There was once a time when Apple was
an underdog and it had an easier time shrouding its product
announcements in mystery and perhaps catching its competitors off
guard. But now tech companies are watching every one of Apple’s moves
- and scrambling to get out in front of them.
Several major tech companies are
cramming product announcements into this holiday-shortened workweek.
Nokia and Motorola Mobility, former leaders in the mobile race who are
now also-rans, have scheduled events for Wednesday at which they are
likely to unveil new smartphones. And the next day, Amazon is
expected to introduce new Kindle devices.
Sony and Samsung, among others, got a
jump on things last week with announcements of new tablets and phones
at a consumer electronics conference in Berlin.
But next week, the tech event calendar
is largely blank - with the exception of an Apple news conference
that is said to be scheduled for September 12, where the company will
reveal its latest iPhone, according to a person briefed on the
company’s plans, who declined to be named because those plans had not
yet been made public.
“It seems that the rumour of an Apple
announcement is having an effect on competitors’ announcements,
unless it’s an amazing coincidence” that several events are scheduled
this week and none the next, said Michael Gartenberg, a technology
analyst at Gartner.
“It does make you wonder if Apple has
thrown the industry a little bit off balance and taken away a little
bit of their confidence,” he said.
In past years it was common for
technology companies to deliver product news at trade shows like the
Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Now some major companies have
scaled back their presence at those conventions and followed Apple’s
lead in running their own elaborate news conferences, hoping to grab
the news media’s undivided attention.
Fall product introductions are
important to companies seeking to generate excitement ahead of the
holiday shopping season. The fall has become especially jam-packed
with news in recent years as both the number of companies involved
and their product lines have grown, with the addition of players like
Amazon and its Kindle products as well as all the companies building
mobile devices based on Google’s Android operating system.
This year is particularly intense
because, in addition to Apple’s anticipated news, Microsoft is
releasing a new version of its flagship Windows operating system, as
it does roughly every three years. Along with a wave of new
traditional-looking personal computers, the introduction of Windows 8
will bring with it an array of tablet computers powered by the
software, including Microsoft’s own Surface tablet, due for release
October 26.
And later this fall, Apple is expected to unveil a smaller version of its iPad with a 7.85-inch screen.
“You’re getting all sorts of
maneuvering by companies around the time they have to have Christmas
products out there,” said Michael Mace, a former marketing executive
at Apple and Palm who has a new startup called Zekira. “I’ve got to
have everything in shops in mid-November. Do I get more attention if I
announce before other guys or after? How long before? If I do it in
September, does stuff look like it’s gotten old?”
With Apple’s record of success now, the
dates of its announcements are to be avoided - much as it is best to
schedule around the debut of a surefire blockbuster from a competing
Hollywood studio. Products announced after Apple’s could be subject
to uncomfortable comparisons or accusations of copying, if they are
noticed at all.
“I would personally want to stay away
from it unless I thought I had some killer product that I thought was
going to be a devastating winner,” Mace said.
Google, which owns Motorola Mobility,
has already tried to upstage Apple. In June it scheduled an event
about its mapping services just five days before Apple presented
mapping software for the iPhone that will replace Google’s technology.
But Google drew some criticism for not actually having much new to
say.
This week is especially important for
Nokia, whose newer Lumia mobile devices have had tepid sales despite
an aggressive marketing campaign. Accompanied by its partner
Microsoft, Nokia will be showing smartphones with software that will
let users swap files among phones, according to a person briefed on
the company’s plans, who declined to be named because the plans were
not yet public.
Tero Kuittinen, an independent mobile
analyst and vice president of Alekstra, a company that helps consumers
reduce their phone bills, said it was crucial for Nokia to get ahead
of Apple in order to send the message that its smartphones look and
behave very differently from the iPhone.
“The only possible vulnerability that
Apple has is that the look and feel of its phones is starting to
stagnate,” Kuittinen said. “What Nokia’s hoping to do is shape the
discussion and have consumers ask, ‘Do I really want to have yet
another look-alike device?”’
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