You know that $18 billion in cash Apple has lying around gathering dust? What say Apple starts staffing up for the coming era of iPhone / iPod touch platform domination? You can buy both companies and talent on the cheap in a recession. Steve is Scotch as I recall.
Combine a crappy economy, an awesome new iPhone SDK, a frictionless wireless App store and a $100 million iFund and what do you get? The best and brightest global entrepreneurial software talent are going to swarm this. Look what jailbreaking wrought and multiply by 10 for a start.
Update Mar 9: Upon further reflection, it strikes me that Apple may well scoop up the a few of the most promising iPhone SDK developer companies themselves. I'm convinced Apple needs to staff up.
I noticed that last year their R&D spending was less than 4% which is pretty low for such an innovative company as Apple. But then maybe some of their recent spending hasn't been expensed yet due to the 2-year window within which they can recognize expenses for the iPhone.
Attentive Mac fans have noticed the fairly high number of missed deadlines. Most recently Leopard was late and a bit buggy when finally released and now the SDK is just in Beta rather than done by February. Apple needs talent - the best available. I almost think they've been too busy building stuff to go out and find some more good people. But that only works so long.
I liked seeing Steve including two of his most able executives in important parts of the Roadmap presentation. They were looking good, actually. Steve casts a long shadow, but he needs plenty of help at the size Apple has grown to be.