Apple's Big Fat Nothing Burger

Apple has finally announced the details of their customer repair program, and predictably does so without doing much of anything other than renting repair jigs (useful) and distributing manuals (which look to be similar to those already built by iFixit.com) I’ll give their marketing team an A+ for retaining their repair monopoly while offering the pretense of cooperation without actually delivering on right to repair.  

These feeble actions are not going to forestall legislation and will probably add incentive to pass statutes requiring full access to repair parts, service documentation, tools, diagnostics and settings controls on fair and reasonable terms. 

Apple has already been blocking the option of self-repair or independent repair using parts pairing (activation) technology.  This step already frustrates the use of used Apple parts as well as third party parts. Buyers of used products are already being pushed out of the market as parts from broken devices cannot be harvested and used for donor parts.  

Today’s announcement doubles down on the pairing absurdity by requiring the consumer to order parts by Serial Number (IMEI) and not model number – adding a needless validation step for buyers. If Apple can limit purchases by serial number, they will know which specific consumers are requesting repairs, and use that information to their advantage.  There is much potential for mischief and retaliation - perhaps slow walking shipments to buyers they do not like. 

We are also concerned that independent repair shops and/or wholesale refurbishers will be unable to order a supply of repair parts directly in bulk.  In our experience less than 10% of all tech buyers want to fix their own equipment and are expecting Right to Repair legislation to re-invigorate local repair options. Unless independent repair providers can order parts without serialization, the program itself will not do much good for consumers. 

Apple does not get any additional protection of their IP using the pairing process – the parts were already delivered with all IP in the first sale and a replacement is only that. A paired part made by Apple is the same as an unpaired part made by Apple.  The step exists only to protect the repair monopoly created by Apple where a request for a repair is turned into a replacement sale. 

Competitors such as Samsung, Motorola and now Google are providing more practical options without making customers reliant upon them for all repairs.  If others feel as I do – my next phone will emphatically not be an Apple product.