Apple jack of all trades?

"Jack of all trades" as drawn by PJ Udo C.J. Fischer
(Image credit: PJs in Vietnam)

Steve Jobs' comment to David Pogue concerning an Apple's eBook reader is interesting and troubling. Jobs pooh-poohed the idea of an Apple eBook reader saying, "Apple doesn’t see e-books as a big market at this point."

Jobs goes on to tell Pogue that, “I’m sure there will always be dedicated devices, and they may have a few advantages in doing just one thing...But I think the general-purpose devices will win the day. Because I think people just probably aren’t willing to pay for a dedicated device.”

Jobs' logic seems to imply that business users don't want different devices that perform a single function. Instead, Jobs believes they want a single device that can do many different things.

I get it. We don't want the business equivalent of a table full of remote controls—each one controlling its own unique device. While there is certainly some sense in what Steve is saying—a fact that the success of the multi-talented iPhone 3GS seems to attest, he shouldn't banish the concept of a dedicated device too quickly. There are many successful devices that do just one thing, and do it quite well.

The AlphaSmart Neo that I've mentioned previously is an excellent example of this. Inexpensive, lightweight and efficient, the Neo does one thing and one thing only—word processing. But it does it sporting instant-on, extremely long battery life, auto-save to NV RAM, and a full size keyboard—things that are sorely lacking in many of the notebooks and netbooks today.

Taken to extreme, Jobs' comments could imply that Apple wants the iPhone, iPod and, yes, possibly the Apple Tablet to be a digital Swiss Army Knife. Steve Jobs and Apple need to take care that they don't develop a “jack of all trades and a master of none” mentality. We've seen too many companies make this mistake recently with complexity in their product lines. They create devices that either can't define their target markets, or they do too many things, but do them all in something less than a stellar manner. (When was the last time that you bought a LCD TV with a built-in DVD player for your business? I thought so.)

Cisco Systems has, of late, fallen victim to this temptation. Their adage used to be, “let a network switch switch and let a network router route.” Their products and their place in the marketplace were well known and well defined. They were extremely successful. Today, it's not so clear. Are they in the network business, the video business, or the data center business? It's hard to tell.

Vertical markets can be a tricky thing. Companies like Nortel that were lured into that “all-in-one” business model haven't done particularly well. Nortel used to be a prominent telephone service provider and a leading telephone switch manufacturer. Their slide began when they bought Bay Networks in a not so successful attempt to become a network equipment provider. Today Nortel is a company in financial restructuring trying to survive bankruptcy and a significant loss of market share.

At the risk of pushing the "apple" metaphor too far, you could say that while an apple has many different varieties, it still remains an apple. When you are at the grocery store, you know that you are buying an apple whether it is a Pink Lady, a Granny Smith or, yes, a McIntosh. You know that you are not buying a nectarine. Apple (the “other apple”) needs to be mindful that they do not lose their product focus. They need to assure that they retain their position as a prominent technology vendor. Keeping their product distinctions in place is a good way to assure this.