Apple's post-iPhone era: iGlasses

Tuesday, November 12, 2019 by Snacks
_What Apple CEO Tim Cook looks like 5 years from now_

What Apple CEO Tim Cook looks like 5 years from now

Yesterday’s Market Moves
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27,691 (+0.04%)
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3,087 (+0.20%)
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8,464 (-0.13%)
Bitcoin
$8,700 (-4.11%)
10-Yr US Treasury
1.945%

Hey Snackers,

WeWork Update #43: It reportedly wants to knight T-Mobile CEO (and aged Adam Neumann lookalike) John Legere as its new CEO.

Markets dipped to start the week — Investors were probably planning an Avengers movie marathon on Disney+, the streaming network that launches today.

Invent

1. Apple's post-iPhone future got leaked: iGlasses & iHelmet (our names, not Apple's)

Augmented Reality (AR) vs. Virtual Reality (VR)... We all need a refresher. AR is reality, but augmented with stuff (picture a whackable Pikachu in Pokemon Go). VR isn't reality. You only see what the programmers want you to see. Now that that's out of the way, let's talk Apple, whose 5-year product roadmap got leaked to The Information. We just learned its next big bets:

  • "iHelmet": That's what we've nicknamed Apple's AR/VR headset, which will cover your eyes completely but use cameras to also show what's actually around you. Coming in 2022.
  • "iGlasses": (Also our nickname). This is the game-changer — socially-acceptable glasses that can sling whatever digital info you want up in the corner. It's Warby Parker meets RoboCop. Coming to an Apple store in 2023.

Nobody wants to "miss" augmented reality... Back when Dell, Microsoft, and HP crushed life with laptop computers, Google and Apple invested in mobile: iPhone and Android. Microsoft missed mobile phones. Now a gaggle of tech companies — including Facebook, Alphabet, Snap, Microsoft, and Sony — think AR and/or VR could be the next big thing.

THE TAKEAWAY

The difference between a good idea and a great idea... Good businesses/entrepreneurs solve a problem that exists today. Great ones anticipate tomorrow's problems, then fix them now. iPhone is Apple's profit puppy, but it's foreseeing an era when you don't want to use your hands to access its powers. iGlasses could be that future in 5 years. Apple's working on it now.

Agglomerate

2. Adidas is closing its American and German "Speedfactories"

Georgia is known for dawgs, peaches, and sneakers... That last part was thanks to Adidas, which opened a highly-automated "Speedfactory" there about 3 years ago. The plan was to produce Boost shoes close to American customers instead of half a world away in Southeast Asia. But Adidas just announced it'll close that Speedfactory and the one in Ansbach, Germany, relocating them to Vietnam and China.

"They took our jobs" sentiment is common... China, Mexico, and other low-wage countries now produce many of the physical goods that America used to. But classic "cost of labor" justification is just one consideration companies make when deciding where to produce:

  • Proximity to customers: This is the main reason why Adidas located in Atlanta in the first place. Being closer lets companies produce faster, and ship shorter distances.
  • Foreign exchange: Companies love producing in the same country that they're selling in so that they don't need to worry about crazy currency fluctuations.
  • Where the supply chain is: This one drove Adidas' latest decision: over 90% of its products are made in Asia, where it enjoys a friendly cluster of suppliers — aka "agglomeration."
THE TAKEAWAY

This was an expensive mistake... We love that Adidas tried out Made In USA shoes (it followed its comrade BMW's lead — they make their SUVs in South Carolina). But this trial was a failure. The 4-ish-year-old Georgia and German Speedfactories will shut by April, affecting 200 jobs. And this mistake may reveal itself as a billion-dollar cost somewhere in Adidas' next earnings report.

What else we’re Snackin’

  • Huge: Alibaba sold $38B of merchandise on its famed Chinese holiday on 11.11 "Singles Day," but growth has seriously slowed
  • Freshly: Amazon is launching its own branded grocery store (not a Whole Foods) in LA
  • Love: Facebook's Instagram will start hiding like counts from some US users starting this week
  • Out: Uber's co-founder and ex-CEO Travis Kalanick just sold half a billion dollars of his Uber stock (that's about 1/5th of his entire stake)
  • TGIF-IPO: TGI Friday is going public (again) through a complicated process
  • Grounded: Southwest has reportedly been flying 38 jets that may not be properly verified

Tuesday

  • President Trump chats with the Economic Club of New York (we're looking for details on the US/China trade deal)
  • Earnings from Tilray, Cronos, Jumia, CBS, and Tyson

Disclosure: Authors of this Snacks own shares of Alibaba, Tesla, and Amazon

ID: 1009381

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