Apple Product Delays Have More Than Doubled Under Tim Cook's Watch, Says Report (wsj.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Wall Street Journal (Warning: source may be paywalled; alternative source): Of the three major new products since Mr. Cook became chief executive in 2011, both AirPods earbuds in 2016 and last year's HomePod speaker missed Apple's publicly projected shipping dates. The Apple Watch, promised for early 2015, arrived late that April with lengthy wait times for delivery. Apple also was delayed in supplying the Apple Pencil and Smart Keyboard, two critical accessories for its iPad Pro. The delays have contributed to much longer waits between Apple announcing a product and shipping it: an average of 23 days for new and updated products over the past six years, compared with the 11-day average over the six years prior, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis of Apple public statements. Longer lead times between announcement and product release have the potential to hurt Apple on multiple fronts. Delays give rivals time to react, something the company tried to prevent in the past by keeping lead times short, analysts and former Apple employees said. They can stoke customer disappointment and have cost Apple sales.

Comments

Was I supposed to take that as a negative?

[SuperKendall]

The world is filled now with products that ship fast and suck until v2.0.

So why am I supposed to find it a negative that Apple will delay shipping products until it feels they are ready? Doesn't that imply the products they DO ship are relatively more stable than competitors, and will be more usable out of the gate?

The iPhone X did not ship until a few weeks after the 8. Yet FaceID works great, the screen works really well (Apple's first OLED), and generally the finish of the software and hardware is really good. Would I have preferred to have a shakier release earlier? Not really.

Two things

[jenningsthecat]

One, perhaps new products are reaching the point of diminishing returns, where it takes more and more effort for a seemingly incremental bit of progress, simply because the bar is already so high and we're already so close to the limits of what existing technologies can provide. Two, maybe Cook isn't the tyrant / asshole that Jobs is reputed to have been? If so, then it's a refreshing change from the 'at any cost' bullshit mentality that is sucking our souls dry and robbing our descendants of their chance at a good life here on Earth.