Apple has traditionally not be an acquirer of large companies. I know many people argue for them to do some big acquisition. I'm not sure that's a good idea.
Apple Maps specifically has improved a lot since release. I can't remember the last time I used Google Maps. Apple is also collecting street view data [2].
Apple has plenty of areas to improve, but it is not from the lack of R&D spending.
[1] http://dashboards.trefis.com/no-login-required/MCeJl2Yc?from...
They can only spend each dollar exactly once. In that sense it is binary. But of course they can decide to do buybacks and invest in stuff. That's what they're doing.
My point is that I don't get why a company like Apple doesn't see great investment opportunities for every last dollar they earn. Especially as they have really huge gaps in their strategy.
They are not on a great trajectory right now. The services business they want to expand on does not look that strong to me in spite of growing reasonably fast right now.
Likewise, all of AR doesn't need the kind of information only a few companies have. Think of assembling something at home, like furniture. Or a car mechanic. Or astronaut. Or soldiers. Different companies may control relevant data sets in different domains, and some may not even be data-intensive like furniture assembly.
Not with the same dollar. We shouldn't forget what giving money back to shareholders means. It means that Apple cannot think of anything to invest that money in that's more promising than what investors can find elsewhere.
You could say it's prudent and honest. Instead of wasting all that money on stuff that never yields a return they're handing it back their owners.
But I still find it surprising that a company like Apple with the enormous leverage of billions of (the wealthiest) users and a brand name second to none doesn't think that it can make great things happen with that money.
I don't think I'm best placed to tell them what that could be. But there are clearly some huge gaps in their strategy.
For instance, they keep pushing AR, because AR is an area where latency matters so much that you need expensive devices for it.
But AR would be so much more valuable in combination with all the information that only Google Maps and Google Street View has. Even more so if you think about the data that's going to be needed for (and generated by) self driving cars.
I imagine it's hugely expensive to gather that information. Apple Maps is second rate. They have nothing like Street View and no self driving car project. I think owning information that makes high end devices far more useful than low end devices is exactly what Apple needs.
There aren't going to be many players in that market exactly because it's so expensive. Only the biggest global tech companies can really do it. That moat will be one of the widest and deepest ever.
Gaming is another area where expensive devices make a difference. Playing games is something almost everybody does on their iPhones. I find it baffling that Apple isn't one of the biggest gaming companies.
Where are Apple's contributions to new user interaction paradigms? The touch bar? Is that it? Apple just isn't thinking big enough. That's why they have so much money left to pay back.
Anyway, you can completely disregard _my_ ideas on what they could do with that money and still be surprised that _they_ can't think of anything.