APPLE NEWTON HANDWRITING RECOGNITION SOFTWARE

APPLE NEWTON HANDWRITING RECOGNITION SOFTWARE

It had software problems, notably, it operated too slowly certain actions, such as scrolling through notes, took too long and its handwriting recognition was fairly inaccurate. The Newton cost about $700 for the first model and as much as $1,000 for later versions. At around 4.5 x 7 inches, almost one inch thick and weighing almost a pound, the Newton was really too large and heavy to be considered pocketsize.

Although Apple had learned about key customer needs during market research, it apparently ignored these when it came to developing the product, opting instead to push ahead and beat its competitors to launch. Whilst the architect in this instance would certainly benefit from the Newton’s features, Apple was hardly aiming at a large target market by focusing on such a specific scenario.Īpple ignored certain customer needs as to the specifications of the tablet. Original motivating use cases for the Newton design was the ‘Architect Scenario’, in which Newton’s designers imagined a residential architect working quickly with a client to sketch, clean up, and interactively modify a simple two-dimensional home plan.In the following, some reasons are mentioned: There have been a lot of discussions about the reason for Apple´s failure with the Newton. This is hardly surprising given that, even at the height of the device’s popularity, only an estimated 200,000 Newtons were in use. Although the exact scale of the Newton losses remains unconfirmed, some sources say that the company sunk a billion dollars into the Newton and recouped only about one quarter of that amount in sales. The product was a huge financial disaster for Apple. After Steve Jobs return to Apple in 1997, the Newton was cancelled in 1998. The product was launched in 1993 and Apple started a marketing campaign centered around its unprecedented handwriting recognition. Apple‘s then-CEO John Sculley was the driving force behind the project.

Apple newton handwriting recognition