Apple to withdraw from Macworld Expo
By siliconindia   |   Wednesday, 17 December 2008, 23:41 IST
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San Francisco: Apple is moving away from the annual mega expo Macworld, in which the company used to announce the launch of its innovative products every year. The company revealed that its iconic Chief Executive Steve Jobs will not make his traditional appearance as a key note speaker in the forthcoming event, which is supposed to be the last Macworld for Apple. Philip Schiller, Senior Vice President of Worldwide Product Marketing will replace Job on stage in San Francisco on January 6. Macworld expo is conducted every year, participating Apple Macintosh computer devotees, including users, developers and innovators pitching Macintosh-related products. Steve Jobs has used his key notes since the first Macworld, held in San Francisco in 1985 to unveil world-captivating products such as iPods, iPhones, iTunes, and Macbook Air laptop computers. People were queuing up to ensure their presence in Job's key not session at Macworld. His decision to withdraw from doing a farewell speech in the next event indicates that his health is in trouble. Apple believes that its popular real-world and online stores have made it easy to connect with fans without having to spend money on an expo. The company has also recently stopped going to similar expos in New York, Tokyo and Paris. Rob Enderle, analyst of Enderle Group said, Apple is now a mainstream vender and they don't have to collect all the loyalists together and chat with them." "Apple's practice of using the Macworld stage to announce innovative products put pressure on the company to have hip, new things to launch every January." He believes that is an unsustainable position for a company to be in given product development and production cycles. Moreover, the customers might wait to see what Apple announces in January instead of buying what the company had on store shelves during the year-end shopping season. Enderle further added that Apple pulling out will kill an event that cost them money and they weren't getting much benefit out of.

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