Apple Still Innovative

Clear they still have a lot behind the scenes.    Need to work on some new things outside what they are known for delivery in now.

Is Apple Losing Its Innovation Edge?
Consumers have greeted Apple’s latest slate of iPhones, computers and the newest connected Watch with solid interest, but not the high enthusiasm from years past. Since the iPhone’s debut in 2007, public excitement soared in the early years but then has steadily dipped as the novelty wore off. According to Statista, global search interest for iPhones has been falling since 2012, after peaking with the iPhone 5. Citi analysts also noticed the same shift over time: “We suspect this is because of a slowdown in innovation and the saturation of iPhone in the addressable market.”

Is Apple falling behind on innovation compared to other tech giants such as Amazon, Google, Tesla and a revived Microsoft? At an event in Brooklyn this week, the company unveiled revamped versions of the iPad Pro, Mac Mini and MacBook Air, including what it’s calling the biggest refresh of its signature tablet since it was introduced eight years ago. But people point to the merely incremental changes made on iPhones and the late introduction of a connected watch — after Google and Samsung already launched theirs — as signs that Apple is no longer the innovation leader. And yet as skepticism lingered, Wall Street went the opposite direction by making Apple the first company in the world to be worth $1 trillion. How can a company supposedly losing its innovation edge get such a high valuation?

The answer is that Apple remains innovative today, according to Wharton experts, and any doubts about it stem from a limited understanding of what innovation entails. Wharton management professor Paul Nary said it is important to distinguish between invention and innovation. Invention is the creation of a new idea or opportunity while innovation “generally means a successful commercialization of a new technology or a new business model, usually by recombining it with other pre-existing elements, and making the possibility, stemming from the invention, into a market reality.” From this viewpoint, he said, Apple is innovative. .... "