2024-02-19 18:29:41
It was the most innovative launch of Dark So far – not because a new product was introduced to the public, but because the company actually officially launched a new field in which it had not dealt with until now. Since then, however, there have already been complaints about the product, reports of malfunctions have been published, and there has been panic on Twitter: Is Apple’s new Vision Pro, that augmented reality helmet, actually a failure?
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Even before the product reached consumers, it generated a lot of interest: not only because of its exorbitant price tag – $3,500 before taxes or additional required accessories – but because of the way Apple launched it. The company released the product gradually, in the United States only, and with the promise of an unreasonably personal service experience – to fit everyone exactly the helmet in the most comfortable way.
According to reports from the first two weeks of the launch – the volume of sales of the new helmet exceeded the 200,000 units mark, by pre-order only. But on social networks, and then also in media outlets in Israel and the world, they presented a very disturbing trend for Apple: people who purchased the product were disappointed, and took advantage of the company’s generous return policy, which reaches two weeks from the day of purchase. The reports talk about a significant scale of returns, but what is happening on the ground?
Zuckerberg: “Our product is much better, period”
As mentioned, Apple’s new product made quite a bit of noise. Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta, referred to it in a video he uploaded to Instagram, in which he compared Apple’s product to Quest 3, the flagship product released by Meta as part of the Metaverse.
In the video, Meta’s CEO criticizes Apple’s price – and claims that it is “seven times” higher than his product. In practice, the Quest 3 costs $500 in the US, compared to Apple’s $3,500. Moreover, Zuckerberg claims in the video that his product is much better than Apple’s. According to him, Meta’s product provides the same Apple features at a lower price, with a different design and lower weight.
“It seems like a lot of people just assumed that the VisionPro would be better because it costs more than $3,000, but to be honest I’m quite surprised that the Quest is so much better in the vast majority of things,” Zuckerberg said. According to him, “in every generation of computing there is closed access and open access, and it is true – in mobile, Apple’s approach won, but it is not always like that.” It should be noted that since 2020, when Facebook announced that it was turning to the metaverse, it has lost 42 billion dollars.
At the same time, Sam Altman, CEO of the artificial intelligence company OpenAI, also commented on the new product, calling Apple’s helmet “one of the most impressive technologies since the iPhone.”
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Reports of vomiting and “biological incompatibility”
The scope of product returns has not been published, neither by Apple nor by estimates. A blog called Apple Insider, known as one that covers the company closely, even claimed that these were false reports. In a blog post, it was stated that sources at 24 stores on the East Coast of the United States did not indicate broad trends in returns, “and certainly not an unexpected and rapid flood.” Moreover, it says that returns seem to be made at a normal rate that characterizes any other launch of Apple products.
But the complaints about the product grew. Some of them were even mentioned in the technological test published here in Globes – when the main problems are clear: a lot of weight on the head and the heat that spreads around the eyes after prolonged use. Other users talked about how the screens that come up through the helmet are pixelated and not sharp enough. It is also claimed that the product does not provide a unique experience, as there is no real news in it. Another complaint concerned the price, which can reach $4,500.
In a report in Apple Insider, the main claims also emerged from the retail stores, which pointed to two main groups returning the product: people who returned it due to biological incompatibility, and content creators who bought the product for their videos. Regarding the first group – one of the workers said in the report that “these are the people who become sick due to the use of this. The ones who vomit and suffer, and they find it out very quickly.” Regarding the second group – one of the employees talks about the YouTubers and media producers who use the purchase as a free rental.
Ziv Kitro, creative director at Pancrafters, which specializes in the worlds of Apple and artificial intelligence, tells Globes that “every time something happens to Apple, people like to make it more than it is. It gets more resonance than what happens in reality, when according to reports it is a low percentage (of returns , NT)”. Alongside this, Kitrou points out that “Apple needs the future product that will come out in two or three years to be easier and more comfortable on the eyes. Most of the complaints are about comfort.”
According to Kitro, “Even if these returns continue to grow, I would not be in a hurry to praise the product. From what I hear, people also complain about the battery time, which means that they squeeze the battery when it is not enough for them. Apple created a very expensive technology here, which was launched gradually , and they manage to record good data. All of this is a very big victory for Apple.”
How do returns affect investors?
What is happening on Wall Street? Sergey Vaschunok, a senior analyst at the Oppenheimer investment house, tells Globes that the return of the glasses does not pose a problem for Apple’s current operations, since it is a negligible amount of the company’s total revenue, but it can affect investors. “This issue is undoubtedly a point of warning for investors, who look ahead and see VisionPro glasses as one of the future growth engines for Apple. Therefore, malfunctions in a product that should be a future growth engine – this is not good for the stock, certainly when the core business has not been growing for years.”
According to him, “In fact, this is an image damage. Apple is historically known as a company that learns from the mistakes of others and does not launch a product that is not perfect, so a fault in the new product could be perceived as a broad operational weakness. It is important to emphasize that what is particularly important for the penetration of Apple’s glasses is the rich content, such as movies and series, and here too there is probably a lot more to be done. It still doesn’t have a lot of content or end uses, so until that happens – this is a product without real value today.”
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