In Mark Gurman’s latest edition of the Powered On newsletter for this week, he reported that a new HomePod speaker with an “iPad-sized” display is currently in development, and he expects that it will likely launch as early as next year if Apple decides to move forward with the final stages in production.
It’s still worth noting that Apple has been exploring other concepts for smart home devices, including one that integrates Apple TV, HomePod, and FaceTime into a single system. However, we have yet to see more Apple products for the home beyond Apple TV and HomePod.
One of the recent betas of tvOS 17.4 reveal references to an unreleased HomePod model with a built-in display, whose hardware is based on the latest Apple TV hardware with the A15 Bionic chip. Therefore, it would be optimized to run tvOS.
Just recently, Apple has seen several shifts in leadership. Last month, DJ Novotney stepped down as VP of Smart Home Engineering. Just last week, Gary Geaves also stepped down as VP of Acoustics for audio technology used in AirPods, HomePods, and Vision Pro. Ruchir Davé will take over the role. So things are starting to shape up in both Apple’s categories of smart home and audio products.
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