Apple acquires Beats Electronics for $3b *

Whoa!

http://9to5mac.com/2014/05/08/apple...s-for-3-2b-deal-could-be-announced-next-week/

 

There's a sucker born every minute.

 

Great. Soon we can expect the iTunes Store to be selling "Mastered for Beats" songs.

 

And here I thought the people at Apple were smart. Silly rabbit.

 

If I owned AAPL............... SELL SELL SELL!!!

 

hmm. Stock price is climbing - I'm kinda shocked as I have not checked it in .. forever.. I may jump ship from Iphone to an Android. I can't imagine I'm the only one. Apparently their margins are improving which is hard to imagine. As for this purchase, seems like quite a large commitment for something that should be losing market share.

 

Mere pocket change for Apple.

Makes some sense since their iTunes Radio has been a bust and downloads are trending down. Shame to see such an innovative company asleep at the wheel when it comes to new music trends. Wonder if it's not too late.

Dan c

 

We won't (don't) like this. But the masses might. Look at how successful Beats has been in the headphone market. But I do wonder if that success will continue, or if the market for overpriced bling-ridden headphone jewelry might finally be losing steam.

 

Still, if the deal goes through it will be Apples largest acquisition ever!

 

How could it not be?!

 

Well Beats sell really well so yes Apple is smart. Just because audiophiles here hate them doesn't mean this is a bad biz move. It's actually pretty smart.

 

I read an article about this on Forbes.com and they say the main "draw" for Applie is the Beats streaming service, as you've noted. The Beats name and associated artists may also give them some "street cred". The article also noted that to date, Apple has never paid over $1B to acquire anything! Lastly, the Forbes article speculated that Beats may have shopped around to companies like Facebook first to help drive up the purchase price.

 

I had MOG for over a year and liked it very much. When Beats acquired it, I waited to what would happen, and while the interface and search style are different, the large catalog and same sound quality has made me not really aware of the transition. If Apple does nothing noticeable to it, then it's fine with me. On the other hand...

 

Apple is working to protect and extend this kind of success as Forbes reported recently:

To look to a more visible Apple cloud success, perhaps we should consider the absolutely massive iTunes/App Store franchise, instead. There, a company who Wilson says, “[doesn’t] have anything in the cloud to speak of” has built a combination of the world’s largest music retailer and the world’s largest software store. Apple has sold more than 25 billion songs and there have been more than 50 billion apps downloaded. (Oh, and the company is also the leader in digital movie sales/rentals as well, though that business is far behind Netflix’s subscription-style offerings.)

Apple’s revenues from all those downloads would total $23.5 billion if it were accounted for as a standalone business, according to Asymco. That small part of Apple’s overall business would be #130 on the Fortune 500 if it were a standalone company. For a sense of just how much that is, Facebook — the company Wilson says will be the second-most valuable behind Google in 2020 — took in just under $8 billion last year. For having “nothing,” Apple’s producing a good deal more than nothing in cloud revenues.​

How the Beats acquisition addresses the future of all that is a mystery.

 

I tried a pair of Beats $120 earbuds.

Let's just say that Apple's pack-in earbuds aren't much worse, and leave it at that.

I can only imagine they're buying it for their successful streaming service, because the headphones are garbage. Although visually they're fantastic - I suppose Apple could always deploy the industrial designers on their own kit. Maybe Apple will get back into the audio business they dipped their toes into with the iPod Hi-Fi almost a decade ago...

 

A match made in heaven.

 

Assuming the deal goes through, we will probably soon see iPhones in colors to match the Beats headphones. Apple has, of course, offered various devices in a variety of colors, including the current iPhone 5C. Some kids with purple Beats headphones would instantly buy a matching iPhone.

 

Guys, this is just a rumour. As John Gruber puts it:

 

Probably a great move in terms of brand recognition, but they could've had a Grado or Etymotics for probably millions. Maybe they'll do a backside deal for one of those companies and use their technology for the audio part.

Here's hoping.

 

Why don't Grado or AKG make something as visually appealing as Beats?

 

All solid points. The main thing here is Beats Music, that's what Apple really wants. Exactly how that would work or if it's even a good deal would remain to be seen, but it's clear Apple is seriously scrambling to get back ahead of this trend. I'm thinking it's too late. Still, with all the Apple products out there they might be able to salvage something.

dan c

 

Because they don't have a hip rapper and mogul attached to them.

I spend a lot of time at high school tournaments and games (because of my job), and you'd be amazed at how many iPhones and Beats headphones the kids are wearing. Everywhere. I also see other brands like Shure, Koss, Klipsh and Sennheiser scattered in there, but you probably see Beats on 90% of the kids who aren't sporting the stock Apple buds.

Grado? Never ever ever. I'm guessing their open design is a huge drawback to kids, as well as the fact that they simply have a low profile. And they're butt ugly. (says a happy owner of the SR-60)

dan c

 

Don't think this is going to happen. So many Apple-related rumors have been wrong that I'll believe it when I see it.

 

Would Apple buy Beats just to kill or severely weaken the streaming service? It seems to me streaming is a huge threat to their iTunes store and if they could kill Beats that leaves only Spotify which has already begun to fall out of favor with artists and Apple could start making sweet deals to keep artists off Spotify. I just don't see that this makes any sense for Apple other than to kill a competitor, even then it's a hefty price to pay to do that but it does come with the headphones that all kids seem to desire.

 

It already happened.

http://www.engadget.com/2014/05/09/beats-apple-confirmed/