Tech Brew Ride Home - Thu. 03/26 – No New iPhone Until 2021?

Starting point is 00:00:00 On April 4th, 2023, around 2 in the morning, a man was found stabbed multiple times on a sidewalk in downtown San Francisco. Hey, who did this to you? What happened next turned the story into a political firestorm. Reports have identified the victim as Bob Lee, the founder of Cash App. From Bloomberg Podcasts, this is Foundering, the Killing of Bob Lee, beginning April 16. Welcome to the TechMeme right home for Thursday, March 26, 2020. I'm Brian McCullough. Today, Apple is weighing its options and considering delaying the release of the 5G iPhone until 2021. Airbnb is offering free housing for medical workers, an interesting raise Thursday that wants to be the flip side of Shopify and e-commerce, and a preview of Huawei's upcoming Googleless flagship phone. Here's what you miss today in the world of tech. sources are telling the NICA Asian review that Apple is considering delaying the launch of the iPhone 12 by at least months over fears that low sales and supply chain constraints could harm the launch

Starting point is 00:01:18 if they stuck to their original timeline. The Cupertino-California-based tech giant has held internal discussions on the possibility of delaying the launch by months. Three people familiar with the matter said, while supply chain sources say practical hurdles could push back the release originally scheduled for September. Quote, supply chain constraint aside, Apple is concerned that the current situation would significantly lower consumer appetite to upgrade their phones,

Starting point is 00:01:45 which could lead to a tame reception of the first 5G iPhone, said a source with direct knowledge of the discussion. They need the first 5G iPhone to be a hit, end quote. Apple is already a year behind its two biggest rivals, Samsung and Huawei, in introducing a 5G capable handset. At the start of the year, the company set an aggressive target for the release of a 5G iPhone, instructing mobile suppliers to prepare to make up to 100 million units of the new devices for 2020 and designing four different models of the handsets, sources told Niki.

Starting point is 00:02:16 Now Apple is closely monitoring the outbreaks in the U.S. and Europe, its two largest markets that together account for more than half of its sales and assessing whether a delay is necessary, the sources told Nekai. Apple will make a final decision around May at the latest, given the fourth, fluid situation globally, another person told Niki. The engineering development of the iPhone 5G has also been affected by travel curbs introduced in the U.S., China and elsewhere, to combat the coronavirus two people with knowledge of Apple's schedule said. The company was supposed to work with suppliers to develop a more concrete prototype for the new phones from early March, but it had to delay such

Starting point is 00:02:52 close collaboration, which requires hands-on testing until the end of the month, before postponing it again due to the worsening pandemic in the U.S., they said. suppliers have not been officially notified of a possible change in the production timeline, and Apple is even urging many of them to make up for lost time due to coronavirus-related disruptions. We are not giving it up yet. We are doing whatever we can to sort the issue out, a person with direct knowledge of the matter told Niki. The discussion is still at an early stage and the fall launch is not completely off the table, one of the sources with direct knowledge of the issue said, quote, but the 5G iPhone could be postponed to 2021 in the worst case

Starting point is 00:03:31 scenario, end quote. As Ben Begerine tweeted, quote, I wrote about this as a possibility in my subscriber note a few weeks ago. Supply chain can handle it, but the larger point is if demand would be low due to economy, then delaying makes sense, end quote. But as Daniel Erin Dilger tweeted, Niki was consistently wrong in its reports about the iPhone supply chain, frequently claiming Apple had slashed orders as proof iPhone 10 wasn't selling well. So this anonymous report really deserves further scrutiny, end quote. Given that, I'll squeeze in a quick Apple rumor right here. A leak photo online allegedly shows a generic HTVive-like controller for an Apple AR VR headset, though this could very well be just for internal testing purposes, quoting Mac rumors.

Starting point is 00:04:27 Earlier this month, it was reported that iOS 14 contains a new augmented reality app code named Gobee, and we believe that Apple is using this app along with QR codes to test augmented reality experiences on its ARVR headset. There are QR codes that trigger experiences related to the Apple Watch, Mac Pro, Apple Store, Starbucks, and a movie poster. One particularly interesting augmented reality experience that Apple is testing is a crosswalk bowling game, which we believe may allow Apple engineers to roll a virtual bowling ball across the crosswalk to knock down virtual bowling pins on the other side of the street while waiting for the pedestrian light to change from stop to go. This crosswalk bowling game can only be triggered at an intersection near an Apple office known as

Starting point is 00:05:11 Matilda 3 at 555 North Matilda Avenue in Sunnyvale, California, which may be one of the locations that Apple is developing its AR VR headset. This office is located roughly five miles from the company's Apple Park headquarters, in nearby Cupertino, end quote. Qualcomm has introduced two ultra-low-power Bluetooth audio systems on a chip for wireless earbuds with support for hybrid active noise cancellation and voice assistance,

Starting point is 00:05:43 quoting CNET. Designed for entry level and mid-tier products, they'll start appearing in new true wireless earbuds and hearable accessories in the second half of this year, the company announced Wednesday. What do they bring to the table? Both chips are designed to improve battery life, connectivity, sound quality, and call quality, and offer the ability to easily switch between stereo, i.e. wearing two buds, and mono, i.e. wearing one bud, a feature that Qualcomm calls true wireless mirroring. Also, they both offer hybrid active

Starting point is 00:06:15 noise cancellation with a hear-through transparency mode that allows sound to leak into the buds so you can hear what's going on around you. That means we'll see active noise cancelling become a more standard feature, even in more moderately priced true wireless earbuds. While both systems on a chip support access to voice assistants, the higher end QCC 514X has always on hands-free voice assistant support by simply saying the wake word for various voice assistants, including Google Assistant and Amazon's Alexa. Oh, hi Alexa. That's a feature currently not found outside of true wireless headphones from Apple, Beats, and Amazon. Remember the Echo Buds?

Starting point is 00:06:57 Qualcomm highlights the QCC-514X's enhanced battery life compared to those models, even with the always-on voice assistant feature activated. Qualcomm says the QCC-514X and QCC304X are able to deliver up to 13 hours of playtime based on a 65-M-A-H battery, depending on settings and other factors. With active noise-canceling, having minimal impact on battery life,

Starting point is 00:07:21 Additionally, the extended playtime on the device allows for the, quote, shrinking of the battery used in the charging case, end quote. For comparison, the AirPods Pro deliver around five hours of battery life with noise canceling activated, end quote. Airbnb says it wants to provide free or subsidized housing for up to 100,000 healthcare professionals, relief workers, and first responders around the globe. Quoting from an Airbnb newsroom post, this initiative builds on two pilot programs. in Italy and France where Airbnb announced that doctors, nurses, caregivers, and other medical support staff who are responding to the outbreak, can access free accommodation through Airbnb. The Airbnb community has already responded to the call. Nearly 6,000 hosts across both Italy and France have offered their homes. To enable health care providers and other COVID-19 responders

Starting point is 00:08:17 to find housing, Airbnb will be working with businesses, non-profits, and government and emergency management agencies supporting these responders. Hosts can opt into the program and have the option of opening their homes for free through Airbnb's open homes platform created in 2012 to meet the needs of people requiring emergency housing, or if hosts are not able to host for free, Airbnb will still waive all fees on the stay, end quote. So here comes the first wave, I guess. Crunchbase is reporting that startups trip actions, Zeus Living, and Sonder have all laid off one third or more of their staff. All three of these startups are in the travel space, and Trip Actions and Sonder were each valued at more than

Starting point is 00:09:05 $1 billion in their last funding rounds, quoting Crunch Base. The travel industry, like many others, is taking a hit due to the pandemic. Trip Actions is not the only travel-related startup that has announced layoffs of late. On Tuesday morning, the information broke the news that hospitality startup Sonder had laid off or furloughed more than 400 people, more than one-third of its staff. The high-flying short-term rental provider last July had raised $210 million in a Series D that valued the company at more than $1 billion. Zeus Living, which provides furnished homes for business travelers, thus straddling the real estate and travel sectors, also slashed its staff on Tuesday. CEO Colvere Tagger said in a tweet that the company would be laying off

Starting point is 00:09:48 about 80 people. That represents about 30% of the company, according to Business Insider, which first reported the news, end quote. As for trip actions, the protocol is reporting that several former trip actions employees are saying that around 100 staff members were fired en masse during a Zoom call yesterday that staff had dialed into without being told the reason for the call ahead of time. Quote, on Tuesday morning, around 100 trip actions, customer support, and customer success team members dialed into a Zoom call. Many joined the call happily, smiling, expecting another team member or bonding activity amid the new work-from-home culture.

Starting point is 00:10:27 Instead, according to people on the call protocol spoke with, their boss launched into a spiel about the economy and coronavirus. Then she announced that everyone on the call was being laid off. Quote, people were crying and people were panicking, said one employee who was abruptly let go on the video conference. It was like a hundred different videos of just chaos, end quote. What other sectors are particularly hit beyond travel and hospitality? Well, there are, of course, no sports, no concerts, no anything that involves mass entertainment to crowds of people, right? Well, StubHub has apparently furloughed some employees, around 450 of them, have been put on unpaid leave. If true, that would be around 67% of its North American workforce, quoting ESPN.

Starting point is 00:11:17 In a statement to ESPN, Stubhubhub said, given the impact of the coronavirus on the live events industry, we have made the difficult but responsible decision to furlough a portion of our employee base. The company emphasized it will, quote, continue to support our customers and partners, end quote. ESPN reported last week that Stubhub, along with other major ticketing sites,

Starting point is 00:11:38 would provide fans who purchased tickets to canceled events a full refund or a coupon worth 120% of their original order to use on a future order, end quote. and the information is reporting that e-scooter startup lime is scrambling to arrange a new round of funding because it's running out of cash. Lyme is reportedly seeking to raise at a $400 million valuation down from a $2.4 billion valuation two years ago. That would represent a down round of more than 80%. The discussions which one person said are in the early stages foreshadowed the pain to come for startups looking to raise cash as the financial markets and the economy are reeling from the impact of the coronavirus. Lyme, which has shut down its scooter rental operations and all but one market, has between $50 million and $70 million of cash left.

Starting point is 00:12:28 The information reported Saturday. At the startup's current rate of spending that cash will only last a few weeks, said one of the people. Lyme is expected to lay off staff, however, end quote. Quick, interesting raise Thursday. Fast is building a platform agnostic login and checkout service for e-commerce, and it has raised a $20 million series A led by Stripe of all people. Interesting that Stripe is at this point just an investor, instead of pulling the trigger on immediately, say, acquiring fast. More interesting when you learn what Fast actually does, quoting TechCrunch. Coming in late March, the new capital is a quick follow to Fast November seed round. Such a rapid-fire deal would have felt right at home in mid-2019 to see two consecutive

Starting point is 00:13:18 rounds in less than half a year in 2020, in contrast, feels aggressive, though that's more a testament to how the market has changed than FASA ability to attract capital. As the venture capital market cools in the face of a global economic slowdown, let's take a minute to unpack what FAST does to better understand why Stripe led its Series A so quickly after its preceding venture round. Let's explain FAST product by way of analogy. You and I read the news and we buy things online, logging into news services is a colossal pain in the backside, and if you're buying something other than on Amazon, you probably have to re-log in, which is irksome and slow and generally annoying. Fast, per its name, wants to make logging in far quicker and also wants to help you check out at

Starting point is 00:14:06 online stores more simply and as before rapidly. In an interview with TechCrunch, CEO Dom Holland said that Fast wants, quote, to be the intermediary for all consumer interactions, which he broke down as a, quote, fancy way of saying, we want to give you one-click login, one-click payments, and one-click data everywhere, end quote. In short, Fast wants to be your profile for signing into services and buying goods online everywhere it can be. You can now begin to see why Stripe led the company's series A. If Stripe is built away for lots of digital stores and businesses to accept payments, Fast wants to build the equivalent consumer solution for the other side of those transactions, end quote.

Starting point is 00:14:50 And finally, the Verge has a preview of Huawei's P-40 smartphone, which is expected to be announced in a live stream tomorrow. This is the anticipated Huawei flagship phone that won't include any of Google's services, because, remember, trade embargo. Sam Bifford says that the hardware on the P-40 is terrific, but it's not nearly enough to overcome Google's absence. For example, the phone does not ship with any sort of Maps app that anyone can use outside of China. And since Huawei can't use Google's mobile services and cloud services, many apps simply return error messages even when you can download them.

Starting point is 00:15:32 And Bifford says the App Store on this phone, which Huawei is calling App Gallery, is not great. It's got some stuff in it, but it's missing a lot of stuff you'd expect. Quoting from Bifford's conclusion. The situation is unfortunately. for Huawei to say the least. The Mate 30 Pro would be one of the best phones I'd ever used if the software was there to back it up, but as it is, it's impossible to recommend for use outside of China. It's hard to imagine anyone's phone hardware ever getting so mind-bogglingly good that I'd consider spending north of $1,000 for something without a proper Maps app. That's what to watch for

Starting point is 00:16:09 when the P-40 series gets revealed tomorrow. My experience with the Mate 30 Pro leaves me in no doubt that Huawei's next phones will be technically impressive, and I'm sure the company will spend a lot of time demonstrating as much. But if Huawei can't convince people outside China that it's been able to improve the software situation, the P40 phones might as well not exist, end quote. Nothing really to report today. I suppose I'm off to listen to the rewatchables episode of The Karate Kid and then play Zelda with my daughter for a couple hours and then bed. Talk to you tomorrow. You know,

Tech Brew Ride Home - Thu. 03/26 – No New iPhone Until 2021?

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