Steve Jobs - Apple Product Matrix Strategy 1997
JackIsBack15Cited 4× on HN, 2016–2026
other · general · evergreen · 2016–2026 on HN
A one-minute clip of Steve Jobs describing how he cut Apple's product line down to a four-quadrant matrix of consumer and pro, desktop and portable, during the 1997 turnaround.
Cited in Apple product-line threads as a reminder of the focus Jobs brought by reducing offerings to a few great products.
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4 comments from Hacker News
I think Steve would have approved of the Neo. The 96/97 lineup was a mess so if a customer asked what to buy you wouldn't know. Now it's fairly simple - Nano for budget users and school, Air for general public, Pro for pros. 1m vid of Jobs on the product line ▶ this video
▶ this video I don't think he aimed for 4 products in a specific line, so he'd probably be miffed about how many variants there are between each. I think the 4 iPads would be forgivable if there was consistency between the various product lines naming. iPhone _ Plus vs iPad Pro vs iPhone XS Max? That by itself is 3 different "descriptors" for their big screen devices (granted, Pro is less about big screen and more about spec stuffing, but non-tech consumers I know think iPad Pro = big screen iPad = expensive iPad).
I remember that back then it was very hard to figure out which Apple computer to buy. Model names had proliferated, thanks to the marketing department, and you needed a spreadsheet to figure out the differences between them. One of the best things Steve ever did was to reduce the offerings to just "four great products." ▶ this video
The article mentions the iPhone SE and how its expected sales are not expected to offset the slowdown of the iPhone 6s and 6s+ sales. I realized I had forgotten the SE even existed (even though it was just been announced a few weeks ago) until this article reminded me of it. To me, this is just further confirmation that Apple's product line is a complete mess. Just go to (apple.com/iphone/compare) or (apple.com/ipad/compare) and look at how ridiculous it is. Can anyone really tell me which one of those models is "best"? There is no clear winner -- the ones with the bigger screen sizes and storage capacity don't have the latest CPUs or other features. Anyone remember the simple "Good, Better, Best" models of Powerbooks? It is starting to feel like Apple is overdue for a product line simplification, like when the four quadrant product grid was first introduced: ▶ this video