Apple about to licence OS X?

Apple is about to drop the Xserve platform and the people who started this company are ex Apple employes. The rumour is that the 'solution' is a third party replacement for the xserve. One imagines it might run a OS X server under licence on third party Apple approved hardware. Moreover, the rumour is that Apple are about to redirect potential Xserve customers to them.

To me it makes sense. For Apple the Xserve is and always has been a niche product. It's one that doesn't fit well with their increasing focus on consumer level hardware and software. However there are many devotees of the platform and presumably, even if Apple can't make money out of it, a third party niche manufacturer could so long as Apple continue developing the server variant of OS X.

Given the manner in which Apple have now taken to developing an entire ecosystem around iOS, and are attempting to do the same with OS X's App Store could this be Apple dipping its toe into the water when it comes to licensing the OS again? Could we expect to see them extending this eventually? Xserve this year, high end workstations in 2012, consumer level products in 2013, maybe HTC phones or Sony TVs running iOS in 2014? Again, this might make sense. The benchmark products might remain uber cool and Apple branded, but the market might be full of Apple approved alternatives and all of them dependent on Apple's App Store.

We might be living in interesting times.

Edited by Desmond (Fri 28-Jan-11 19:40:12)

It's possible, but then it's only likely to happen as Apple seems to be less and less about computers. They're a consumer electronics company more than a computer company now.

I can see the first, but not the later stages.

Xserve = enterprise, essentially, so by all means license it to a company that is, in effect, not in a competing space - and indeed, urge/ cajole/ bribe them to complement IOS by making OSX Server and kit VERY iPhone/ iPad etc friendly. It would plug in very nicely, without any cannibalism and negligible impact on Apple's bottom line.

But cut its throat in the consumer space? I believe it when I see it.

I can agree to a point. However, if Apple really is out to aggressively expand its market and doesn't license its OSs then there will come the point that it hits a glass ceiling of its own making. There will be few left who are willing to pay 'Apple tax'. There will be many, who want the features, but are untrustworthy or just don't like the look of Apple's products. Moreover, as the likes of iOS expand in terms of what they can potentially do there will be a limit to what sorts of product Apple is willing to manufacture to expand their own market.

Let's take an example; the TV/home entertainment market. Unseen by most consumers the OS element here is about to explode. Google are out there with their TV box, Apple have their 'hobby' Apple TV and there are no end of boxes of all descriptions running Linux and its variants. There are no end of 'connected' TVs running no end of nasty proprietary OSs. WIll Apple be prepared to manufacture all the kit needed to exploit the strength of its media ecosystem in this market? I doubt it. There are just too many variants to support in terms of standards, but if they licensed iOS to set top box and TV manufacturers then they have a huge market just sitting there for the taking. No end of consumers would buy TVs and boxes with a familiar interface and a badge that says in effect 'Apple Inside'. It would have virtually no impact on the rest of Apple's market space. Indeed, it could feed it. After all, what phone or portable media player would go best with your iOS TV? What laptop? What Tablet?

Companies want the source code when they licence an OS for embedded purposes these days. Apple would never agree to that.

I think the limit on Apple is the limit on the industry - and that is component supply. Apple has, a bit like MS did back on the day, found itself as a price maker, not a price taker.

Apple effectively does license its OS. It doesn't not make iPhones (Foxconn does, among others) nor MB, MBAs or MBP etc. Despite being a "hardware company" it makes very little hardware.

It was, at one point and may still be, the largest buyer of flash memory in the world - which it then sent to Foxconn to put in iPhones.

It has recently hinted at a strategically significant supply deal - many have thought this is hi-res screens, I suspect it is SSDs (flash-with-bells, if you will!).

I think you are making the mistake of "Microsoft Thinking". And I doubt Apple will let that happen (at least until SJ dies).

But who does make their own hardware these days?

Where do you draw the line?

Apple could have their own shipping company, own courier, own printers, own mines for mining the materials.

It's not really cost effective to own all your own production facilities, if you farm out the work you can switch between manufacturers to get the best deal.

Of course, the disadvantage is leaks do occur.

This is true.

The question, however, is whether - in terms of the capacity of the company - this is a material difference to when MS licensed 'doze to all and sundry - but on its terms. Dell, HP etc etc just had to suck it up.

Now, of course, they have a more-or-less viable alternative in Android and a few are, indeed, using it as a stick to beat MS with.

Would Apple want to risk getting into that position - and weaken is brand - when it is already bigger than MS by value?

Smartphone OSes don't make money. It's the hardware that makes money.

Sure, Microsoft write a smartphone OS and sell it, but Microsoft are losing money to get into the market like they always do.

Smartphone OSes don't make money.

A smartphone isn't smart without the OS.

Not really. Every phone has an OS. It's just a smartphone has the ability to have new software installed.

The phone I had before my iPhone was, in any sensible definition, a smartphone. It was also a piece of garbage.

The smart bit of a smartphone is the OS. Everything else is packaging.

They did this before and it was pretty much a disaster so I can't see them repeating the same mistake.

Microsoft certainly smart quite a bit since the launch of the iPhone - They could never equal Apple in the SmartPhone OS market IMHO.

Doesn't matter how many mobile companies they may be in cahoots with. They will always be outclassed. MS would have to copy an iPhone to even get close, and we all know THAT'S never going to happen.

Thankfully.

All things pass.

They may come out with some good ideas, but they will be new rehashes of the same old combinations of the same things reworked in a different shiny skin or package.

I like the 'idea' of a couple of Nokias, but everything else about them, I detest.

I am NOT an iPhone fanboy by any means, I love my Moto A780 for what THAT can do. The iPhones just does everything else better, and I've spent a long time using the various apps etc.
I DON'T like the shape of the iPhone 4, and there are NO decent cases for it, but small price to pay.

In reply to a post by stniuk:

They did this before and it was pretty much a disaster so I can't see them repeating the same mistake.

Unlike last time when income from the desktop Mac made up virtually the whole of their total revenue, at some point this will dwindle a very small proportion of the total and, at that point they may decide to have another try. The only way I could see them doing it would be by licensing to a (very) few tier 1 vendors such as IBM/Lenovo and HP.

You presume that IBM or HP would be interested. I doubt it.

Once OSX is made to run on generic Intel server hardware then OSX will be stolen and used on any hardware.

That'll be good for the Hackintosh crowd but Mac hardware sales would drop.

In reply to a post by AEP:

You presume that IBM or HP would be interested. I doubt it.

He didn't presume anything.


edit: typo.

Edited by ian_c (Mon 14-Feb-11 19:58:54)

I presume you mean "did not". If he didn't think those companies would be interested then it was a fairly meaningless comment. I give him more credit than to think that was the case.

No, AEP, He was speculating. He may have postulated that they would be interested, but he presumed nothing.

Yawn. Even by your standards that is impossibly pedantic.

Given how shamelessly you were trying to patronise the OP, I feel it was warranted.

Let's keep the mutual non-admiration threads in Free Chat folks, where it won't frighten the natives...

Edited by billford (Mon 14-Feb-11 22:28:46)