Apple

Apple today posted a new advertisement for the iPad to highlight artist Elliphant’s recording and beat making via the tablet. The one minute long ad highlights different applications used to make music with the iPad, ranging from first-party apps like Garageband to third-party programs such as Manual Camera and Nano Studio. The “iPad Remix” of the song All or Nothing is linked to from Apple’s page for the advertisement, and it is worth a listen to see how music made an iPad sounds. The full video advertisement is embedded below. This ad is the latest in a string of iPad Air 2 “Change” ads, which began going live after the new device started shipping last fall.

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Six months after buying the subscription music service Beats Music, Apple is actively working to launch a completely new paid streaming music service that will compete with Spotify and Rdio. Yet to be named, the new service is entirely Apple-designed, yet leverages Beats’ technologies and music content, a collaboration that has thus far led to personnel challenges and delays. Multiple sources within Apple and the music industry have provided the first in-depth details of Apple’s upcoming streaming service, which we share below.

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Kantar World Panel’s Carolina Milanesi has crunched the numbers and notes that iOS beat Android in the US in the holiday quarter with a hefty .1% margin — iOS devices accounted for 47.7% of sales, Android devices accounted for 47.6%. Apple’s iOS beat Android in other key markets including Japan and Australia but still trailed in others in Europe and China.
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Apple may be preparing a big update to its Maps application for iOS and OS X. San Francisco’s KPIX reported earlier today that a Dodge Caravan sporting an impressive array of cameras has been spotted roaming the area. The California DMV confirmed that the vehicle (seen in the photos above and below, via Claycord) was leased to Apple.

The CBS affiliate reached out to technology analyst Rob Enderle for his thoughts on what this might be. Enderle said that this van simply has too many cameras (a whopping twelve of them) to be a mapping car—though he failed to note that Google uses even more cameras on its own Street View cars.

Video and more photos after the break…

Seagate will discontinue its lineup of Thunderbolt storage products in favor of pushing Thunderbolt under its premium LaCie brand, 9to5Mac has learned.

A company spokesperson confirmed the move noting that the product life cycles for the company’s USM technology, which allowed integration of interfaces like Thunderbolt through adapters, is “coming to a conclusion.”
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Last month Apple rolled out support for dozens of banks and credit unions with Apple Pay bringing the count to more than 45 institutions, and today Apple is out with the first wave of the month adding more than a dozen new banks to its list of supported Apple Pay banks bringing the total count to over 60 institutions. Here are the new banks listed as supporting Apple Pay as of today:
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Apple is looking to hire individuals across the US for a team of IBM Business Development Executives that “will be accountable for all aspects of the Apple and IBM partnership for a defined geographic and account set territory.” That means Apple is hiring a team of individuals that will act as company liaisons to help roll out and oversee sales teams pushing the new Apple/IBM iOS solutions to enterprise customers. The positions, which are industry and region-specific, also show Apple’s plan for the upcoming expansion of its enterprise solutions for new industries including manufacturing and healthcare. 
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[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tZTRTv56k58]

Following the latest drone flyover video of Apple’s under construction “Campus 2” last month, today we get an up-to-date look at progress over the last several weeks with another 4K video courtesy of Myithz.
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Following the October surprise bankruptcy filed by GT Advanced Technologies—a key sapphire supplier for the iPhone—Apple today announced plans to invest $2 billion over the next 30 years in the failed plant. The Mesa, Arizona-located plant will become the central command center for its various data centers around the globe.

“We’re proud to continue investing in the U.S. with a new data center in Arizona, which will serve as a command center for our global networks,” Kristin Huguet, a spokeswoman for Cupertino, California-based Apple, wrote in an e-mailed statement on Monday. “This multibillion-dollar project is one of the largest investments we’ve ever made.”

Shortly after the bankruptcy announcement from GT Advanced Technologies, Apple described the decision as surprising while adding that the company would focus on job preservation.
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IDC is out today with its numbers on tablet shipments for Q4 2014 showing Apple remained on top of the market both last quarter and throughout 2014 despite a slight drop in overall market share.

Apple sold 21.4 million iPads during the holiday quarter last year, which gave the company around 28% market share compared to 33% with 26 million units sold during the same quarter last year. Apple beats out number two Samsung, according to IDC, which grabbed 14.5% of the market in Q4 with 11 million units shipped. Samsung also dipped in overall market share from 17.2% with 13.5 million units shipped in the year ago quarter.
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My next new car probably won’t have CarPlay. I’ve reached this decision in part due to automakers’ slow crawl to put CarPlay in vehicles that you can actually buy today. While 2015 may bring the feature to more vehicles on the road with more than 30 automobile brands committed to ship CarPlay in the future, we’re still not there yet and the roll out is slow.

More influential, though, is my experience using aftermarket CarPlay in my current car for several months convincing me that CarPlay’s features are not yet where they need to be. As I noted in my hands-on review last fall, CarPlay introduces a new set of problems while trying to make using your iPhone in the car safer and easier.

So if CarPlay isn’t ultimately the answer to creating a better iPhone experience on the road, then what is? I’m convinced the Apple Watch will be better suited…

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Apple’s annual Back to School sale in Australia and New Zealand has gone live with a promotion for qualifying students to receive Apple Store credit with the purchase of a Mac, iPad, or iPhone. Similar to last year, the Back to School sale includes the usual education pricing on Macs and iPads, but this year Apple is including Apple Store gift cards rather than App Store gift cards like last year.
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Following on the heels of a record-breaking quarter for Apple, Strategy Analytics has crunched the numbers and crowned Apple the king of the smartphone vendors for Q4 2014—or rather, one of the kings. It seems the Cupertino company managed to tie rival Samsung for the title.

Both companies shipped 74.5 million handsets during the quarter, though Samsung still outsold Apple in terms of the annual total by a hefty margin. Those quarterly sales gave both companies an equal marketshare of 19.6%.

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Apple broke many records with its latest quarter reporting $74.6 billion in revenue and $18 billion in profit with 74.4 million iPhones sold, numbers which greatly surpassed both Apple’s guidance and the even higher consensus analysts predicted, and Wall Street is taking notice.

Following a dismal day for the market yesterday which saw Apple down a few points ahead of its earnings report—it was soon back on the rise in after hours trading—both Apple and the Dow are climbing this morning largely due to those record numbers yesterday. Hovering around 7.5% higher since opening this morning and occasionally crossing 8%, Apple is positioned to cross its previous record high shortly.
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Apple announced a lot of numbers during its fiscal Q1 2015 earnings call today in addition to confirming the Apple Watch will ship in April. Some of Apple’s highlights include numbers on Apple Pay since its launch in October, the 1 billionth iOS device shipping in November, and big growth in China as Apple sells a record 74.4 million iPhones during the quarter.

Head below for a roundup of stats and milestones that Apple announced during the call:
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Today during Apple’s Q1 earnings call with investors, CEO Tim Cook announced that the company sold its billionth iOS device back in November.
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