Just because Apple TV Plus is free now doesn’t mean it will stay that way Video is a “core part of this effort,” wrote Matthew Ball, an industry analyst and former head of strategy at Amazon Studios, in a Redef analysis last May. Eventually, Apple could spread that out to include Apple News Plus and Apple Arcade. Customers who pay for an Apple Music student plan will get a free subscription to Apple TV Plus. The company is already experimenting with such bundles. Each service attracts its own paying subscribers, but there’s a future in which all of these services are bundled together to create a more unified customer base for Apple.
That doesn’t include important ongoing hardware-based subscriptions iOS users pay for today, including iCloud storage and the company’s iPhone leasing program. Creating an ecosystem of ongoing, subscriber-based products that keep customers within the company’s ecosystem is crucial.Īpple Music, Apple Arcade, Apple News Plus, and now Apple TV Plus exist to give people an avenue into the broader Apple ecosystem. Cook knows this, but he’s outlined how important software services are to Apple’s future. All eyes are on whether TV Plus can take off or whether it will flop. This is a new space for the company, one it’s been trying to crack for years. “We’d like as many people as possible to view it.”
