Gabe Newell: Valve’s Worst Fear Is Apple

Valve cofounder and CEO Gabe Newell believes that the greatest threat to the company’s upcoming Steam Box will come from Apple and not from current or next gen consoles.

"The threat right now is that Apple has gained a huge amount of market share, and has a relatively obvious pathway towards entering the living room with their platform," he told a class at the University of Texas' LBJ School of Public Affairs.

"I think that there's a scenario where we see sort of a dumbed down living room platform emerging — I think Apple rolls the console guys really easily. The question is can we make enough progress in the PC space to establish ourselves there, and also figure out better ways of addressing mobile before Apple takes over the living room?"

Newell then told the class that he is OK with the fact that several companies will release Steam Box alternatives. He explained that it is important to foster the openness of PC against the locked down nature of Apple’s platforms which – he believes – is at odds with Valve’s core philosophy of sharing and monetizing user generated content.

"The biggest challenge, I don't think is from the consoles," he asserted. "I think the biggest challenge is that Apple moves on the living room before the PC industry sort of gets its act together."