Shares of Snapchat parent Snap (NYSE:SNAP) are jumping today, up 5% as of 11:20 a.m. EDT, after the company unveiled a handful of new offerings yesterday. Wall Street analysts were somewhat mixed on the news, but some upgraded Snap shares in research notes this morning.
So what
On Thursday, Snap hosted its first partner conference and unveiled a new mobile gaming platform that would be ad-supported and free for users. Titles will include original games and third-party games from partner developers. Snap is also launching eight more Snap Originals, exclusive short-form video content with shows that typically run just a few minutes. Snapchat will get additional augmented reality (AR) video filters that aren't focused on selfies but instead incorporate AR technology into other types of overlays like famous landmarks, among others. Snapchat will soon allow users to share Stories on other third-party apps, too.
Image source: Snap.
As part of its growing ad business, Snap announced the Snap Audience Network, an ad network that will allow it to run ads in other apps. The most prominent digital advertising businesses utilize ad networks to expand their reach and ad-targeting capabilities.
Now what
The Snap Audience Network is potentially the most important of the announcements, as the core Snapchat platform has seemingly peaked in terms of user growth. Lacking user growth, launching an ad network could allow Snap to continue growing its advertising business outside of Snapchat.
However, analyst reactions were mixed. Morgan Stanley analysts believe the new offerings have potential but "material monetization of this new engagement is not as straightforward," opting to keep a sell rating and $5.50 price target. Stifel has a neutral rating and $10 price target, with analysts saying the announcements showed Snap can still innovate. Summit Insights upgraded Snap shares from sell to hold while doubling its price target from $5 to $10. Bank of America Merrill Lynch kept its neutral rating but increased its price target from $10 to $12.
Overall, analysts were cautiously optimistic about the news, recognizing the potential while waiting to see if Snap can execute.
Amazon is making wireless earbuds equipped with its voice assistant Alexa, Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reported Thursday.
Citing anonymous sources within the company, Gurman said the earbuds will look and function like Apple’s super-popular AirPods, but that Amazon is working on better audio quality for its version of the product. His report details specific features:
The headphones will let people use their voice to order goods, access music, weather and other information on the go. The Amazon digital assistant will be summoned by saying “Alexa.” There will be physical gesture controls, such as tapping to pick up and end calls and switch between songs, the people said. Amazon declined to comment.
The Amazon earbuds will be the first Alexa wearable and will help the company push its voice assistant into more and more daily routines — skirting the fact that it doesn’t have a naturally compatible operating system that puts it on millions of phones, as Siri does with iOS or Google Assistant does with Android.
Gurman also cites Counterpoint Research, saying that Apple sold more than 7 million pairs of AirPods in the last quarter of 2018 alone. The first generation of AirPods debuted in September 2016, and the devices have been mimicked by Google, which released its poorly reviewed Pixel Buds in October 2017, and Samsung, which launched its also poorly reviewed Galaxy Buds this February.
AirPods have been a bizarre cultural moment, in part because they looked very strange when people first started wearing them in public and in part because they were so expensive ($159) and so easy to lose. “Owners of AirPods are rich idiots” quickly became a popular meme genre, and AirPods are an entire “subculture” on the internet phenomena database Know Your Meme.
The memes have gotten stranger and more elaborate over the past six months, peaking again around the holidays — this time with TikTok clips mocking AirPod owners for assuming that anyone who still has wires on their headphones is homeless, and with viral Instagram posts, including one that shows people who were gifted AirPods at Christmas being knighted as new “members” of the cultural elite.
Top 10 richest people (Forbes 2018) 1. Airpod users 2. Amazon CEO 3. Bill Gates 4. People who refuse to shop at Walmart 5. Mark Zuckerberg 6. Jay-Z 7. People who say "let's get this bread" 8. Floyd Mayweather 9. Oprah 10. People with "entrepreneur" or " " in their bio
“The AirPod jokes wave has crested once again,” New York magazine’s Brian Feldman wrote in January. According to Mashable, a 27-year-old lobbyist was mocked by a group of 20 preteens for wearing normal earbuds earlier this year. (“I was walking to my office down Pennsylvania Avenue and began putting my headphones [in] to make a call. A group of 20 or so middle school students passed by me with one loudly proclaiming ‘nice headphone[s]’ and another exclaiming ‘POOR.’”)
Apple launched the second-generation AirPods in March 2019, marking them up to $199. For Amazon, the typical play is to make super-cheap hardware that becomes ubiquitous because it seems silly not to buy it. Its AirPods competitor, it would be reasonable to assume, will come at a price point significantly lower than Apple’s; this imperative could be why, as the Gurman report mentions, the company has had such a hard time finding a manufacturer. As with the proliferation of its Echo smart speakers, Amazon probably doesn’t even care if it takes a hit on the product. It just wants Alexa in every ear.
The milestone is a turning point in the race to be the dominant streaming music service, and an early sign of success for Apple's new "services" strategy which aims to sell existing iPhone users paid monthly subscriptions to online services.
In February, Apple Music had 28 million paid subscribers in the United States and Spotify had 26 million, according to the report, which cited people familiar with the matter.
The report also mentioned that Apple Music's worldwide and United States growth rates are higher than Spotify's.
Spotify still has more subscribers than Apple Music. Spotify said it has 96 million paid users in February, and unlike Apple Music, it offers a free tier that's supported by advertising. Spotify has 207 million users when you add free users to the number of paid subscriptions.
Including people who use the free Spotify tier, Spotify has more users than Apple Music in the United States. Apple Music has 56 million paid subscribers worldwide, according to the Financial Times.
But Apple Music has a few advantages that Spotify doesn't. It comes pre-installed on iPhones, of which there are 900 million currently in use around the world. The biggest U.S. carrier, Verizon, bundles free Apple Music subscriptions with certain cell phone service plans, but Spotify has similar deals with Sprint and Samsung.
Spotify and Apple are on bad terms. Last month, Spotify's CEO blasted Apple for what it called "unfair" policies around its App Store and filed an antitrust complaint with the European Commission. Apple responded in a statement on its site that said Spotify was wrapping "its financial motivations in misleading rhetoric."
Logic might dictate that it’s impossible for a pair of $30 headphones from a little-known brand to be better than $159 headphones from a huge company, but there’s one thing you have to consider when it comes to comparing the SoundPEATS True Wireless Bluetooth Earbuds to Apple’s AirPods: plastic. Since the tips of Apple’s AirPods are made of smooth plastic, you can’t create seal in order to isolate sound. With the SoundPEATS true wireless buds though, the tips are silicone so all that bass is locked into your ear canal. Definitely check them out before you spend more than five times as much on AirPods.
Here’s some additional info from the product page:
[TWS & BLUETOOTH 5.0] – Adopt global professional Realtek chipset, true wireless design with latest Bluetooth 5.0, the SoundPEATS TrueFree wireless earbuds own fast and stable transmission without tangling.
[SINGLE & COUPLE] – Support working together to enjoy stereo sound, or using one earbud only for preference or driving safety. Different from the previous version or other brand, the TrueFree wireless earbuds provide HiFi stereo sound at both music and phone calls.
[ONE-STEP PAIRING] – Born to offer you every convenience, the earbuds are built with very easy operation. Pull out the earbuds from charging case and hit on Bluetooth list. That’s how easily you get the earbuds paired.
[EXTENDED PLAYTIME] – Compact and lightweight magnetic charging case for you to carry the earbuds around. 3.5 hours playtime per charge and 15 hours in total, the earbuds strive to keep you company longer.
[BIG IN SMALL] – SoundPEATS TrueFree wireless earbuds fulfill all your fantasy and needs about Bluetooth earphones. As long as your device is with Bluetooth version above 4.0, you can use it with the earbuds. SoundPEATS provides 12 months hassle-free warranty to ensure the enjoyment of your purchase.
Follow @BGRDeals on Twitter to keep up with the latest and greatest deals we find around the web.
To learn more about our sponsored deals and sponsored posts opportunities, please email sponsored@bgr.com
BGR Deals content is independent of Editorial and Advertising, and BGR may receive a commission on purchases made through our posts.
April showers bring a May 2019 Update for Windows 10
Because my son is about to turn 21 and where does the time go, this edition of Short Takes looks at Microsoft’s glorious but overdue u-turn on Windows 10 updates, Microsoft’s retreat from the consumer market, U.S. governmental spying on Huawei, Samsung’s falling profits, and so much more.
Microsoft’s overdue about-face on Windows 10 updates is a win for humanity
For four years, Microsoft has jammed frequent, disruptive, and often-unreliable software updates down the throats of Windows 10 users. But this week, finally, it announced that it has heard the criticism: Starting with Windows 10 version 1903, set for broad release in May, it will allow all Windows 10 users—yes, even the lowly Windows 10 Home users who were previously treated like update guinea pigs—to defer so-called quality updates, which arrive one or more times every month, by up to 35 days. Furthermore, and even more important, it is moving so-called feature updates—which are really major Windows version upgrades—out of the normal Windows Update process so that no user will ever inadvertently install a mammoth upgrade when all they were really trying to do was make sure their PC had the latest security updates. Folks, this is what I’ve been asking for for four years. And while I do not appreciate the amount of time it took, I applaud the fact that it’s finally happening.
“Microsoft is finally fixing one of the worst things about Windows 10”
It’s getting rid of the emojis?
It’s official: Microsoft is exiting the consumer market
It will claim otherwise, but with Microsoft killing off yet another consumer service, I’m calling it: The firm no longer even tries to address the consumer market in any meaningful way. And, no, Xbox and video games don’t count: Even though gamers are, semantically speaking, “consumers,” they’re really prosumers and premium device buyers that have more in common with Surface PC owners than they do with the soccer moms playing Words with Friends on their smartphones. And the future of gaming is cloud-based, which has more to do with Azure than it does with Minecraft. Yes, Microsoft has many products and services aimed at individuals, but they are almost uniformly productivity-focused—OneDrive, Office 365, OneNote, Outlook.com, and so on—and are really aimed at upselling users to more fully-managed business solutions. There’s no need to fret over this: Microsoft is sticking with what it’s good at. And getting out of consumer markets for which it has no particularly skill or interest. So let’s observe a moment of silence and then move on. It’s over.
“Microsoft Nukes Its Ebooks Store, and That’s Probably for the Best”
No, it would have better not launching it in the first place.
U.S. government spied on Huawei, found evidence of sanction violations
The U.S. government gets really quiet when asked to produce any evidence that China-based electronics giant Huawei is colluding with the Chinese government to spy on corporations and governments in the west. (Because there isn’t any.) But it’s not above being hypocritical, apparently, as the U.S. government has itself spied on Huawei. And while it found no evidence of collusion, it says it did find evidence that Huawei violated U.S. sanctio Microsoft Nukes Its Ebooks Store, and That’s Probably for the Bestns against Iran and committed bank fraud. News of the U.S. spying on Huawei comes via a federal hearing at which Assistant U.S. Attorney Alex Solomon said that he intended to use information “obtained or derived from electronic surveillance and physical search” of Huawei. Oh, the irony.
“Apple hires Google’s top AI expert”
Now it will need to hire an ethics expert too.
Samsung profits fall through the floor
Looks like Apple isn’t the only smartphone giant that’s struggling these days: Samsung this week said that its operating income in the most recent quarter fell by an astonishing 60 percent year-over-year to $5.5 billion, its worst drop in four years. Samsung’s problems aren’t all phone related—in fact, memory chips sales were the biggest contributor to the shortfall—and it does expect its new lineup of S10 handsets to pick up steam in the coming quarter. But we’ll need to wait until later this month to get exact figures on smartphone sales. I expect a bloodbath: The S10 lineup actually launched in the quarter for which Samsung is now reporting results. I don’t see things improving going forward.
“AirPower: The Best Gadget Apple Never Made”
You are terrible.
Jeff Bezos retains control of Amazon in divorce
I don’t usually report on celebrity divorces for obvious reasons, but this one could have had relevant repercussions. Fortunately, however, Jeff Bezos will retain control of Amazon in the wake of his divorce from his wife MacKenzie, who will only walk away with a 25 percent stake in the online retailing giant. This will allow Mr. Bezos to retain his voting control of their $143 billion stake in Amazon. But don’t worry about MacKenzie: Her stake in Amazon is still worth $36 billion, making her the world’s third-richest woman. But here’s an even better way to look at it: MacKenzie Bezos’ stake in Amazon is worth more than the market values of nearly 70 percent of the companies in the S&P 500. I guess it really does pay to marry into wealth.
“France not on ‘crusade’ against U.S. with digital tax”
Right. It’s just on a crusade against certain giant tech firms. All of which happen to be based in the U.S.
Apple’s streaming music service has been adding subscribers in the world’s biggest music market more quickly than its Swedish rival, which leads globally.
Photo:
Richard B. Levine/Zuma Press
Apple Music has surpassed
Spotify Technology SA
SPOT 1.94%
in paid U.S. subscriptions, according to people familiar with the matter, in a shift that escalates the music rivals’ contest for listeners world-wide.
Apple Inc.’s
AAPL 0.29%
streaming-music service has been adding subscribers in the world’s biggest music market more rapidly than its Swedish rival—a monthly growth rate of about 2.6% to 3%, compared with 1.5% to 2% for Spotify—the people said.
Apple Music had more than 28 million subscribers in the U.S. as of February, compared with Spotify’s 26 million, the people said. Neither service publicly breaks out regional subscriber counts, and those figures include only paying users, excluding those in trial offerings that the companies can count in their public subscriber disclosures. Including nonpaying listeners of its ad-supported tier, who generate a fraction of the revenue subscribers do, Spotify has more users overall in the U.S.
Apple was expected to reach its milestone more than six months ago, but Spotify intensified efforts to maintain its lead, expanding various promotions including a discounted subscription bundle with video-streaming service Hulu. More recently, the Swedish company filed an antitrust complaint in Europe claiming Apple abuses its control over the App Store to advantage the iPhone maker’s service, something Apple denies.
Dow Jones & Co., publisher of The Wall Street Journal, has a commercial agreement to supply news through Apple services. Meanwhile, Spotify said in February that it agreed to buy podcaster Gimlet Media, with which The Wall Street Journal also has a content partnership.
Spotify remains far ahead of Apple globally. As of December, Spotify said it had 207 million active users around the world, 96 million of whom are paying subscribers or in a trial period leading to a subscription. The rest of Spotify’s active users have opted for a free, ad-supported version of the service. Apple, which doesn’t offer a free, ad-supported option, has more than 50 million paying subscribers.
The growth of Apple Music is one of the strongest validations yet of Apple’s strategy to increase revenue by selling services across its devices—a shift after decades of focusing on hardware sales. Last week, the technology company announced new subscription offerings for magazines, TV shows and videogames.
The push into subscriptions comes as Apple’s bread-and-butter iPhone business struggles. In January, the company reported its first decline in sales and profits for the holiday period after iPhone sales fell 15% to $52 billion. Services, which includes streaming-music subscriptions, device insurance and mobile payments, blunted those declines, rising 19% to $10.88 billion in the period.
As streaming has become the most popular way people listen to music—and the most lucrative source of growth for the recording industry—subscriptions have become the most closely watched metric for the services competing to grow market share.
Apple Music is growing faster globally—at a rate of about 2.4% to 2.8%, compared with Spotify’s 2% to 2.3%—and the gap is starting to close in other markets outside the U.S., according to the people familiar with the numbers.
Apple Music’s momentum is particularly pronounced in the other large, English-speaking territories where iTunes, the company’s music-download store, was popular and where iPhone usage is high.
Apple has used its devices’ popularity to attract music-streaming users. The Apple Music app comes preloaded on iPhones and other Apple hardware. The company has a base of about 101 million active iPhones in the U.S., according to Strategy Analytics, a market research firm.
From the invention of the phonograph in 1877 to the boom in streaming services today, the music industry has had to constantly adapt to emerging technology. In this video, we explore whether music can continue to reinvent itself to survive. Photo: Liliana Llamas/WSJ
The service is also available on Android devices and has been installed about 40 million times world-wide from the Google Play store, according to the app-tracking firm Sensor Tower.
Offers tying subscriptions to mobile-phone services have also helped Apple make significant inroads. For example, the company this month joined with
Verizon Communications Inc.
to provide six months of Apple Music free to new and current customers.
It has used its marketing muscle to accelerate subscriptions, spending twice as much as Spotify on TV ads in the U.S. since 2016, with spots during National Football League games, awards shows and other big events, according to ad measurement firm iSpot.tv.
Spotify, which went public last year, has responded with offerings of its own, including an offer of free Hulu access with premium subscriptions. It also has extended discounts—three months of its premium service for 99 cents—that drive much of its subscriber growth, according to people familiar with the matter.
The streaming-music service is trying to counter Apple’s distribution advantage of 1.4 billion active devices through an agreement struck in August with
Samsung Electronics Co.
, making Spotify the default music service across the South Korean company’s phones, TVs and speakers.
Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook, on a call with analysts last year, played down the competition among streaming-music providers, pointing instead to the potential size of the subscriber market.
Despite its growth, Apple’s streaming-music business isn’t expected to lift company profits. Costs associated with paying labels, publishers and artists means the service has a gross margin of roughly 15%, the lowest of any of Apple’s services, according to RBC Capital Markets.
“From Apple’s perspective, they’re not looking at this business for overall dollars,” said Ben Bajarin, an analyst with the technology firm Creative Strategies. “It’s about making the value of their hardware go up.”
Apple's "courage" in removing the headphone jack from the iPhone happened too early for most wireless earbuds manufacturers, including Apple itself. Now we're enjoying the second generation of the AirPods, but Apple looks set to get some new competition from one of the biggest players in the smart device category: Amazon.
As Bloomberg reports, Amazon is expected to release a competitor to Apple's AirPods in the second half of 2019. They will be very similar to the second generation of AirPods, with Alexa handling voice interactions alongside physical gestures for answering and ending a call among other things.
One area of focus is audio quality. Clearly Amazon wants to out perform Apple where it can, and a better audio experience seems to be the best bet for grabbing consumer attention. We can expect the Alexa earbuds to mirror AirPods in other areas, including shipping with a storage case that doubles as a charger, which can itself be recharged using a USB cable. As for colors, we should apparently expect black and gray options.
In order for these earbuds to be smart, Amazon needs to pair them with a smartphone. That means both Android and iOS devices will need to be running an Alexa app for them to function. As these apps are already popular, it shouldn't form a barrier for people opting to buy them over AirPods, but Amazon could offer another advantage when it comes to pricing.
More From PCmag
The AirPods currently sell for $159 with a charging case or $199 with a wireless charging case. Amazon is always keen to offer lower pricing than its rivals, so we could see the Alexa earbuds priced at $129 or even $99 if Amazon really wanted to make an impact. If the audio quality is better, too, they should be an instant hit.
