The head of the company’s gaming subscription service explains its priorities as it anticipates the Vision Pro revolution, and tries to bring originality to a market still dominated by free to play mobile titles When Apple launched its games subscription service, Arcade, in September 2019, it drew a huge amount of attention – as with everything the company does. Offering 100 premium (ie, not ad-infested) mobile games for a monthly subscription fee of £4.99/$4.99 (now £6.99), and the promise of more titles to come, it was an attempt to bring the Netflix business model to gaming. It offered an a ..read more

Microsoft, Meta and Google are snapping up small players in the burgeoning industry – but the Competition and Markets Authority is demanding fair play “Monopoly,” said Peter Thiel, Silicon Valley’s answer to Darth Vader, “is the condition of every successful business.” This aspiration is widely shared by Gamman, the new acronynm for the Valley’s giants – Google, Apple, Microsoft, Meta, Amazon and Nvidia. And the arrival of AI has sharpened the appetite of each for attaining that blessed state before the others get there. One symptom of their anxiety is the way they have been throwing unconscio ..read more

South Korean firm regains pole position amid biggest drop in iPhone sales since Covid-19 lockdowns Apple has lost its spot as the world’s biggest mobile phone seller after a steep sales drop as South Korean rival Samsung retook the lead in the global market share. Samsung had been the biggest seller of mobile phones for 12 years until the end of 2023, when sales of Apple’s iPhone models overtook it ..read more

Walter Huang was killed when his car steered in to a highway barrier and Tesla will avoid questions into its technology in a trial Tesla has settled a lawsuit over a car crash which killed an Apple engineer in 2018 after his car veered off a highway near San Francisco, court documents showed on Monday. The settlement was made as the trial was about to start over the high-profile accident involving Tesla’s driver assistant technology, ending a five-year legal battle over the case ..read more

Faster chip, tremendous battery life, premium touch points and a price cut make the best even better Apple’s latest MacBook Air adds more power to an already potent package while maintaining its very long battery life and coming at a lower price than its predecessor. The 2024 model ships with Apple’s latest M3 chip, first seen in the MacBook Pro, giving the company’s thinnest and lightest machine a boost in performance. On the outside the laptop is identical to the 2022 model ..read more

Tech company cuts employees from eight offices in Santa Clara in its first big wave of post-pandemic job cuts Apple is laying off more than 600 workers in California, marking the company’s first big wave of post-pandemic job cuts amid a broader wave of tech industry consolidation. The iPhone maker notified 614 workers in multiple offices on 28 March that they were losing their jobs, with the layoffs becoming effective on 27 May, according to reports to regional authorities ..read more

Late-night host reveals Apple advised not to invite tech regulator on his Apple TV+ show and podcast the Problem with Jon Stewart Jon Stewart has accused Apple of urging him not to interview the United States’ head tech regulator, the Federal Trade Commission chair, Lina Khan, on his erstwhile Apple TV+ show and podcast The Problem with Jon Stewart. In an interview with Khan on The Daily Show, which Stewart is guest-hosting on Monday nights through the November election, Stewart asked Khan about her office’s pursuit of anti-trust litigation against such major companies as Amazon and Kroger. Wh ..read more

The tech giant fights regulators on both sides of the Atlantic, as the US government launches a grab-bag of accusations. Plus, Elon Musk’s bad day in court • Don’t get TechScape delivered to your inbox? Sign up for the full article here Apple’s problems have gone transatlantic. Even as it squabbles with the EU over the Digital Markets Act and nervously eyes the UK’s passage of the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers bill, the company’s biggest fight is now back at home, after the US government launched what will likely be the antitrust case of the decade. From our story: The lawsuit, fi ..read more

Live, rolling coverage of business, economics and financial markets as Boeing chief executive departs after safety incidents including mid-air door blow-out The government’s shareholding in NatWest Group has fallen below 30% for the first time since 2008, the bank has confirmed. The public’s stake in the group was last reported at 30.98% on 15 March. We welcome the government’s continued commitment to returning NatWest Group to private ownership. With the government shareholding now below 30%, we have been pleased with the recent momentum to achieving this shared ambition, which we believe is ..read more

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