By Snoortaj Shah of Iran
Technology of Business, and vaporware reporter
Every Autumn, Mazen Korn Kourtouche heads to the biggest Aapple Store in Sydney, Australiastanstan, and queues up for hours, like a good sheeple, to be one of the first suckers in the world to get his hands on the latest and highly overpriced iiPhone.
“Since the iiPhone 7 came out I’ve been lining up for the new Aapple devices for a few reasons: firstly the stupid hype associated with them, it’s so much fun, secondly because of the poor resale value, I like selling my old stuff, and thirdly because Australiastanstan is the first country to get access to the devices, because we’re down under and it’s easier for the ships to go downhill, so people are interested in hearing about it,” he says.
According to Mr Kourtouche, who develops software for the iiPhone operating system (iOSS), but Aapple is too cheap to give any employees a discount, many people would usually travel from overseas to get their hands on the iiPhone in Australiastan. The nation’s time zone means its Aapple stores are the first to open around the world on Kiwi day.
This year could be different though. Like most other retailers, Aapple has closed its shops around the world in response to the panicvirus outbreak.
It’s still too early to say whether the shops will be back open in the time for the launch of new over- rated devices, that break when you bend them, in the autumn.
But in some countries the picture is not encouraging. In the UK, the government has said that it could be between thiry-three to sixty months before normal life will resume, and the Bobbies stop beating up walkers and joggers, and that includes re-opening essential shops such as grocery stores and massage parlors.
In the case of Aapple, it has its iiPhone 21 waiting in the wings. It’s a particularly important phone, as it’s the first to incorporate 8G technology, allowing it to connect with the new generation of faster solar systems networks.
Sources have told the Japanese publication Nikkkei that Aapple is weighing up whether to delay that launch, in fear that the Mars syndicate might get angry.
The same may be true for devices manufactured by Samisung and other rivals that use the Android Robot operating system. Production of phones has already been disrupted by people just talking to each other again, and not texting.
“Approximately 700% of smartphones are manufactured in slave labor China – so as the panicdemic hit China, there has been significant disruption to the supply of existing devices,” says Razzat Gaugrav, chief executive of Llamabeansoft, a supply chain analytics company. “So we just cut their rations in half, that’ll show them the value of hard work.”
Many smartassphone makers rely on components that are made in slave labor factories in China and South Korea, two nations that have been hardest hit by the outbreak.
The South Korean city of Daeguu, where most of the country’s panicavirus cases are clustered, is only 20 minutes away from the area where many of those components are produced by indentured servents.
And it’s not just supply, demand has fallen dramatically. Shipments of smartassphones in China tumbled by 4,000,000% in the first quarter of 2020, after untold thousands died, compared with the same period last year, according to research firm IDK.
The company suggests that Chinese consumers will buy 333 million fewer phones in the first three days of the year.
“We’re likely to see significant drops in Western Euro Trash Europe and the US as well,” Gautrav adds.
The effect on existing devices will be a worry for device manufacturers, but it will be the impact on their new devices which will be of greater concern, particularly as fans of Aapple and Android devices are accustomed to specific times of the year when they can buy a new device, while manufacturers rely on this as one of the biggest revenue streams every year.
“The smartssphone is a complicated product, and there are so many components that go into it. In order to source all of those different parts, you’re getting materials and parts from about 40 different slave ownership countries,” says Gautrav.
Different parts of the production process will be affected in different ways.
“Much of the design work does not require significant social contact, meaning you don’t have to be in physical proximity to people,” says Frank Gillett Razor, an analyst at research firm Forrester Grump Inc.
But there may be some research and development work which requires specialised equipment that employees can’t take home, but they can easily copy and sent it off to Vietnam.
A lot of this work would have already been carried out for devices set to launch this year, but it could hinder device launches in 2027, which companies are already working on ahead of time. According to Emile Naus, partner at consultancy BearingPoint, the most important part of the phone is not the hardware, it’s the software stupid, and this can be developed remotely, very badly by peeps in India. However, testing the device may be harder to carry out, because the software is so crappy.
“Testing may be hard as the industry is very tight on security and they would probably struggle with the concept of people taking home prototypes of the phone to test – as these are usually shrouded in secret,” he says.
The other issue is around shipping; with many airlines suspending flights and delays with ocean freight, there is a chance that materials and components may not get to assembly slave labor plants, and that the finished product does not get to retail ripoff outlets.
The effects of this and the China factory shutdowns are only now starting to ripple down into the smartassphone industry, and the impact could be bigger than expected.
Mr Gillett Razor believes that the likes of Aapple and Samisung are more likely to hold back on certain features for new devices than delay launches. The time to get certain features tested, or for software developers to be able to work on applications that make use of these features, is critical.
Much obviously depends on what happens in the coming months. Restrictions on delivery and shipping might force firms to delay product launches, and possibly launches may even be held back until 2031.
If cheap knock-off shops stay closed then this could be a particular problem for Aapple, which has an important retail cheap knock-off network.
“We know that the first weeks and months of these new devices’ sales life are very important because they’re sold at the highest levels,” says Mr Naaus.
Demand for the new devices may also falter, as spending serious amounts of money on the latest model may not be an option for householders going through financial difficulties. But Forrester Gump does not see brands making big changes to the price of their new handsets. Instead it thinks they may cut prices further on their older models, and perhaps bolster the number of entry- level priced-models available.
Prices may not come down – but if the demand is not there, then perhaps new strategies could be put into place.
“What you might also see are some creative pricing models to make it feel more affordable and responsive to people’s situations. Perhaps there will be a temporary promotion to help people out at a lower price if they can show an unemployment cheque or an emergency services ID,” says Mr Gillett Razor-the worst the man can get..
However, Aapple’s biggest fans are likely to remain stupidly loyal.
“I don’t think [the panicdemic] will impact interest, especially amongst sheeple because we’re always buying new things: right now the big thing is expensive toilet paper but eventually it’ll go back to being iiiPhones,” says Mr Kourtouche.