The author of a new book critical of the gadget maker said she’s doubtful that new products rumored to be in the works at Apple will return the tech giant to its glory days.
“I’m really skeptical about its chances for success,” Yukari Kane said about the possibility of a smart TV by Apple. On the much-rumored iWatch, Kane retorted: “I mean, would you want one?”
Kane is the author of “Haunted Empire: Apple After Steve Jobs,” which explores how Apple has fared since Steve Jobs, the company’s colorful founder and charismatic spokesman, died almost three years ago.
The former Wall Street Journal reporter concludes what some Apple investors have feared since Jobs’ death in 2011: Apple is not the same as it was under Jobs — and it’s hard to say whether it ever will be again.
“On the innovation front, I guess we’ll see,” she told The Post. “But I do think its going to be difficult.”
Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO and Jobs’ hand-picked successor, dismissed the book just as it was hitting shelves on Tuesday.
“This nonsense belongs with some of the other books I’ve read about Apple,” Cook said in a statement. “It fails to capture Apple, Steve, or anyone else in the company. I am very confident about our future.”
Yet Kane refused to blame Cook for Apple losing its sheen. She insists that Cook is “the right man for the job” in Jobs’ absence. Apple was never going to bring in an another “disruptive innovator” to replace Jobs, she said. Plus, Apple is so much larger now that it faces different challenges than when Jobs was running the show.
Still, Kane thinks everyone at Apple needs to admit that Jobs is gone and Apple is in “a new stage of life.”
“Tim Cook has to reset expectations for Apple,“ she said. “Right now Apple is caught in this spot where they’re saying, ‘We haven’t changed. We’re as innovative as ever’ — when everything has changed.”
Kane cited the low margins on TV sales as a reason a smart TV could be a tough sell for Apple. “Customers are paying $600 for a good- enough TV. Are they really going to pay $2,000 for a great television” by Apple?” she asked.
She thinks a smart watch is too much of “a fashion item” to reach the masses in the way the iPhone or the iPad did.
To be sure, Apple’s shares have struggled since Jobs died amid questions about its future growth. Cook has recently faced pressure from Wall Street, led by billionaire sabre-rattler Carl Icahn, to boost the stock through dividends and buybacks.
Apple’s stock closed up 0.88 percent to $531.40 Tuesday, but it’s down 20 percent from the one-year anniversary of Jobs’ death.
According to Kane’s book, Jobs was disappointed when the company’s stock fell just 2 percent after Apple announced his surgery for cancer in 2004.
“That’s it?” he said.
Asked whether he would be more satisfied with the company’s recent stock woes, Kane said: “I can’t imagine Tim Cook would even say Steve would have wanted Tim to be better.”
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