behind Apple’s Greatest Products and Inside Steve’s Brain, a biography of Steve Jobs.
He’s also written a top-selling biography of Apple CEO Tim Cook and authored Cult of Mac and Cult of iPod, which both won prestigious design awards. Most recently, he was co-author of Cult of Mac, 2nd Edition.
Leander has been reporting about Apple and technology for nearly 30 years.
Before founding Cult of Mac as an independent publication, Leander was news editor at Wired.com, where he was responsible for the day-to-day running of the Wired.com website. He headed up a team of six section editors, a dozen reporters and a large pool of freelancers. Together the team produced a daily digest of stories about the impact of science and technology, and won several awards, including several Webby Awards, 2X Knight-Batten Awards for Innovation in Journalism and the 2010 MIN (Magazine Industry Newsletter) award for best blog, among others.
Before being promoted to news editor, Leander was Wired.com’s senior reporter, primarily covering Apple. During that time, Leander published a ton of scoops, including the first in-depth report about the development of the iPod. Leander attended almost every keynote speech and special product launch presented by Steve Jobs, including the historic launches of the iPhone and iPad. He also reported from almost every Macworld Expo in the late ’90s and early ‘2000s, including, sadly, the last shows in Boston, San Francisco and Tokyo. His reporting for Wired.com formed the basis of the first Cult of Mac book, and subsequently this website.
Before joining Wired, Leander was a senior reporter at the legendary MacWeek, the storied and long-running weekly that documented Apple and its community in the 1980s and ’90s.
Leander has written for Wired magazine (including the Issue 16.04 cover story about Steve Jobs’ leadership at Apple, entitled Evil/Genius), Scientific American, The Guardian, The Observer, The San Francisco Chronicle and many other publications.
Leander has a postgrad diploma in artificial intelligence from the University of Aberdeen, and a BSc (Hons) in experimental psychology from the University of Sussex.
He has a diploma in journalism from the UK’s National Council for the Training of Journalists.
Leander lives in San Francisco, California, and is married with four children. He’s an avid biker and has ridden in many long-distance bike events, including California’s legendary Death Ride.
You can find out more about Leander on LinkedIn and Facebook. You can follow him on X at @lkahney or Instagram.
76 responses to “Apple Will Start Selling Real TVs This Fall: Rumor”
I’d tend to lean towards Bravo Sierra on this one…
Chris
http://friendsofmaconfb.wordpr…
Let’s see…
As always, a rumor is just a rumor. However, it may explain why AppleTV is lagging so far behind Roku in terms of accessible content.
Who knows.
Time will tell.
Nope this wont happen.. Apple only goes for markets where the existing stuff is flawed.. A TV is quite a dumb device and is priced accordingly. The only way they shift a decent number of Apple TV’s now is because its dirt cheap.. The premium model (V1) didnt sell. Current Apple TV is the perfect interface for airplay. A TV would be just a TV with an Apple TV integrated… I too am calling BS on this…. next…
If it’s a *partnership* as described (perhaps with a large failing, flailing Japanese electronics company beginning with the letter ‘S’?), it might make sense.
I could definitely see a line of Plasma televisions in all different sizes and prices…another way for Apple to shake the pockets of their loyal customers.
What can be gained from an Apple-branded TV that the current AppleTV doesn’t already provide?
And that’s why this idea is rather moot.
Sony already ships Internet Tv’s with Google TV built in. Doubt it’d be Sony.
They should keep selling the iOS boxes. Integrate these features in and move on. Television is a big deal in many homes but if Apple truly wants to compete with Netflix, Pay-Per-View and Bluray players, they need to make entry inexpensive and easy without requiring new television sets.
I was looking to buy three iOS boxes over the next year as well as a Mac Mini to serve as an iTunes server. If I am required to buy televisions, I’ll cut my loses and get something like the Roku or Boxee Box.
I could see pairing up with manufacturers to put Apple TV features in their TVs, but really, why would Apple want to do that?
Set top boxes are cheap, available to people who already have a TV, and don’t rely on the quality of another manufacturer’s product.
I can’t see why Apple would want to do this. Maybe I’m missing something?
What Netflix did to DVD rentals maybe Apple or somebody else could do for TV.
I barely watch TV because the existing system IS flawed.Apple would make TVs very attractive and well-built and space-age and all that.Then they could redesign the remote to get rid of the 89 tiny, unusable buttons and give you something simple and well-designed. ( I mean why is the MUTE button so tiny and hard-to-find? When will we ever have just one, not two or three, confusing remotes? )If Apple could get agreements with the networks to allow me to pay for TV programs ala-carte, Instead of a $50/month for 150 channels of all-you-can-stand ads, that would be compelling to me. But the cable industry would fight that vigorously I suppose.
I’m so thankful for Netflix streaming to iPad and AppleTV for the time being.
Maybe he was thinking Samsung, even though they are in South Korea.
As long as the start using plasma I’ll be interested. Can’t stand LCD tech. OLEd was be awesome.
Nope. This is not going to happen. I just don’t understand people’s obsession with this rumor. Apple is just not going to make $2000 internet-connected television sets when they can turn everyone’s existing television set into an AppleTV for $99, which is what they currently do. As a further note? Apple Stores simply aren’t designed to sell TVs. I’d love to see a moratorium on this rumor forever.
too bad.
I hope they make a better remote either way. the current one drives me crazy.
It’s obvious that TV is up next for Apple. In line with the management book “Good to great” (where Jim Collins describes Apple-like superior companies), Apple is building momentum to enter this market. AirPlay is an important technology to reach this, but much more than that is required. There’s a lot more you can do on a television screen than simply watch TV, and Apple needs a greater share in the “other” part. Gaming will be a major part of that and iOS is leading the way with both iPad screen mirroring and dual screen gaming. In a year from now, there will be plenty of games available from developers. And of course there could be one more thing: TV recording (if you can’t beat them, join them).
By the way, Leander’s book “Inside Steve’s brain” really inspired me in analyzing business in general. I strongly recommend it!
This is why the Apple TV rumor persists – because it is so attractive.
The current TV ecosystem is SO broken. The cable companies suck and the hardware does too.
Like you say, a well-designed TV with a la carte programming would be killer. Will the content creators go for it though?
This would a lot of disruption in an industry with billions of dollars at stake.
This story makes no sense at all. What does a built in Apple TV have to do with anything. If you gave me an Apple TV for free right now it would change nothing for me. Oh, sure I could do a few more things I couldn’t do before but I would still rely on my free DVR for day to day recording and watching 98% of my TV shows on my plasma. When I forgot to record a show it will be nice to watch it now using the Apple TV and iTunes or Hulu or whatever on my plasma but that’s still only 2% of what I do on my TV. If I was going to get a new TV and it came with Apple TV for the same cost as with out, then sure but we both know that any going to happen. You don’t get something for nothing.
The existing stuff is REALLY flawed. Tried to order cable recently?
There’s massive change going on in programming recently. My kids barely watch TV any more — thye get it all form Netflix, Hulu or the network’s apps.
A lot of TV is already available through the net — an easy-to-set-up Apple TV (no extra box) could bring it all together.
The big problem for programming is sports, I think. Sports is what gives the networks their lock on the TV viewing public. Finding a way to bring sports to an Apple TV will be the challenge — perhaps through subscription apps?
Nowadays with the “NetTV” options on all Philips, Samsung and Sony tv’s, I would say: Yes.
Apple is making 27″ /30″ monitors for a while now, they have experience and room in the stores to build and sell them, and with TV’s also having H264 playback and Wi-Fi capabilities, they are almost mini computers.
Have you ever used any of the TV’s with a decoder card? or the setop decoders?
your TV can do everything, but the controls and User Experience are awful. 1995 cellphones and worse.
With Philips ditching the TV’s (and having iPhone/iPod compatible connectors on every electronics device that can have one (Stereos, home cinema sets and even Wake-Up light alarm clocks) I dare to say that they might sell (and/or license) some of there knowhow to Apple to make killer ass TV’s.
I know I would waiting in line to have an ambilight OS X driven 42″ TV with a touch of Philips in my living room
And now back to reality.
But you can still wish :)
Yeah, I wondered about storage too. But most stores get daily deliveries from warehouses anyway. I’m guessing demand would be pretty predictable, and most sets could be delivered in a just-in-time fashion.
Or I guess the stores could rent storage from other outlets in the mall — there seems to be plenty of space to let these days.
It will be a real Apple television set, designed by Apple, with parts from companies like Samsung. Just like any other Apple product. Of course, there will still be the Apple TV box with the same features, but many people would love to have an Apple designed television.
There is not enough bandwidth for all of these Internet connected dreams (or clouds) unless Apple provides a better pipe.
or they could simple improve the existing Apple TV add on and have folks use their existing TVs, which is more likely the case.
No, consider the security impact. You would order online and pick up from a store, or any other method that doesn’t require a lot of storage in Apple stores.
An Apple created TV isn’t going to fix the issues. Dumping the Nielsen system as the sole judgement for what is ‘good’ would. Give shows credit for all sources of income. If they make or beat their budget, they stay. If not, goodbye. Improving the Nielsen sampling wouldn’t hurt either.
Dumping the Cable system where I have to pay someone like Time Warner $ 60 a month for the privilege of paying another $20 a month for the channels I really want, would be a step in the right direction. Let me just get my HBO and Showtime which is what I want. Perhaps also a la carte the rest. Single channels wouldn’t really work but how about packages. $10 a month for the five broadcast stations, another $10 for this or that set (which could be all the non broadcast stations that a network owns or subject focused like sports or news). Or move it all to data streams where we can subscribe for a couple of bucks and watch it all on our tablets and computers and tvs mixing and matching as much as we want.
In other words, the studios and networks should get their heads out of their butts and embrace the online world when it comes to tv. Heck how about movies too. I know the chains are up in arms about this whole digital rental after 60 days for stuff that is out of the theatres but why shouldn’t the studios do it. If someone is willing to pay $20 for a one view digital rental to watch something at home without the headaches of texters, yelling kids etc (or rewatch something) let them. Maybe then the theatres will start doing something about all the annoyances.
Again, a TV with iOS etc isn’t going to fix the flaws. Because they aren’t about the hardware, they are about the content. You can fix that without changing the software.
As for your sports comment, there’s already an MLB app and an NBA app on the Apple TV that handles those just fine. I’m surprised you didn’t do your research and know this before you commented.
I’d be surprised if Apple gets into the already crowded TV business. TV’s are basically commodities and even with Apple TV, Air Play and other products built in there will be no added functionality. I would hate to see Apple waste it’s resources and reputation in this way. Putting the Apple brand on TV would be a turn in the wrong direction and would tell me to sell AAPL.
Oh please, oh please, oh please….
They aren’t getting into the bandwidth game. That’s your problem. They’ll just have it available for when you move up a tier in your ISP. :-P
As much as I loved my DVR, I gave up my TV several years back because I didn’t wanna deal with Comcast’s horrendous prices. There’s a lot of money to be saved by cutting that cord. One of the big challenges Apple is going to face, once more, is the industry itself; if you look at HBO, for example, they continue to gorge to their customers. (AMC and the others are starting to catch up with quality content.) There’s a reason why they’ve kept out of this for so long, but I think if anyone can do it right, especially upon a 3.0/4.0 release, it’s Apple. Maybe they’ll partner up with AT&T on this, and that’s another tractor beam I don’t wanna look at…
Agreed, the Home TV is broken, but it’s not a hardware issue. The issue is the teleco’s and the crap hardware that they require and the crap programming that the bundle. An Apple TV is nit going to solve this. My home TV is amazing, and it’s 3 years old or more! Plus I can turn it into an Apple TV at the press of a button.
Apple does not have the facilities to build it’s own TV. So it would be a Sharp, Sony, Samsung or some other off the shelf vendor, with an Apple TV inside it. Where’s the improvement over the current setup?? Where is Apple able to make it’s profit?
This is a garbadge rumor and I wish it would die.
But what is the benefit? It will still have a Samsung, or Sony or whatever panel inside. Why would I buy a $3000 Apple panel over the exact same $2200 Samsung? Just because Apple has put an unibody case around it?
We have to be patient for OLED TV sets – probably in 2012 or 2013…
What about the interface? Obviously a (direct) touch interface is not working, keyboards never did – so what is working in the livig room 3m away from the device? With a remote control you can navigate to 4 directions, with a return button that’s working for basic things. An iPhone/iPad/iPod touch screen as the only device?
Just wondering….
It just shifts who pays for the device. Like Jobs said, set top boxes are subsidized so people are hesitant to even pay $100 for one. Apple could easily team up with Sharp to have Apple TV built right into their line of TVs.
Apple gets paid, Sharp gets a competitive advantage in the TV market and people don’t have to spend another hundo for another cluttering box. Everyone wins.
A nicely designed Apple LED TV with IOS/AirPlay and lets hope a good deal of flash memory to record or push some content to would be awesome. Maybe that’s why I haven’t heard anything yet about AirPlay-video licensing other then rumours. Maybe Apple has changed its mind and thought why not make a TV ourselves and only the new Apple TV will be able to do AirPlay-video. Interesting.
This a ghastly idea.
I hate iTunes!
I have an iPhone4 (outrageously expensive) but get my content via DropBox.
Apple will sell you an expensive TV and then you will have to pay extra for the mains lead as it will have a non-standard socket!