Silicon Valley is Dead - Long Live Silicon Valley ...

Who am i?

I got to Silicon Valley (CD) at about the same time when we were first transferred to a “distant, distant galaxy”. He started with Byte, 48KB Apple II +, automatic dialers and 300 baud modems. He worked in the CD 25 years. And now there is more interesting than ever.

Silicon Valley, a product for consumers

Establish evolutionary cycles to better understand the unsurpassed creative self-destruction of the CD.


')
CD version 0.1 (alpha, 1956–1977, no consumers). Strictly speaking, the CD began with the founding of Shockley Semiconductor, of which a year later Fairchild came out, and in 1968 - Intel. But I regard this period as a 20-year alpha version, since then they did not have any consumers.

CD 1.0 (personal, 1977-1992, tens of millions of consumers). The appearance of the twins Apple II and Atari VCS / 2600 in 1977 (both Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs were at the source) brought CD into the minds of consumers as a supplier of useful and eye-catching machines.

CD 2.0 (in contact, 1992-2007, hundreds of millions of consumers). In 1992, America Online for Windows (and the next year, the Mosaic Internet browser) marked the beginning of this cycle. It includes the rise of user Internet, and with it the emergence of Amazon for shopping and Google for search.

CD 3.0 (mobile, 2007-2022, billions of consumers). The presentation of the iPhone as “this is an iPod, a phone and an Internet communicator” introduced us to the cycle in which we are now. And whatever fascinating it is ...

Mobile devices are not well advertised.

Smartphones (and in a sense, tablets) are not only the most valuable information devices for the current generation (and more personalized than the Internet on the desktop), or even several generations (they are more complex, global, accessible, and often used than a television).

Prediction : mobile devices will remain the most valuable information devices.

A powerful device with a screen that is in your pocket all day, and connected to everything and everything they need is indistinguishable from magic. It represents more than the sum of all the best parts of all previous info-devices. Depth of print, mobility of radio, emotions of television, dedication of digital technologies ...

They improve our social life, as well as the economic and political aspects of life. And the three most valuable services are Google (organizing billions of pieces of information), Facebook (billions of people) and Amazon (billions of things).

If the end of CD version 3.0 is similar to 1.0 and 2.0, we still have about 7 years left.

Prediction: From the communications that we have, we will move on to the communications that are present to us. The world will be not only in our pockets and palms, but also on our wrists and noses.

Accessories that help us to feel our connection with the world every second (wearable gadgets like Apple Watch) or more deeply (virtuality like Oculus Rift, Samsung Gear VR or Google Cardboard and augmented reality like Microsoft Hololens or Google Magic Leap). Like other technologies, these accessories will take big steps in their third generation, so be prepared to feel the increased connectivity starting from 2019. Yes, mobile devices, their services and accessories are what makes the third version of the CD most famous. But we will not finish this until it comes ...

True mobility

At the turn of CD 4.0 (approximately in 2022) people get the opportunity to be in touch anywhere. But the distances separating us have not been subjected to innovation for a hundred years. We will not be truly mobile (by definition, “able to move freely and easily”) until cars receive all the benefits of computing power and communication systems. This can begin, as well as two of the three previous CD cycles (Apple II and iPhone), with an excellent integrated system authored by Apple.

Prediction : Apple will introduce an unmanned vehicle.

Despite the struggle of “Apple against all the others supported by Google” on the field of smartphones, Apple will go against competitors using the ro-mobile platform developed by Google. And everyone else - Tesla, Mercedes, and others, will assume the role that Samsung plays for Google in the field of smartphones.

Movement in an unexpected direction

In connection with the forecasted predictions, three questions arise.

1. Why Apple (and not Google, Tesla, BMW, Mercedes, etc.)?

Although Apple will have to catch up, especially in the areas of manufacturing mechanisms and batteries, they have design, system integration, market coverage, a powerful supply chain, plenty of money, a brand, and market entry advantages. Although traditional car companies such as Mercedes, Volkswagen Group or BMW have dozens and hundreds of their own specialists working on robotic cars in CDs, these numbers are overshadowed by the capabilities of Apple (or Google), where, according to rumors, thousands of people are already working on it. At the same time, Apple / Google should not apply for permission and resources to the home office in Stuttgart, Wolfsburg, Munich, Detroit or Tokyo each time.

2. Why is the final product (like the iPhone), not the platform (like CarPlay)?

The terrible failures that followed when Apple allowed others to make products for end-users based on their technologies (recall the Mac and MOTO ROKR E1 clones) taught the Cupertino not to do more things like that - they haven't done it for ten years.

3. Why is 2022 if Google has robobom today?

The key moment in roboMobiles is that the door-to-door delivery of the user is 100% without his participation, including technically difficult trips along ordinary streets in residential areas. Even Google and Tesla do not promise us 100% unmanned vehicles before 2020. And knowing how such things are done in the CD, we can freely throw them a couple of years.

And even with all this reasoning, there are three good reasons for Apple not to get into the development of vehicles:

1) New type and new scale for production. Apple has been working on reducing gadgets over the past 20 years. Why would they suddenly want to stamp square meters of steel?

2) The margin percentage is less than usual. Even BMW has a corporate margin of 10%. For an office like Apple, accustomed to a margin of around 50%, this is cruel.

3) The need for new retail sites and infrastructure. Traditional car sales (even without the need to support the model range) will require serious investments in real estate. Although, you can imagine that they will show cars in existing stores, but for a test drive to bring them directly to the address.

But in the end, the benefits will outweigh:

• Improving the quality of life of people. Apple will not miss the opportunity to unite people, reducing the psychological and physical distraction to drive a car to zero.
• Saving the lives of people. 90% of accidents occur because of human errors (1.2 million people die in the world every year and 20 million are damaged. From 45% to 60% of deaths occur in accidents where only one car participated - just the right case for Replacing machines for RoboMobi). If Apple creates a product that is opposed to the most common cause of death among people aged 15 to 29, eliminating accidents caused by drunk drivers (30% of the total number of accidents) and accidents caused by driver distraction (18% of all accidents) , it will be the coolest thing we have seen before, and will only be surpassed when Apple invents teleportation in the year in 2122.
• This will lead to strong business growth - even such as the Apple business. Profit from a piece can be up to $ 2500 (this is like 10% of a car worth $ 30,000 from BMW), despite the fact that the market is estimated at 40 million units per year in the world. And they will do with the products of Lexus, BMW, Mercedes, Audi and Acura (each of which sells from 1.3 million to 1.8 million cars a year) the same things that their phones did with Blackberry, Nokia and Motorola. Selling 2 million units a year, they can receive an annual income of about $ 50 billion, of which $ 5 billion will be a margin.
• The company's chief designer, Johnny Ive, will be interested in going to work the next ten years (“irony” tag)

What can become an Apple Car

Prediction: Apple will start with a standalone electric two-door car for traveling up to 150 miles. You will need to build a breakthrough platform and make it available to premium users who buy their first car. It can be followed by a sedan capable of covering long distances, or even a crossover.


Imagine adding a windshield windshield to the right.

If Apple uses in its auto windshield transparency technology, combines it with integrated LCD displays or projectors, then the mobile will simply become the largest screen in the family of their devices. The distances will be measured not in kilometers, but in the number of watched films from Pixar or episodes of the 9th season of the series “Silicon Valley” from HBO.

CD 4.0 - winners and losers

Apple (product), Google (platform), Facebook (time and location of people) and Uber (control over car traffic and “transportation as a service”, when rototaxi starts to join the company) can seriously win.

Lexus, BMW, Mercedes, Audi and Acura (and maybe even Honda, Toyota and Ford) can lose at least a third of their total market, for it can happen that only one company will be able to produce cars for the Google platform.

Right on time

A sense of true mobility will hit us just at the moment when Silicon Valley turns 20 years old in 2027. But do not worry. You do not have to take your children to this party - Apple Car will do it for you.