CNN Money has today shared the second part of its interview with Apple SVP Eddy Cue. In the first part of the interview, shared last week, Cue noted of how the Apple TV has graduated from the “hobby” stage and sold more than 20 million units. While sales of the new fourth-gen box are unclear at this point, Cue did hint at some future features come to the device in part two of the interview, as well as Apple’s ultimate goal with the tvOS platform.
The current state of cable TV, as CNN notes, is in somewhat of a disastrous and outdated state. Cue, however, brags that the new Apple TV offers a “much better experience for consuming content” than other offerings on the market. The end goal, Cue said, is to entirely replace the need for a cable company’s set top box.
When asked if Apple would achieve this goal by revealing its own streaming TV service, Cue gave a handful of non-answers. Cue was specifically asked about CBS CEO Les Moonves’ comments when he stated “Apple is having conversations with everyone about doing their own streaming services.” Cue, however, simply responded with, “The great thing is that Les is actually on Apple TV,” referring to the CBS All Access app in the tvOS App Store.
Cue was then asked about the idea of buying a whole cable package through Apple TV, which he replied is already possible if cable companies let it happen:
The main selling point of the Apple TV, Cue believes, is that it offers a way for developers to truly change how TV is consumed. It “offers a platform to truly innovate,” Cue said. The Apple executive also shot down the notion that Apple needs exvlusive programing to differentiate itself from the likes of Google and Roku. “We don’t try to do things that are exclusive,” he said. “What we try to do is build technologies that let developers do things that they can’t do anywhere else.”
However, when asked about financing its own TV shows, Cue was a lot more coy in his answer:
