{"id":989,"date":"2021-01-22T16:23:26","date_gmt":"2021-01-22T10:53:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/opiniown.com\/?p=989"},"modified":"2021-01-22T16:25:20","modified_gmt":"2021-01-22T10:55:20","slug":"apple-a-lifestyle-company","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/opiniown.com\/apple-a-lifestyle-company\/","title":{"rendered":"Apple, A Lifestyle Company? – That\u2019s Great! Isn\u2019t it?"},"content":{"rendered":"

It is widespread on news media that Intel\u2019s new CEO-to-be, Pat Gelsinger, has recently been viewed as taking a potshot at Apple by calling them a lifestyle company. As a Verge<\/a> recently reported, Gelsinger said, \u201cWe have to deliver better products to the PC ecosystem than any possible thing that a lifestyle company in Cupertino,\u201d in order to motivate his employees.<\/p>\n

\"<\/p>\n

If I would be running Apple, I would take this as a compliment. A great brand always aspires to be an influencer.<\/p>\n

Looking from outside perspective, Intel, which is a tier 1 supplier for Apple, wouldn\u2019t like to offend its existing and future customer. Intel is one consumer brand which customers don\u2019t buy directly. It was one of the few B2B brands that successfully branded itself along with computer OEMs like Dell, Compaq, and IBM in mid-1990s. Intel\u2019s dominance in the 1990s till the mid-2020s gradually led to complacency. Today AMD, ARM, Qualcomm are giving Intel a tough challenge in the gaming and graphics domains.<\/p>\n

Microprocessors are an integral component, Intel used to be a dominant supplier for PC OEM\u2019s but their over-dominance has led their customer to find alternatives. Microsoft is soon likely to move to their SQ1 branded processors<\/a> for their Surface computer product line. So the big question arises why did Intel received such a big snub from its top customer. This snub was long in the making, as microprocessors are not something that a computer manufacturer can develop overnight and ditch their supplier.<\/p>\n

The answer to that is simple, yet difficult to understand. When you are a consumer-facing brand like Apple, Google or Microsoft, egos run high. Undoubtedly, you are in the business of selling a lifestyle, if your product is in close proximity with your customer. For example, a mobile phone, or a laptop defines a person\u2019s lifestyle. Here, \u201cfunction follows form,\u201d and not the other way round. Human constantly need a way to express themselves, and that the reason we are willing to spend anything on cars or apparel.<\/p>\n

When Intel started positioning itself as geeky with advertisements starring Jim Parson<\/a> (Sheldon from \u2018Big Bang Theory\u2019 fame). AMD on the other hand positioned themselves as hard core and badass, which appealed to the gaming community, and when Intel saw itself loosing, it started advertising itself in gaming where it lost badly.<\/p>\n

\"intel<\/p>\n

Apple and Microsoft and brands with big egos, and Intel\u2019s brand images would always would have created some form of resentment, as their product lines were priced according to Intel\u2019s product line-up. This I believe has gradually led Apple and Microsoft to find an alternate to Intel, so as to remove dependence on Intel\u2019s brand rather than its microprocessors. I\u2019m sure that had Intel agreed to custom brand its processors of Apple and Microsoft, this situation wouldn\u2019t have occurred.<\/p>\n

So the final takeaway is if you want to be popular, you better be ready for backlash, as your peers will try to take you down, just for spite. And if you are willing to live in oblivion, you are likely to survive longer, and be a part of any ego wars.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It is widespread on news media that Intel\u2019s new CEO-to-be, Pat Gelsinger, has recently been viewed as taking a potshot at Apple by calling them a lifestyle company. As a Verge recently reported, … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":990,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[562],"tags":[721,722,725,726,724,723],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/opiniown.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/989"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/opiniown.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/opiniown.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/opiniown.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/opiniown.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=989"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/opiniown.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/989\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":992,"href":"https:\/\/opiniown.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/989\/revisions\/992"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/opiniown.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/990"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/opiniown.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=989"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/opiniown.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=989"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/opiniown.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=989"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}