Two Reasons Apple Killed the Product Founder Steve Jobs Said the Company “Finally Cracked It”

Apple, before the launch of Apple TV app and Apple TV set-top box, explored a full-fledged television with touchscreen capabilities, a report has said. The prototypes of these devices were ready even when Steve Jobs, before his passing, claimed to have solved the puzzle of creating a Apple TV. However, this vision never materialized.
According to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, before his death in 2011, the Apple co-founder told biographer Walter Isaacson that he had “finally cracked it,” referring to large-screen prototypes that could also double as a touchscreen Mac or iPad.
The product would sync with other devices and the iCloud service, Jobs said, and “have the simplest user interface you could imagine.”

Apple shelved TV-like device launch

Gurman said that despite this progress, Apple ultimately shelved the project for two reasons. One was the low profit margins and the other was high production and shipping costs.
Gurman said Apple’s analysis of the TV market as a business suggested that TVs offer low margins and that consumers typically don’t buy new ones very often, similar to the way they upgrade to iPhones or Mac PCs.
“The efforts never reached as far as the Apple Watch or Vision Pro — or even the now-defunct self-driving car. TV is a low-margin industry, and consumers don’t buy new very often. At the time, Apple was very dependent on people upgrading iPhones, iPads and Macs as often as possible (this is still true today, but at least the company has a healthier service business). A low-margin device without a path to upgrades would have been a mistake,” Gurman added.
High production costs also proved to be a deal-breaker. The overall cost of shipping TV-like devices from factories to people’s homes was also a concern.
“Apple also immediately encountered cost concerns, including the cost of air-shipping giant panels from factories to warehouses to homes. The company would have needed to develop and produce new chips to power the displays as well as the input-output electronics. And the project would have required manufacturing facilities for high-quality displays and adequate supplies of glass,” Gurman added.
however, it appears that Jobs’ ‘TV dream’ may not be dead because Apple is rumored to be working on a TV. You can read more about that here.

Launch of Apple TV set-top box and upcoming smart screens

However, this did not affect Apple’s ambitions to reach people’s televisions. Apple now offers Apple TV box for streaming and Apple TV+ app that has a selection of successful content.
Gurman has also said that Apple is actively developing various smart devices for the home, including a wall-mounted smart display “that users can stick in their kitchens for video conferencing and finding recipes.”
Notably, Amazon recently launched a 21-inch smart display and gave the Echo Show 15 an upgrade. By comparison, Apple’s version is said to be the size of two iPhones side by side, putting the total screen size under 7 inches.