The people-friendly and cheap Vision Pro II can't save Apple's headset

In June 2023, Apple unveiled their "cross-era" product at WWDC 2023 - Vision Pro, which became the hottest product at the time with its excellent interactivity and top-level hardware stacking, and also made many consumers begin to understand the MR headset market. Recently, it was also revealed that Apple will officially mass produce the first-generation Vision Pro in December this year, with the first batch of about 400,000 units, with a sales target of 1 million units in 2024 and 10 million units in the third year.

(Image source: Apple's official website)

But to be honest, the price of $3,499 is "out of reach" for the vast majority of consumers, and it is difficult for anyone to really spend more than 30,000 yuan to buy such a gimmick more than practicality. Cook has said in an interview that he hopes the Vision Pro can lead Apple's future development direction and replace the iPhone as the company's new core product in the next 10 years.

Therefore, for Apple, they need a more affordable product to quickly occupy the relevant market share in the MR market and become the market leader. Coincidentally, Taiwan's Electronic Times revealed that Apple has begun to prepare the production plan of the second-generation Vision Pro, compared with the first generation, its biggest improvement is "affordable price", and Apple is currently developing AR glasses at the same time.

(Image source: Apple's official website)

It seems that Apple is really planning to make a splash this wave.

Friendly = easy to sell?

According to the revelations, the second generation of Vision Pro (tentative name) has four models, and it can be determined that at least one of the four is close to the people, and the material cost is only 50% of the first generation (the cost of the first generation of materials is 1800 US dollars, equivalent to 12877 yuan), that is, around 900 US dollars (equivalent to 6436 yuan), plus assembly and various transportation costs, Xiaolei guessed that its price is about 15000 yuan. Although this price still does not have much price advantage compared to manufacturers such as HTC and Pico, Apple has more advanced hardware configurations and a more complete ecosystem, which I believe can open a certain gap in the most important experience.

(Image source: Apple's official website)

According to Mark Gurman, the affordable version of the Vision Pro will shrink in display, chip, camera, speaker, 3D camera, frame, and may even abandon the H2 chip, which can greatly reduce Bluetooth latency.

The regular version of the Vision Pro 2nd generation will be tweaked in some details, and the redesigned battery module may also significantly reduce its size and weight, but the final result points in one direction: "price reduction".

Yes, no matter how good your product is, or even ahead of similar products, the high price dooms it to become a "toy" for a niche group. But the paradox is that Apple believes that the Vision Pro will be the "next iPhone", so it is the right choice to launch more low-cost and affordable "Vision", at least to make it affordable for developers who are willing to adapt to the software, so that there is a follow-up ecosystem to talk about.

Although Apple has not yet announced the ecological application of Vision Pro, according to the performance of products in the same market, Xiaolei personally believes that it is not optimistic, the number of developers in this field is not large, not to mention those high-quality developers, compared to this new field, they are more willing to put their time and resources on traditional mobile platforms. Christian Guyton, a British computing editor, also said that Vision Pro may be difficult to make achievements in the field of VR games, mainly because Apple has too many related restrictions, and it is really difficult for developers to get started.

I have to admit that the Vision Pro announced by Apple this year is extremely amazing in terms of technology and effect, although the price of more than 30,000 is indeed an "exaggeration", but it can indeed provide an experience that is difficult to achieve at this stage at the same cost, and its cost proportion is comparable to the average level of Apple products, which is within a reasonable range. It is foreseeable that even if it is sold at a price of $3,499, there will definitely be a grand situation of "hard to find", and everyone who wants to buy it as soon as possible will most likely face a large price increase.

However, this phenomenon will also cause a new wave of market development, as we have seen, Meta, Thunderbird, Pico, NOLO, HTC and other manufacturers are gradually improving their product power, I believe that the launch of Apple's Vision Pro will also make more consumers and developers pay attention to this new market in a period of rapid development. As for whether the Vision Pro can become the next iPhone, Xiaolei does not dare to define it yet, but it is certain that next year will be the year of the VR/MR market explosion.

(Image source: Meta official)

Apple is building a new moat?

In addition to the exposed Vision Pro second generation, some foreign media said that Apple is developing an augmented reality (AR) glasses, which may contain many features of the Vision Pro, but it is smaller and the price will be more reasonable. In recent years, Apple has continuously strengthened its R&D capabilities in the AR field, frequently acquiring and investing in related startups and technical experts. In addition, Apple actively cooperates with the global developer community to jointly promote the development and application of AR technology. This all lays the groundwork for Apple's next new market.

(Image source: Apple's official website)

So can Apple's Vision Pro bring a new oasis to Apple? It may be too early to answer this question. But what is certain is that the emergence of Vision Pro is to further consolidate Apple's own strong ecosystem, so that different Apple devices are more and more interactive and connected, so that users can become more and more inseparable from Apple's hardware family bucket. The Vision Pro, which is priced lower and more affordable, may drive more users to become loyal Apple users.

But can Apple really make another "iPhone"? In Xiaolei's view, it is difficult, compared with Apple, Meta, HTC, and Pico entered the game earlier, have a richer industrial network, and various functions may be more cost-effective for ordinary consumers.

At present, the participants in the MR industry chain are still relatively scattered and isolated, and lack the leadership and coordination of leaders and drivers, resulting in the overall efficiency of product design, development, production, testing, sales and other links is not high, which may also be one of the reasons for the "difficult birth" of Vision Pro.

(Image source: Apple's official website)

Vision Pro is bound to be one of the hottest products in 2024, but how long it can be popular, how well the second generation of Vision Pro performs, and whether there will be a third generation of products depends on whether the market and consumers are willing to pay.