Tim Cook Announces 13 Million Apple TV’s Sold, 6 Million In One Year

Apple TV is a big hit. At least that’s the spin Apple CEO Tim Cook put on the company’s set-top box.

Speaking to AllThingsD’s Walt Mossberg and Kara Swisher during the D11 conference on Tuesday, Cook spent much of his time refuting claims that Apple shares are way down because the company is no longer innovating within its industry.

Eventually talk turned towards Apple TV, a piece of technology that Cook admits “could be better” and is “still an experience that is too much like 10 or 20 years ago.”

Cook then noted that Apple TV “continues to be an area of great interest for us.”

Tim Cook revealed that Apple has sold 13 million Apple TVs, “about half” or 6 million units sold in the last year alone. In comparison, set-top provider Roku has racked up sales of 5 million in the US.

The sales volume for Apple TV’s is definitely an improvement over years past. In 2012, the company pushed through 2.7 million Apple TVs for the year. In Q1 2013, Apple had already moved 2 million units.

As you make recall ,Steve Jobs once proclaimed, “no one wants to buy a box,” while Cook added, “Frankly, the popularity of the Apple TV has become much larger than we thought it would. We aren’t marketing it.”

An increasing number of homes are ditching the pre-packaged entertainment of cable TV providers for the cheaper and more on-demand offerings of Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Instant Video, and other video on demand providers. As more homes turn into “zero TV” atmospheres, we will likely see an increase in the number of not only Apple TV’s being sold but also Rokus, Google TVs, and built-in smart TVs from the likes of Vizio, Samsung, and others.

Are you surprised by the success of Apple TV, or will more successes follow the still relatively new technology?