Apparently Apple’s not recession proof. I am surprised that the cuts involved the FCP groups rather than management types. I’m not sure what’s going on at Apple but it does seem there’s been more of an emphisis on gadgets and appliances than software in the last few years. My friend bought Shake right after Apple purchased it and offered it at a lower cost. He was very upset when they announced they would no longer be developing the software and pretty much dropped any support for it. My theory was that they bought it to cannabalize it’s features for Motion, a common Apple tactic. There’s no question that the iPhone and other appliances and their dependebt apps are where Apple is making it’s real money. They’ve never been able to break the 10 to 15 percent market share in computers. They should take the Adobe approach with their software and make it as OS neutural as possible. Although I prefer Premeir Pro over FCP, it might increase their software sales. But I guess I’m speaking heresy (ha).
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 02/18 at 09:25 PM
This is of course my opinion but I think a lot of people forget that first and foremost apple is a hardware manufacturer and that is their primary business. iPods, iPhones and iPads are all hardware in addition to being cool and useful gadgets.
Apple makes software and the OS to help make their hardware sellable and give them a competitive advantage. It is just a bonus that people pay them for it. iTunes is free because it sells iPods and they get a small cut for the distribution. While it may make them a few hundred million dollars a year it means very little to their bottom line. A few hundred million dollars seems like a lot of money to me and you but to a multibillion dollar company that perspective wouldn’t be the same.
The same goes for ProApps, there is no other software in their line or any other software manufacturer’s that drives high end, high margin sales of Mac Pro’s. With over a million registered FCP users and likely a couple million unregistered users thats a lot of influence. Everyone wants a fancy new computer especially the ‘cool’ and ‘sexy’ macs but if you edit High Definition video, want becomes actual need.
A couple of years ago I was bouncing around a couple of companies as they were upgrading and giving in to the FCP trend as well as consulting other editors on personal systems to buy. In less than a year I spent (other peoples money of course) around $200K on edit systems with the average price being between $35K - $50K. Today I could build better more capable systems for about $25 - $35K but this is because fast Raids have come down in price. The actual price of the Apple hardware has gone up.
It would be easy for Apple to make FCP work on a PC but that would take away a huge competitive advantage and Apple as a company thinks of Apple first, never forget that. There have been rumors of Apple selling the ProApps division pretty much since their inception. In regards to Shake, Apple bought it for its technology and marketing purposes, not the product. Shake had a small install base with thousands of users, not 10’s of thousands and certainly not 100’s of thousands. It gave them credibility in the professional market when Avid was still king of the NLE’s. WETA used Apple software on LOTR’s so Apple must make professional products right? Good enough for ‘Pete’, good enough for me.
With the internet anyone can say something and then it becomes a huge rumor and suddenly idiots on the news are quoting it as truth because they saw it on the internet but that is a whole other rant. While I do not and cannot deny that Apple has laid people off from the ProApps division, I believe that is the end of the story. No doom an gloom about Apple selling ProApps or getting out of the NLE business.
There are so many reasons why Apple would get rid of staff, the simple question everyone should ask themselves is if FCP was available on PC would you still edit on a Mac.
It is a very simple question of economics. I am a pretty die hard Mac guy, but if I could get an FCP system up on a PC with the computer costing $2500 instead of $5500, guess what, I’m running FCP on a PC.
Apple knows this. While never is a very long time, I find it highly unlikely that Apple would sell or spinoff the ProApps into a cross platform application. It doesn’t make financial sense, the switch to PC would cost them more money in the longer run than whatever they could sell them for.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 02/20 at 01:45 PM
