Poll: What Is Apple's Achilles Heel?

By BNET Staff | August 7, 2009

34 Comments

More from Leadership

Even seemingly untouchable companies stumble, and that can lead to a downward spiral. Apple already knows this — all too well. For the moment though, Apple is getting lots of things right, which you can read about in BNET’s latest feature package, The Science Behind Apple’s Magic. But just because the company has it together now, doesn’t mean something (or some competitor) can’t knock Apple down.

Poll

So BNET readers, what do you think could end Apple's winning streak?

A micromanaging CEO with health issues.

Google.

The Federal Trade Commission.

The Federal Communications Commission.

Its followers -- the intense cult of Apple (or Steve Jobs) can't last forever.

Apple has no Achilles heel.

None of the above. I'll leave a better answer in the comments.

Related Tags Apple Inc., Achilles Heel, Lindsay Blakely

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RE: Poll: What Is Apple's Achilles Heel?

I think Apple will do very well even if Steve Jobs were to die tomorrow. Google is eating Apple's dust in the cell phone arena and serves as little or no threat. I think Apple is going to be very strong for the forseable future.

ArticlesFind

08/08/2009 08:46 AM

BNET Moderator

Cable TV

Apple made music better with the iPod and iTunes Music Store, but they have failed to duplicate that success with movies. The content is there, but the Apple TV box is a joke, normal people will not connect a computer to a TV, and the folks who like most to watch movies on a laptop screen are not going to pay for the content. Apple's famous success in creating an integrated, easy-to-use system for music just didn't happen for movies.

But other companies are doing better. Netflix most notably with a subscription service and now fully digital access. The cable companies VOD systems are bad only in their lack of content (which Apple also suffers from), and now the cable channels are starting to align around "TV Everywhere" so that a Showtime, Starz or HBO subscriber will be able to watch their shows and movies on th living-room TV (they can today) and their laptops. There's no special place for Apple in any of these setups.

And Apple doesn't succeed unless it has created a special place where it's product integration is safe from interference.

(Full disclosure: I work for BNET, which is part of CBS Corp., which recently signed on to participate in the TV Everywhere trials. I know only what I read in the papers about this effort.)

Stephen Howard-Sarin

08/08/2009 01:02 PM

RE: Poll: What Is Apple's Achilles Heel?

its cult of secrecy and paranoia - the scientology of
companies. I LOVE their products but would hate to work for
them. Sometimes the 'create a buzz' is just irritating, eg, I'm
waiting for a batch of new iphones reaching the shops in
Australia. The stores are forbidden by Apple from putting my
name on a waiting list or even from calling me to let me know
when stock arrives.....

Pprofpopp

08/08/2009 08:13 PM

RE: Poll: What Is Apple's Achilles Heel?

With Apple, it is about the software. Much like the Coke vs. Pepsi battle when Coke put all it's eggs in the "New Coke" basket and Pepsi took advantage to gain market share, Apple is taking advantage of Microsoft's mishandling of the whole Vista mess.
However, Apple is expanding far to fast (more and more Apple Stores) and much like another Giant in another industry (Starbucks) it will soon find that it has overplayed its hand. Because eventually, Microsoft is going to swerve into producing a good OS that will somewhat steam the flow of Apple converts.

ric822

08/11/2009 11:19 AM

RE: Poll: What Is Apple's Achilles Heel?

When Steve Jobs leaves Apple (however that happens), the next CEO will be tempted to allow other computer manufacturers to sell OEM machines running Mac OS. While I think that this could be made to work, I think that more than likely it will get bungled. That could ruin Apple.

RationalGuy

08/11/2009 01:05 PM

RE: Poll: What Is Apple's Achilles Heel?

@ArticlesFind: I'm glad you feel such confidence in Apple, but
take a moment to consider the succession. When Jack Welch
left GE, he had not one but three top-notch candidates
for his successor (although Bob Nardelli's reputation has faded a
bit since then). Steve Jobs's footprint on Apple is at least as
big, but can you name even one other executive from the
company?

arkanaut

08/11/2009 07:20 PM

igerard

When Steve Jobs will be left, the risk is what I name in French : "le
syndrome des ap?tres"

I would translate this in english simply : the apostle syndrome

I mean, the thing that follower do traditionally when the leader is out, is
to follow the old rules, without the capability to reinvent themselves...

You know, when SJ left Apple in 85, the guy was not able to reinvent the
OS...

Sometimes leaders are able to invent new rules, because they don"t
follow any rules by themselves, they invent them...

I hope that my english is well enough to be understandable...

Anyway, this series of articles are very very interesting, thanx you a lot
wink

igerard

08/12/2009 03:40 AM

RE: Poll: What Is Apple's Achilles Heel?

I agree with ric822. He hit the nail on the head. Apple is tryng to expand faster than they should and this will lead to poor business decisions. If they do not pull back soon, Apple will crash much like Starbucks and end up closing stores and cutting back.

Lea44

08/12/2009 07:05 AM

RE: Poll: What Is Apple's Achilles Heel?

Apple's sole partnership with AT&T for iPhone!

arozwilliams

08/12/2009 08:37 AM

RobFinlay

Apple will loose their premium position in consumer's minds if
they continue to lock customers into their products and
services without offering standard based capabilities. For
instance, their DRM music is far inferior to Amazon's open
format. The fact that you have to ditch your whole product
(ipods and iphones) when the rechargeable battery dies
(because Apple doesn't allow you to replace batteries) is
preposterous. Consumers might not be that savvy now, but
as they learn that these "locks" are not in their favor, they
will increasingly ditch Apple in lie of more open services and
products.

RobFinlay

08/12/2009 10:28 AM

@RobFinlay

Rob Finlay,

Your entire post is completely unfounded.

First of all, Apple ditched DRM last year in favor of
non-DRM .aac format. It's much more efficient and better
than Amazon's outdated .mp3 format.

Next, you don't have to ditch your product. There are
hundreds of places to buy replacement batteries online, and
ipods are very easy to open up. Sure, the average user
can't do it, but they most certainly DO offer to
replace your battery for you, for a reasonable price.

Never has anyone been "locked" in to an Apple product.

Burlyman

08/12/2009 05:10 PM

RE: Poll: What Is Apple's Achilles Heel?

They don't offer any actual value/feature for dollar over any competitive options on the market - ever. Marketing and "draw you in" industrial design have done more than might have been imagined for Apple - good for them! But, this will all be the reason for their demise. After all, there is no substantive reason for their success. There is now "use", no "value" in their products (they work but so do their competitors' - sometimes better, always less costly), for a thoughtful consumer. But, of course, thoughtful consumers are rare. So, I guess Apple is smarter than I and smarter than the people they extract dollars from. Seems, most everyone's happy with that so I guess we're all good then. Seriously... "they got nothing!!?!"

dboymorris@...

08/13/2009 09:13 AM

RE: Poll: What Is Apple's Achilles Heel?

@ dboymorris

Wow, what a post, are you kidding ?

I am impressed by this one : After all, there is no substantive reason
for their success

Look at the industrial design of the last unibody macbookpro, look at the
last dev tools and toolkit they made... and go back to the discussion wink

Maybe it is just troll and it does work....

igerard

08/13/2009 02:35 PM

SCopty

Please dont make this about whether Apple is awesome or not really I think we are all sick of those arguments.

I dont think they neccessarily have an achilles heel in the terms that neither of those things will actually substantially hurt the company. Apple will be aroudn for a while and they will strong leader for at least a couple of years.

I am not a big apple fan but no one can deny that they have been very smart about marketing their technology specially in the field of revolutionizing(simplifying, at that) the technological Interface and how people interact with their everyday technology.

salemcopty

08/14/2009 06:24 AM

RE: Poll: What Is Apple's Achilles Heel?

I agree with arozwilliams. The iPhone/AT&T deal was the worst
they could make. So much for being that independent computer
company that produced for everyone and gave us the freedom
to use the software that WE wanted to use.