Posts Tagged: htc

strategy — 10 Comments
3
Mar 10

Apple fires a shot over the bow

Apple to Android: may we have your attention please

They grow up so fast, don’t they?

It was just three years ago that Apple introduced iPhone. That was when, in one little aside, Steve Jobs gleefully noted that this new bundle of joy was patented out the wazoo.

Well, yesterday those patents got their first good workout. Apple filed a lawsuit against HTC claiming 20 violations. In doing so, Apple has stepped over an interesting line. That scrappy young revolutionary is now officially playing with the big boys — adding a little aggression to their arsenal of tricks.

I’m not saying this is a bad thing. In a global market worth countless billions, it’s bound to get a bit rough. Companies will try anything they can to gain an advantage or strip away the other guy’s advantage. Give them an inch, they’ll take a mile.

Obviously Apple believes they have a case against HTC. But just as obvious, there’s a far, far greater goal here. Apple wants the whole unruly gang of Androiders to think long and hard before they borrow/steal even a glimmer of the technology that sets iPhone apart. That includes hardware, software and philosophy. The message is: don’t even think about it.

Apple is demonstrating that they have the brains and brawn to fight in any arena, whether consumers be the judge or judges be the judge.

Yes, I do get a little wispy whenever another piece of the original, lovable Apple falls by the wayside. But the kid needs to grow up sometime, and it’s hard to be cute when you need to be intimidating.

Unlike some, I really don’t worry about Apple turning into the kind of company they’ve always fought against. Their moral compass remains one of the biggest reasons for their success.

strategy / technology — 4 Comments
19
Feb 10

Apps of the world, unite

The Mobile World Congress met in Barcelona this week. Think of it as the United Nations of mobile technology companies — with about as much ability to influence world events as the real United Nations.

The biggest deal coming out of the 2010 Congress was “App Planet.” The idea was to lay out a vision for unified standards that would make life better for developers and customers. The official website says: By pulling all the key players together in one place at one time, we will make App Planet the new Centre of the Apps Universe for the four days of Mobile World Congress.

Only problem: key player #1 — Apple — did not attend the conference. So it seems that the real point of Planet Of The Apps was to do collectively what no one has been able to do alone: create a credible challenge to Apple’s world-leading app platform. If nothing else, it allowed 200 companies to take some time off from brutalizing each other in the normal course of business.

Given the importance of App Planet to this gathering, it surprised many when Steve Jobs was named recipient of the Congress’s Mobile Personality of the Year Award. Yes, the same Steve Jobs who will never in a million years support the global app standards being developed by this brotherly group. I guess they just like his personality.

It’s not like they didn’t have the chance to honor one of their own. The nominees beaten by Steve Jobs were the bigshots of the planetary app movement: Eric Schmidt (CEO, Google), Mike Lazaridis (co-CEO, Research In Motion) and Pete Chou (CEO, HTC). Apple sent no one to collect the award, indicating their respect for this particular honor.

I really don’t have anything against technology companies banding together to move things forward. I just think it’s safe to say that if any of the participating companies were in Apple’s position today, they’d be as far away from this Congress as possible — even if it meant not being on hand to pick up the Mobile Personality of the Year award.