Yesterday there were reports that Apple was enduring its longest share price decline in 18 years – following the disappointing results last week, highlighting a slowdown in worldwide iPhone sales. In what looks be an attempt to stem the flow, Apple CEO Tim Cook made a rare appearance on CNBC's Mad Money, promising jam tomorrow.
To start the interview CNBC's Jim Cramer claimed that the media is reporting that "Apple is dead". To this the Apple CEO replied that he thought such reports were "a huge overreaction". Explaining further, Mr Cook said Apple still made $50bn plus in revenues and $10 billion in profits – "more than any other company makes," yet the results last week weren't up to Wall Street expectations.
Cook went on to say that this year's sales didn't look so good due to an "abnormally high upgrade rate last year". Changing tack the Apple CEO then went on to assert that "the most important thing is that customers love our products" and in the long-term their satisfaction and loyalty will keep Apple on the up.
On market trends Cook said that smartphones are just 40 per cent of the mobile phones market worldwide right now, so there's a long way to go to market saturation and there are huge markets like India that will be important for Apple in the future.
Then the Apple CEO started to tease the next iPhones:
"We have great innovation in the pipeline, new iPhones that will incent you and other people that have iPhones today to upgrade to new iPhones," asserted Cook
"I can't think of anything else that I need," cried Cramer, interrupting the Apple CEO.
Mr Cook continued his iPhone spiel "We are going to give you things that you can’t live without, that you just don’t even know you need today… You will look back and wonder ‘how did I live without this?’"
Unfortunately the statement offered no clues about what the things we can't live without are. Of course CEOs shouldn't reveal competitive plans but will Apple really be able to live up to that statement after so many minor updates to its device ranges over recent years?
