It's a great feature but it's far from a guaranteed money maker. This could just as likely disappear from future iPhone models.

edit: also competing dedicated devices also include the cost of SAR insurance in their monthly fees, which are significant: https://www.garmin.com/en-US/p/837461/pn/010-06000-SU

It starts at $15 a month but any serious user is paying more like $35-65 a month.

While I don't know how large this group is, skiers, hikers, boaters, campers, off-roaders would all likely get use out of this functionality.

Hahahahahahaha! Not a chance. Maybe the over landing crowd, and hardcore hikers, but most casual enjoyers of the outdoors definitely do NOT have a Spot or InReach. Next time you’re on a ski hill, ask around - you’ll be shocked how few people have them.

and for a life saving device like this i know a subset of people will not want it a part of their phone.

...but this will definitely take a LOT of business from garmin because i believe that subset to be pretty small.

With that said, the iPhone (Pro?) is becoming somewhat of a swiss army knife for casual tramping: offline maps with GPS and a compass, an excellent set of cameras, an ereader, excellent battery life to back all that up _and_ it can now communicate with the rest of the world in non-life threatening -- but marginal -- situations. As an example, we leave intentions with people whenever we leave ("here is our route, if we're not back by midday on the third, contact SAR"); being able to message people and say "hey, I've rolled my ankle, we're safe but will be late because we're limping out, don't worry" is a pretty excellent feature.

We're probably a niche market, but several friends in that community are pretty excited about this feature. For 2-3 day trips, this makes the outdoors much more accessible.

Kind of like how Collision Detection could have been an excellent Apple Watch upsell feature but was brought to all iPhones anyway.

They recognize the power of things like fall and afib detection for pushing into the ever growing consumer Health market.

When I lived in the desert, the local newspaper regularly published stories about tourists getting lost/stuck/stranded and then dying.

Going by the newspaper accounts, I'd estimate at least a dozen people died in the desert each year, and that was just in my area.

And that's not even counting the lives saved.

Here in Las Vegas we have a ring of mountains around the city--and virtually no cell coverage beyond that ring. Even within the ring the outlying areas are often shadowed out.

I was unable to find nation wide stats on search and rescue events.

[1] https://www.adirondackexplorer.org/stories/record-number-of-...

I wouldn't be surprised if there's a lot of midwest areas that have a similar problem.

I have never not lost cell coverage when going on a hike in the mountains, and I only go on casual day hikes.

With any cellular phone it's possible to dial the local emergency number.

Doesn't matter if your current operator has coverage, the phone will find the network that has the best coverage. There's still explicit validation of this capability for new phone devices.

You don't even need a SIM card.

But now Apple has ended the practice.

The way this probably plays out is by the time the 2 years is up or shortly thereafter this will be subsidized by the gov.

Apple is leaving quite a bit of money on the table here, while simultaneously spending quite a bit. Wipe the entitlement from your eyes and recognize this for what it is.

iPhone margins do allow for it.

> Wipe the entitlement from your eyes and recognize this for what it is.

Sir, let me very calmly ask you to please behave better in discussions here.

That smacks of some serious entitlement man…

Satellite emergency services has never been free, even if you buy an garmin device for this, they don't operate if you're not paying your monthly bill.