The iPhone 8 and iPhone X (ten) was launched yesterday, and Apple joins Xiaomi, Samsung, Essential in the era of bezeless phones.
Sharp did it first, then Xiaomi launched the MIX last year, then everybody else came along.
If you’re still thinking that phones are still all about hardware by now, then you’re probably not looking deep enough. As with any new electronics, all most people care about are the specs, but eventually I do believe it’s the software that makes all the difference. It’s easy to make a full screen display, but if the user software experience doesn’t change, it will be difficult for brands to catch up. The small things Apple did to enhance the user experience, getting back to home screen (by swiping up), accessing control center by swiping down from top right corner, accessing notification by swiping down from center and access search by swiping down from the middle — basically converting buttons into swipes. More often that not, this would be too cumbersome to implement on Android as a custom UI, so many brands don’t do it. So at the end of the day, there will be people who buy iPhones because of iOS for this, and people who buy Android because they love being able to customise.
Have you used MIUI? It was great in the past, but the user experience… let’s just say it could be improved. I think the fragmentation of Android makes it very difficult for smartphone manufacturers to keep up with the updates. Perhaps one day all devices will go stock android, that will just leave iOS and Android as the two platforms of choice.
Another thing to note is that Apple is building more things on its own, like the GPU. The GPU announcement from the iPhone 8/8+/X launch comes after Apple announced back in April to phase out graphics chips in its smartphones, watches, tablets, and televisions licensed from Imagination Technologies within the next two years. That company is fucked. Although Apple isn’t making it’s own screens now, but it’s a sign that they are trying to control a larger portion of their supply chain and manufacturing. Who knows, maybe one day Apple might be self sufficient and perhaps turn these innovation into another business vertical.
When you start small, you should use components from others to lower your cost, but when you’re large enough like Apple, it’s time to start taking more of the pie to grow your bottom line.
Thoughts?