Eddy Cue, Apple’s senior vice president of services, issued a dire warning today, suggesting that the iPhone might follow the same path as the iPod in a decade. The driving factor behind this, as one might expect, is artificial intelligence.
Established companies often struggle … we’re not in the oil or toothpaste business—these are products designed to endure … you may find that you don’t need an iPhone in ten years.
Cue further noted that Apple’s most significant decision was to discontinue the iPod, describing it as a daring choice. “Why would you eliminate the golden goose?” he remarked.
While this may seem counterintuitive for a company that relies on iPhone sales for over half of its revenue, Cue sees AI as a “massive technological evolution” that can challenge companies once considered invincible. “When I arrived in Silicon Valley,” he recalled, “the most prominent companies—like HP, Sun Microsystems, and Intel—either no longer exist or have become significantly smaller and less influential.”
