Top of the big era

Although they are all Apple products, AppleTV is completely different from iPhone and iPad.

AppleTV is just a marginal product of Apple, with weak market competitiveness, limited stock and incremental sales, so it lacks negotiating power. In order to maintain cooperation with Zhou Buqi, it has to make concessions.

Otherwise, AppleTV may be eliminated by the market.

iPhone and iPad are different, they have dominance in the market!

Especially iPad, most of the tablet market is iPad.

Market is status, it is the right to speak.

It is impossible to make Apple make concessions on iPhone and iPad, unless one day iPhone and iPad really reach a position of almost monopolizing the market, then there will be administrative intervention, and the administration and law will require Apple to reduce commissions, just like Qualcomm will be sanctioned for charging too high patent fees.

But now Apple's products are far from reaching the level of monopoly. Samsung, Asda, Microsoft, Huawei, HP, Sony and other competitors are very strong, and users have many choices, not just Apple products.

If there is no monopoly involved, it is difficult for administrative power to intervene.

It is really harder to make Apple give up 30% commission by market forces alone.

Zhou Buqi was just joking. He knew that Cook would not back down in this regard. He took the initiative to express his willingness to reduce the commission on AppleTV. It can be said that he has given enough face to Boss Zhou. That's enough!

Stop while you are ahead!

The business was settled, and Zhou Buqi couldn't just pat his butt and leave. He chatted with him in a leisurely manner, "By the way, Apple has a big news now!"

"The lawsuit with Qualcomm?"

"No, music."

"Oh."

Cook looked at him warily.

Zhou Buqi said with a sigh: "You are not really going to spend 3 billion US dollars to acquire Beats, the headphone company, are you?"

Cook hesitated for a moment and said: "The deal has been finalized."

Zhou Buqi pouted and said: "My girlfriend also bought a few Beats headphones. I tried them and felt that they were not good at all! The poor sound quality is not as good as the 10-yuan street stall goods on Taobao. It means that the marketing is good and it has played a big role in the film and television and sports industries."

"Brand is vitality." Cook smiled slightly.

Zhou Buqi was very surprised, "Is Beats a bigger brand than Apple? If Apple wants to make a product, does it need to rely on external brands?"

Cook couldn't tell him in detail, "It's very complicated."

Zhou Buqi smiled and said, "Did you hear something from somewhere and find out the internal secrets of Estar?"

"Secret?" Cook was slightly stunned, "What secret?"

Zhou Buqi said lightly: "Estar is going to make a headphone product next, a real headphone product belonging to the mobile Internet."

Cook said: "I know nothing about such things."

"Really don't know?" Zhou Buqi was a bit of calling a cat a cat, "To be honest, did you hear that I was going to personally come forward as product director to design a mobile headset for Estar, so you were tempted and hurriedly spent a high price to buy Beats, a headphone manufacturer. The acquisition price of 3 billion US dollars... In my opinion, Beats is less than 300 million US dollars!"

This is complete nonsense.

He had never had such an idea before.

Because three months ago, he saw a wide range of reports in the media saying that Apple was going to spend a lot of money to acquire Beats, a trendy headphone manufacturer.

Such news attracted the attention and interest of Mr. Zhou.

He even knew why Beats was worth $3 billion.

What Apple was interested in was not Beats headphones or the "Beats" brand, but a software product built by Beats under its strong marketing power and brand system - Beats Music.

This is a music streaming product.

Apple has been doing music streaming for many years, but it has never been very successful and has little presence in the market. Compared with Spotify, there is a huge gap.

But music is an inevitable part of Apple.

This is a continuation from Jobs.

Jobs is a senior movie and music fan, which made film and television and music become important strategic planning and business lines of Apple many years ago, and even invited Disney CEO Robert Iger to Apple as a director.

Film and television streaming and music streaming are both in Apple's core strategy.

It's just that film and television streaming is too difficult, so we won't start for the time being.

Let's start music streaming first.

Apple acquired Beats, a headphone manufacturer, mainly because it was targeting the streaming platform Beats Music, and then changed its name and surname, turning Beats Music into Apple Music!

Let Apple have a truly competitive music streaming platform.

Cook has been criticized by the outside world for his lack of innovation, and Apple has no more exciting new products under his management. Of course, he was not convinced. After the iPhone and iPad had established themselves in the market, he set his sights on music.

Zhou Buqi naturally had to find a way to intercept it.

He never thought of going to Esda to serve as a product director.

But in order to stop Apple, he had to come forward!

Apple's earphones AirPods will not be released until 2016, which is still early. Asda will launch real mobile Internet headphones in the summer of 2015...and they must have the same shape as Apple's AirPods.

If they are different, the interception effect will be greatly reduced.

Asda launched such a headset to the market one year in advance. In 2016, Apple still had the nerve to launch an "exactly the same" mobile phone?

But if you want to dig into Apple's grave and manufacture identical headphones in advance, the only way is for Boss Zhou to come forward in person.

As early as after the Spring Festival in February, Asda established the headphone project department under Zhou Buqi's instruction.

Just like Zhou Buqi said, the director of the project department is himself!

To this end, during the Spring Festival, he specially drew more than 20 sketches as the design concept for new headphones, and he wanted to lead the creation of hardware products from top to bottom.

When I see Cook this time, I might as well give him some eye drops first.

Cook's face changed slightly, and he was very shocked, "You want to be a product manager? You want to design a headset?"

Zhou Buqi smiled and said, "This is a business secret."

Cook asked: "When?"

Zhou Buqi said: "Now, I am already the director of this project team. I have formed a team of more than 20 people, mainly to solve the technical problems of connecting headphones and mobile phones. This team is in China. Next I may acquire a small headphone company here in the United States to solve some deep technologies in music experience.”

Cook took a deep breath and asked, "How long will it take for you to get this done?"

"Probably... huh?" Zhou Buqi looked wary, "What do you mean? You don't want to follow the trend, do you?"

"No, no!"

Cook was sweating.

I thought this was too much of a coincidence.

That's what he planned too.

After acquiring Beats, there were two main things.

First, integrate Beats’ streaming music business to develop Apple’s streaming music business; second, integrate Beats’ technical resources and lay the technical foundation for Apple’s next Bluetooth headset.

Unexpectedly, Boss Zhou had already targeted him!

On second thought, it really makes sense!

Boss Zhou has already laid the groundwork for the preliminary project of "mobile Bluetooth headset".

In the global market, the largest music streaming company is Spotify. Zhou Buqi is the largest investor and the company's executive director, with great say. Spotify’s founding team all regard him as their godfather.

In the mainland Chinese market, the largest music streaming company is Weidian Music, which itself is a Zhoubuqi company.

In addition, he also controls Asda, one of the top three mobile phone manufacturers in the world.

If you want to make a good mobile Bluetooth headset, you cannot do without these two points.

First, there must be a smartphone as a platform, and Bluetooth headsets and smartphones must be efficiently connected.

Second, after the hardware is connected, software services are needed, and a music streaming platform is needed to provide music playback.

Boss Zhou has already done these two things!

Now, all we need is an epoch-making Bluetooth headset that can lead the trend and truly belongs to the mobile Internet!

Cook was a little flustered.

Somewhat frustrated.

After all the hard work and secret planning, I thought I would have the opportunity to lead the trend of an era like my predecessor Steve Jobs... But I didn't expect that I would fall behind Boss Zhou early. People have already done the same thing!

Zhou Buqi looked at the other party with a strange expression, frowned and said, "Why do I think something is wrong with you? Are you trying to copy my ideas?"

"No, I'm just a little surprised."

Cook maintained a good demeanor and smiled.

But this smile looks uglier than crying.

Zhou Buqi breathed a sigh of relief and said slowly: "I haven't been a product manager for many years. When I first started my business in the early years, I participated in the design of Xiaonei.com and Friends.net as a product manager, but they were all Internet products. This time is different. This time it is a hardware product, which is a big challenge for me. ”

Cook reluctantly said: "You can do it, it's just a headset."

Zhou Buqi smiled and said: "Apple is a master in making software and hardware products. If I encounter any trouble making headphones, can I come and ask you for help?"

"Ahem..." Cook was speechless and could only politely refuse, "After Apple acquired Beats, we can be considered competitors in this field."

Zhou Buqi said: "It makes sense, lest you think that I am copying the design of Beats headphones. I don't like Beats headphones at all. If I want to do it, it must be an epoch-making headphone product. Okay, if it doesn't matter, I will Let’s go, that’s it for today, AppleTV’s commission will be halved, don’t forget to keep your verbal promise!”

"Of course, the 15% commission is settled."

Cook sighed secretly.

But Zhou Buqi flashed the phone in his hand, "I've recorded everything, 15% commission, no regrets!"