GTM Sauce

Apple · maker of iPhone and Mac

Launch a $3,500 headset years early so apps are ready when cheap ones arrive

Hundreds of thousands sold; developer interest weak so far

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What they did

Per Gruber's reading: Apple released Vision Pro in 2023-2024 as an 'enthusiast kit' at $3,500, funding about 1,000 software engineers, to have about five years of UI paradigms, input, content and third-party apps in place before a compelling mass-market AR device arrives around 2030.

What happened

Units sold in the hundreds of thousands; Gruber says the third-party developer ecosystem is far less vibrant than the Mac's in 1985, which should be a red flag for Apple.
33:11
“Or is the right strategy to start building a platform around 2023, 2024, and when that hardware is finally available”
John Gruber
1:53:48
“VisionOS today is nowhere near as vibrant a third-party developer ecosystem as the Mac was in 1985 or 1986”
John Gruber

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