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Why You Can't Manufacture Like Apple
HughPickens.com writes Medium reports that although many startups want to design something that mimics the fit and finish of an Apple product, it's a good way to go out of business. "What happened when Apple wanted to CNC machine a million MacBook bodies a year? They bought 10k CNC machines to do it. How about when they wanted to laser drill holes in MacBook Pros for the sleep light but only one company made a machine that could drill those 20 m holes in aluminum? It bought the company that made the machines and took all the inventory. And that time when they needed batteries to fit into a tiny machined housing but no manufacturer was willing to make batteries so thin? Apple made their own battery cells. From scratch." Other things that Apple often does that can cause problems for a startup include white plastic (which is the most difficult color to mold), CNC machining at scale (too expensive), Laser drilled holes (far more difficult than it may seem), molded plastic packaging (recycled cardboard is your friend), and 4-color, double-walled, matte boxes + HD foam inserts (It's not unusual for them to cost upwards of $12/unit at scale. And then they get thrown away.). "If you see a feature on an Apple device you want to copy, try to find it on another company's product. If you do, it's probably okay to design into your product. Otherwise, lower your expectations. I assure you it'll be better for your startup."
Simply, you can't manufacture like Apple, because if you manage too, you'll be just as expensive and the vast majority will want the name brand anyway. It's a me, too, that doesn't work.
But they had to buy 10k CNC machines to build 1M bodies? Doesn't sound right. Only 100 per machine.
One of my many duties at work is very basic supply-side logistics for a much simpler form of manufacturing.
If your organization needs to be told these things then you are already completely screwed.
Yes, yes, let us get to the Apple bashing orgasm... We must all be sheep. Because some people are clueless as to why anyone would want a well made, easy to use product, and therefore must assume we're all mindless and under the spell of dead Steve Jobs. I started with a couple of Android smartphones. I got really upset by them being abandoned by the manufacturer while they were less than a year old. I disliked their plasticky build. I wasn't completely thrilled by the somewhat balky operation. When I could finally afford an iPhone, I looked around at current Androids first and ended up buying an iPhone 4s. I really liked it a lot. Not saying it was perfect but a couple of years later I saved up and got the iPhone 5s. Here's a bulletin for the lot of you. I am a computer tech. I repair tech all day long. I know one or two things about technology in general. I made an informed choice and was so satisfied with that choice that I made the same choice when it came time to upgrade. Just because YOU don't get my choice does not make me or a lot of other people sheep!
I don't think the problem was so much the fear of getting bought out, but the fear that if they didn't sell, Microsoft would make their own implementation that would put them out of business.
Because stamping out 100 million copies of a single model (e.g., iphone) is a LOT more cost effective than trying to tool up to stamp out 10 million copies each of 10 different models. Which means that they can increase their profit margin or increase feature set at the same price as they see fit.
I run: Windows, OS X, Linux, FreeBSD. Just because you have a hammer, doesn't mean everything is a nail.
Next up, Apple has more money to throw around than a Startup! Full Story @ 11!
It's cute to see how much money they blow on their designs, but really, is this news, or stuff that matters?
Nice way to interpret his intent into something base can prop your ad hominem upon.
There's nothing wrong with establishing an argument that claims you work in a particular field and therefore are accustomed to making educated choices about stuff related to that field.
If someone calls themselves a chef or a foodie, it may not make them right when they say how long you should boil pasta, but it means their opinion about it IS based on care, thought, and knowledge about the subject at hand. If someone random says "boil spaghetti for 20 minutes" then you may be more apt to consider their opinion as out of hand than someone who presents "credentials".
If slashdot wasn't such a fucking non-stop pissing-contest people might not feel the need to present "papers please" when offering their thoughtful opinions about stuff.
Asking people to think is like asking them to buy you a new car
My current CEO says form and style are essential in our next product. The board and him agree that design is the key to success. He says he was an Apple like feel that oozes quality. He wants to be like Steve Jobs.
Then he says we're going to do that by hiring an undergrad design major part time from a local college once we finish our mechanical and board designs. He will polish it up and make it great.
He said all this within 2 mins. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. The project manager then offers up design tips from his wife...
Also, I'm told we need to target Logitech's price point...
People completely underestimate what it takes to make an Apple-like product. This is especially true for engineers (of which I am one) who tend think to since it's not technically hard to do, it must mean that designers don't bring much to the table. "I can bevel that edge", "That rounded corner isn't hard to do", etc etc. We also tend to think that function is most important and that form is an afterthought... even though we don't actually say that.
The claim wasn't that there was only one CNC company or only one laser drilling company. It's that there was only one at the time that could meet their specs and they could afford to just buy those companies, which you with your startup can't do. So don't expect to compete with Apple on the manufacturing quality because they can afford the very best and in many cases you can't.
If the startup made the same huge profit margins that Apple does, I don't see why doing any of these things would be a problem.
And if someone dropped billions of dollars in my hands I could do some pretty cool stuff too. What exactly is your point since that is a purely hypothetical conjecture? Startups don't have the kind of money that Apple does which is exactly the point.
NO startup can possibly match Apple's manufacturing costs. Very few companies of any size are able to match Apple when it comes to manufacturing costs on the products they make because Apple can buy stuff at such enormous scales. Read up on economies of scale. Apple only produces a small number of products so even companies like Samsung are unlikely to be able to match their costs because they spread out their purchases among more products. Apple is able to economically do things that set their products apart that at smaller scales would be economically impractical. This makes the gap even harder to close since it gives their products features that actually differentiate them from the competition in ways other than price.
see, I dont care for apple, No need to get into my reasons im sure other posters here have already listed them. HOWEVER I also understand that different people have different wants and needs in their devices. the iphone is better for some people, and the android is better for others. Depending on ones needs depends on what I recomend to people. I will bust my friends balls, but in the end whatever makes people happy is what they should get
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
Whilst the iphone is pretty, what apple actually sells is a device you don't have to babysit, that does what it says on the box in a manner that is both attractive and pleasant to use.
The reason many people, myself included by apple gear is because I have spent the past 20 years babysitting computer shit because it half does what it says, needs care to use to ensure it doesn't get malware, etc. I'm fucking over it. I don't care about the theoretical reduced flexibility if the device does what I actually want it to do, and doesn't need babysitting.
Being pretty is a bonus, not the primary motivator.
I run: Windows, OS X, Linux, FreeBSD. Just because you have a hammer, doesn't mean everything is a nail.
And don't forget that those armies of near-slaves also work for all tech companies, not just Apple.
Get free satoshi (Bitcoin) and Dogecoins
So, to recap, Apple wants a nicer looking sleep light, and as a result hip replacements just got a lot more expensive.
CNC machines aren't made by only one company
That doesn't mean all CNC machines are equal or that they can all meet the same specifications, run rates or handle the same products.
laser drilling isn't really rocket science
I think you have no idea what you are talking about. Drilling one hole with a laser isn't too hard. Drilling millions of holes with tight tolerances with near perfect repeatability IS as difficult as "rocket science". (as if that is some sort of valid comparison...) That's exactly what make manufacturing hard.
packaging have been done better etc.
Really? Name me one consumer electronics manufacturer that provides better packaging than Apple does.
Those many different models are often just variations.
That's true but every different option adds cost and complexity to the supply chain. The fewer versions of a product you make the lower your costs will be. Every product variation has extra administrative overhead cost, engineering cost, manufacturing cost, freight cost, inventory cost, etc. Whenever you buy from a company offering lots of options you are paying extra for them even if you don't actually take advantage of them because some of the costs are shared.
Sometimes there are good reasons to offer products with extra options or multiple products but a lot of companies don't really think it through. My company produces a wire harness that goes into some SUVs. We produce two versions of this product which are identical except for a grommet. There was no technical requirement for the grommets to be different but two engineers in different wings of the company couldn't be bothered to talk with each other and so we now have to maintain two SKU numbers, two order books, two bills, get worse pricing on grommets because the volume on each is lower, pay more in freight, have to stock more inventory etc.
Those white plastic laptops of Apples got quite a few calls into their support center.
#1: yellowing and cracking of plastic.
#2: Hard drive failure
#3: Battery failure
I think with the 3 items combined, the failure rate must have been in the high %30 mark.
Anyone that owned one shoudl be able to verify that.
Hmm, I was service manager at an Apple authorized computer store. Fixed hundreds of white plastic MacBooks. I would think that, given a long enough timespan, you could get to 30% failure on those three items, collectively. But certainly not within warranty, and generally not due to manufacturing defects.
I never saw any yellowing that wasn't caused by abuse. And I mean cigarette burns, being left on top of a radiator, etc. Cracks on the keyboard bezel, sure. That WAS a design flaw. Cosmetic only, BTW - didn't affect function. Apple fixed them all, in or out of warranty.
Hard drives fail. Apple doesn't make them. Look up the manufacturers specs for G's of impact in operation, and compare that to the way MacBooks are used. Mostly by students... We had one guy who was using his laptop on the seat of a moving, off-road truck. Apple replaced that hard drive, four times that I know of, in and out of warranty - at no charge. Eventually he got a free upgrade to an Air, with SSD. Solved.
Battery failure. Well, batteries are expendable items. I would say 95% of the batteries replaced were over their rated lifetime cycles; usually WAY over. The few that weren't, were also replaced free, in or out of warranty.
But they didn't outright buy your company. They got an exclusive license on the product by promising to sell enough copies to make you rich. Then they released their own knockoff of the product (on which they didn't pay you any royalties) and you went out of business. Embrace - extend - extinguish.
Last I checked blackberries don't allow tethering via bluetooth or wifi, and while they do email real well, they didn't do much else all that well. I'm not sure it makes one a "trend-jumper" to desire new features that are useful. Blackberries didn't evolve, and they died, a lesson Apple had best pay attention to.
I couldn't care less what the apple product LOOKS like, I care what it does and how much trouble I'm likely to have with it. I have been a rabid Apple hater my entire life, until perhaps the past 6 years. Right now they are the best products out there. While I'd rather have a high quality hardware device with higher end processing/graphics capabilities that also has high design and mfg quality and not be paying for bullshit like laser etched holes and other ID related nonsense, they are all low quality shit, and having bought several I refuse to do it again. I would rather have reduced specs and a higher price than buy something cheap, fast and a trash can ornament. You have Apple, or you have cheap chinese shitshop, even if it has a Dell/HP logo. Knowing what I know about computer design, something I did for a living for 15 years, I choose Apple, for now. If HP or Dell or company Q wants to step up their game and start making a computer that is not utter shit, the decision may change in the future.
For the same reason I buy Apple, I buy Honda. I've owned a lot of Fords, they were shit, I won't buy another Ford. My Honda's have been going strong for 10 years, and fuck it, they cost 15-20% more up front but the TCO is far less. If Honda burns me I will start looking again, but as long as they make good stuff they have my loyalty.
We're all different. For people like me (who are fortunate enough to have sufficient cash to pay for the privilege), design is as important as function. Good design sells stuff.
For 'some people' there's a phrase to describe what you're talking about, by the way: 'Conspicuous consumption', or more rudely put, 'F.U. money'. :-)
Conspicuous consumption? 99% of the time I use my laptop at home. It's only conspicuous to me. Maybe you define yourself in terms of how others view you; I don't.
"...Microsoft would make and BUNDLE their own implementation..."
Yep, that was a very real threat. I saw that happen to companies that didn't sell to Microsoft, and I was at companies that developed stuff with the thought of Microsoft taking us over in mind (that was usually a mistake).
it appears to be a very predatory way of doing business on my eyes.
I remember an article I read on the late 80's or early 90's about how some small companies of that era feared growing too fast and ended up catching the attention of Microsoft, that at that time was buying everything and everybody (prices are pretty lower at that times). Building something cool that Microsoft would need was the fastest way of going out ot business.
Completely different. Microsoft would find a company that had a product that they wanted. That company had two options. Sell to Microsoft, or get destroyed. Sometimes it meant Microsoft finding a similar company, or developing in house. But either way, the masses would get a free product from Microsoft that sort of did the same thing, or pay for one that they don't realize is better. One prime example is Netscape. Microsoft bought Mosaic, called it IE, and gave it away for free. Bill Gates was renowned for "declaring war" on small companies. He is absolutely ruthless when someone says no to him, and lashes out like Stalin on steroids.
What Apple did was buy some companies that could be used to make better products. Notice that the Microsoft ones were never, or rarely, better than the other guy. They forced it down your throat using their monopoly. These are also not competing companies, just those that have something that they want to use in house, not resell.
Apple is an evil company, as are all companies. Microsoft at its peak was a criminal racket, and history will look back with an unbiased eye, and shake their heads that we let them run rampant like we did. If you want to know why, check out the history on the trade deficit in the 70's and 80's. Microsoft was one of the few companies that sold abroad. Also look at their campaign spending. They practically own the Washington state legislature. Now it doesn't seem like a big deal, since that's status quo. In the 80's, back when the US still had some integrity and a Constitution, it was cutting edge evil.
The only thing worse than a Democrat is a Republican.
They didn't buy you at fair value. They said that you could either sell to them at a severe loss, or they would make their own version of your product and put you out of business.
With all the charity Bill Gates has been making press releases about lately, people seem to have forgotten that he received all that money in the first place by building a monopoly and using incredibly anti-competitive business tactics.
-1 disagree is not a modifier for a reason. -1 troll, flaimbait, redundant, overrated are NOT acceptable substitutes.
They didn't buy you at fair value. They said that you could either sell to them at a severe loss, or they would make their own version of your product and put you out of business
Then you weren't worth "fair value". I find it interesting how Microsoft dumped all this money into software firms and all of the replies to my post are complaints that they could have dumped more. Well, it's not their job to do that.