Apple Q2: iPads up, iPhones down

Today’s big story for Apple revenue was once again focused on services. That’s likely to be the tale for the foreseeable future, as the company continues to pump billions into products offerings like Apple TV+.

As predicted, hardware was more of a mixed bag for the company. The iPad, a bright spot in an otherwise stagnant tablet market also marked a key highlight the quarter, as revenue jumped 22 percent year over year. Notably, the company now offers its largest range of slates, with recent quiet refreshes to the Air and Mini following last year’s big Pro update.

Revenue for Mac dipped slightly, in spite of a recent refreshes to the MacBook Pro and iMac and last year’s milestone of 100 million Macs in use. Late last month, the company apologized for on-going woes involving its MacBook keyboards.

iPhones, meanwhile, missed expectations slightly, maintaining the recent downturn in handset sales.

Last quarter was a rough one for Apple devices, as iPhone revenue dropped 15 year over year. Tim Cook attempted to soften that blow with lowered guidance, pointing specifically to a less than spectacular showing in China. That, in turn, was the result of several factors, including a slowing Chinese economy and plateauing global smartphone numbers. This quarter notably saw an iPhone price drop in China.

Yesterday’s Alphabet earnings took a similar line, as CEO Sundar Pichai noted “headwinds” in year on year sales of its Pixel device. Google is expected to follow in Apple’s footsteps with its own budget smartphone, the Pixel 3a next week at I/O.

Many analysts have pointed to 5G as the next major factor in kickstarting phone sales for both Apple and the rest of the industry. However, all signs currently point to a 2020 arrival for a 5G iPhone — putting the device more than a year out, and well behind releases from chief competition like Samsung and Huawei.

That said, a recent deal with Qualcomm that finally ended the long time feud between the two hardware powerhouses could hasten the arrival of the technology on the iPhone. Though it seems equally likely the company will focus on other features and simply wait until next year, when 5G has had an opportunity for a much wider roll out.

In a statement, Cook lauded iPads sales, while attempting to set the stage for future announcements. “Our March quarter results show the continued strength of our installed base of over 1.4 billion active devices, as we set an all-time record for Services, and the strong momentum of our Wearables, Home and Accessories category, which set a new March quarter record,” Cook said. “We delivered our strongest iPad growth in six years, and we are as excited as ever about our pipeline of innovative hardware, software and services. We’re looking forward to sharing more with developers and customers at Apple’s 30th annual Worldwide Developers Conference in June.”

Last year’s WWDC was notably devoid of any sort of hardware announcements, with most coming toward the end of the year. This year’s could be different, as the company looks to shake loose some of the hardware cobwebs. Apple TV, HomePod and other home devices seem prime for an upgrade as it continues to pump money into the services that fuel those products, along with increased competition to HomeKit from the likes of Amazon and Google.

The exact breakdown of device sales is difficult to parse, given how the company currently reports earnings. Late last year, the company announced that it would no longer be reporting iPhone sales figures. Revenue for the home and accessories categories, meanwhile, are mixed in with wearables — namely the best-selling Apple Watch.

from iPhone – TechCrunch https://tcrn.ch/2WeKbax

Developers can now verify mobile app users over WhatsApp instead of SMS

Facebook today released a new SDK that allows mobile app developers to integrate WhatsApp verification into Account Kit for iOS and Android. This will allow developers to build apps where users can opt to receive their verification codes through the WhatsApp app installed on their phone instead of through SMS.

Today, many apps give users the ability to sign up using only a phone number — a now popular alternative to Facebook Login, thanks to the social network’s numerous privacy scandals that led to fewer people choosing to use Facebook with third-party apps.

Plus, using phone numbers to sign up is common with a younger generation of users who don’t have Facebook accounts — and sometimes barely use email, except for joining apps and services.

When using a phone number to sign in, it’s common for the app to confirm the user by sending a verification code over SMS to the number provided. The user then enters that code to create their account. This process can also be used when logging in, as part of a multi-factor verification system where a user’s account information is combined with this extra step for added security.

While this process is straightforward and easy enough to follow, SMS is not everyone’s preferred messaging platform. That’s particularly true in emerging markets like India, where 200 million people are on WhatsApp, for example. In addition, those without an unlimited messaging plan are careful not to overuse texting when it can be avoided.

That’s where the WhatsApp SDK comes in. Once integrated into an iOS or Android app, developers can offer to send users their verification code over WhatsApp instead of text messaging. They can even choose to disable SMS verification, notes Facebook.

This is all a part of WhatsApp’s Account Kit, which is a larger set of developer tools designed to allow people to quickly register and log in to apps or websites using only a phone number and email, no password required.

This WhatsApp verification codes option has been available on WhatsApp’s web SDK since late 2018, but hadn’t been available with mobile apps until today.

from Android – TechCrunch https://tcrn.ch/2ITg8m2
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Aperture dies the true death in Apple’s next macOS update

Aperture was a great application for editing photos back in the day, but it hasn’t been supported by Apple for years. You can, however, still run it on the latest Macs, should you need to. But that won’t be the case for long, the company has announced.

In a support page pointed out by MacRumors, Apple explains that “for technical reasons, Aperture will not run in future versions of macOS after macOS Mojave.”

What exactly those technical reasons are only Apple knows, but it isn’t hard to imagine the various file structures, architectures, libraries and so on that Aperture relied on are simply no longer compatible with the changes the company has made to the OS. macOS has come quite a distance since Aperture was abandoned in 2014, and it’s actually kind of impressive that the app still runs.

Apple To Cease Development Of Aperture And Transition Users To Photos For OS X

You can of course keep a machine running Mojave around if you really need to use Aperture for some reason or another, but honestly, there’s not much reason any more. The photo editor has long been outpaced by its competition, the likes of Lightroom, Capture One, and of course mobile photography software. Apple’s own Photos app is nothing like Aperture but fills some of the same roles.

To that end Apple suggests you migrate your Aperture photo library into either Lightroom Classic, which has an import tool specifically for this, or Photos, which should automatically import your old library when you launch it for the first time. If it hasn’t already, you can hold option while opening it and it will let you manually add a library to it.

Be aware however that adjustments and other settings you’ve made in Aperture may not carry over or might be set in stone once they arrive in their new home. So if you’ve been putting off editing that one shoot from all those years ago… better do that first.

It’s sad to see a good product finally fade away completely, but I’ve already shed those tears, moved on to Lightroom, and never looked back. I wish Apple prioritized its pro and pro-ish users more too, but what can I say? They don’t.

from Apple – TechCrunch https://tcrn.ch/2PD23te

Apple defends its takedown of some apps monitoring screen-time

Apple is defending its removal of certain parental control apps from the app store in a new statement.

The company has come under fire for its removal of certain apps that were pitched as tools giving parents more control over their children’s screen-time, but that Apple said relied on technology that was too invasive for private use.

“We recently removed several parental control apps from the App Store, and we did it for a simple reason: they put users’ privacy and security at risk. It’s important to understand why and how this happened,” the company said in a statement

The heart of the issue is the use of mobile device management technologies in the parental control apps that Apple has removed from the app store, the company said.

These device management tools give  control and access over a device’s user location, app use, email accounts, camera permissions and browsing history to a third party.

“We started exploring this use of MDM by non-enterprise developers back in early 2017 and updated our guidelines based on that work in mid-2017,” the company said.

Apple acknowledged that the technology has legitimate uses in the context of businesses looking to monitor and manage corporate devices to control proprietary data and hardware, but, the company said, it is “a clear violation of App Store policies — for a private, consumer-focused app business to install MDM control over a customer’s device.”

The company said it communicated to app developers that they were in violation of App Store guidelines and gave the company 30 days to submit updates to avoid being booted from the App Store.

Indeed, we first reported that Apple was warning developers about screen-time apps in December.

Apple puts third-party screen time apps on notice

“Several developers released updates to bring their apps in line with these policies,” Apple said in a statement. “Those that didn’t were removed from the App Store.”

from Apple – TechCrunch https://tcrn.ch/2vt86au

Some reassuring data for those worried unicorns are wrecking the Bay Area

Joanna Glasner Contributor

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The San Francisco Bay Area is a global powerhouse at launching startups that go on to dominate their industries. For locals, this has long been a blessing and a curse.

On the bright side, the tech startup machine produces well-paid tech jobs and dollars flowing into local economies. On the flip side, it also exacerbates housing scarcity and sky-high living costs.

These issues were top-of-mind long before the unicorn boom: After all, tech giants from Intel to Google to Facebook have been scaling up in Northern California for over four decades. Lately however, the question of how many tech giants the region can sustainably support is getting fresh attention, as Pinterest, Uber and other super-valuable local companies embark on the IPO path.

The worries of techie oversaturation led us at Crunchbase News to take a look at the question: To what extent do tech companies launched and based in the Bay Area continue to grow here? And what portion of employees work elsewhere?

For those agonizing about the inflationary impact of the local unicorn boom, the data offers a bit of reassurance. While companies founded in the Bay Area rarely move their headquarters, their workforces tend to become much more geographically dispersed as they grow.

Headquarters ≠ headcount

Just because a company is based in Northern California doesn’t mean most workers are there also. Headquarters, our survey shows, does not always translate into headcount.

“Headquarters location can often be the wrong benchmark to use to identify where employees are located,” said Steve Cadigan, founder of Cadigan Talent Ventures, a Silicon Valley-based talent consultancy. That’s particularly the case for large tech companies.

Among the largest technology employers in Northern California, Crunchbase News found most have fewer than 25 percent of their full-time employees working in the city where they’re headquartered. We lay out the details for 10 of the most valuable regional tech companies in the chart below.

With the exception of Intel, all of these companies have a double-digit percentage of employees at headquarters, so it’s not as if they’re leaving town. However, if you’re a new hire at Silicon Valley’s most valuable companies, it appears chances are greater that you’ll be based outside of headquarters.

Tesla, meanwhile, is somewhat of a unique case. The company is based in Palo Alto, but doesn’t crack the city’s list of top 10 employers. In nearby Fremont, Calif., however, Tesla is the largest city employer, with roughly 10,000 reportedly working at its auto plant there.(Tesla has about 49,000 employees globally.)

Unicorns flock to San Fran, workers less so

High-valuation private and recently public tech companies can also be pretty dispersed.

Although they tend to have a larger percentage of employees at headquarters than more-established technology giants, the unicorn crowd does like to spread its wings.

Take Uber, the poster child for this trend. Although based in San Francisco, the ride-hailing giant has fewer than one-fourth of its employees there. Out of a global workforce of around 22,300, only about 5,000 are SF-based.

It’s unclear if that kind of breakdown is typical. We had trouble assembling similar geographic employee counts at other Bay Area unicorns, mainly because cities break out numbers only for their 10 largest employers. The lion’s share of regional unicorns are San Francisco-based, and of them only Uber made the Top 10.

That said, there is another, rougher methodology for assessing who works at headquarters: job postings. At a number of the most valuable Bay Area-based unicorns — including Airbnb, Juul, Lime, Instacart, Stripe and the now-public Lyft —  a high number of open positions are far from the home office. And as we wrote last year, private companies have been actively seeking out cities to set up secondary hubs.

Even for earlier-stage startups, it’s not uncommon to set up headquarters in the San Francisco area for access to financing and networking, while doing the bulk of hiring in another location, Cadigan said. The evolution of collaborative work tools has also enabled more companies to add staff working remotely or in secondary offices.

Plus, of course, unicorn startups tend to be national or global in focus, and that necessitates hiring where their customers are located.

Take our jobs, please

As we wrap up, it’s worth bringing up how unusual it once was for denizens of a metro area to oppose a big influx of high-skill jobs. In the past couple of years, however, these attitudes have become more common. Witness Queens residents’ mixed reactions to Amazon’s HQ2 plans. And in San Francisco, a potential surge of newly minted IPO millionaires is causing some consternation among locals, along with jubilation among the realtor crowd.

Just as college towns retain room for new students by graduating older ones, however, it seems reasonable that sustaining Northern California’s strength as a startup hub requires locating jobs out-of-area as companies scale. That could be good news for other cities, including Austin, Phoenix, Nashville, Portland and others, which have emerged as popular secondary locations for fast-growing unicorns.

That said, we’re not predicting near-term contraction in Bay Area tech employment, particularly of the startup variety. The region’s massive entrepreneurial and venture ecosystem keeps on producing valuable newcomers well-capitalized to keep hiring.

Methodology

We looked only at employment at company headquarters (except for Apple). Companies on the list may have additional employees based in other Northern California cities. For Apple, we included all Silicon Valley employees, per estimates by the Silicon Valley Business Journal.

Numbers are rounded to the nearest hundred for the largest employers. Most of the data is for full-time employees only. Large tech employers hire predominantly full-time for staff positions, so part-time, whether included or not, is expected to reflect only a very small percentage of employment.

Cities list their 10 largest employers in annual reports. We used either the annual reports themselves or data excerpted in Wikipedia, using calendar year 2017 or 2018.

from Apple – TechCrunch https://tcrn.ch/2DDiMb0

Apple patches iOS App Store bug that was preventing app downloads

Apple is rolling out a fix for an App Store bug that was preventing users from downloading new iOS apps or app updates. The issue, which impacted an unknown number of users, involved a Terms & Conditions dialog box that would continue to pop up even when users tapped the “Agree” button.

The issue had frustrated users who took to Twitter in an attempt to get help from Apple Support.

9to5Mac and AppleInsider previously reported on the problem, citing the social media complaints. The Apple Support account had not responded publicly to those who reached out, beyond asking customers to get in touch on DM with more details or pointing those with more vague complaints to a support doc about connection issues.

The bug was affecting a small percentage of Apple’s iOS user base worldwide, we understand from people familiar with the problem at Apple. However, even a “small number” can be large, when you’re dealing with something like the iPhone install base.

In addition, the bug wasn’t limited to an unreleased developer or beta build of iOS, 9to5Mac had noted — but was also showing up on the public release (iOS 12.2).

There was no workaround that would allow users to skip the Terms & Condition pop-up in order to download apps and updates. All users could do was to tap “Cancel” to get out of the loop, so they could continue to use their phone.

@AppleSupport what is going on with App Store? T&C’s are on an endless loop when I “agree”! Please help fix this bug! #AppleSupport #PleaseHelp #TermsAndConditions #NewUpdateNeeded #ASAP pic.twitter.com/gf0QtjtCfo

— 3mcmxcii3 (@3mcmxcii31) April 25, 2019

Encountering a bug right now. Reporting so they could take action. @Apple @AppStore @AppleSupport #Apple #IPhone #AppStore #AppleSupport #IOS12 pic.twitter.com/Qb7dkvRsXm

— Sheena (@shnsbg_) April 25, 2019

We understand that Apple has now deployed a fix for the bug that should finish rolling out in a matter of hours.

The bug fix won’t require impacted users to take any steps on their own — like downloading an update or patch, for example. It will instead be resolved on the App Store’s backend.

from Apple – TechCrunch https://tcrn.ch/2PtyJ8s

The Google Assistant can now tell you a story on your phone

For the last year or so, you could ask the Google Assistant on your Google Home device to read your kids a story. Today, just in time for National Tell a Story Day, Google is bringing this feature to Android and iOS phones, too. It’ll be available in English in the U.S., U.K., Canada, Australia and India.

When you asked the Assistant on your phone to tell you a story before, you’d get a short inspirational quote or maybe a bad joke. Having two different experiences for the same command never really made much sense, so it’s good to see Google consolidate this.

The available stories range from tales about Blaze and the Monster Machines to more classic bedtime stories like ‘Sleeping Beauty’ and ‘Little Red Riding Hood.’

That’s in addition to other story features like ‘read along,’ which automatically plays sound effects as you read from a number of Disney Little Golden Books. That’s obviously the cooler feature overall, but the selection of supported books remains limited. For longer stories, there’s obviously audiobook support.

Or you could just sit down with your kids and read them a book. That’s also an option.

from Android – TechCrunch https://tcrn.ch/2GFkwme
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