Apple's September event: What to expect – live updates

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Many are asking if this will be the year Apple unrolls a bundle of services.

Apple, which made its name selling hardware, has expanded into subscriptions in recent years with Apple Music, Apple Pay and more becoming an increasingly important revenue stream for the company. Reports surfaced in June that Apple was considering a single subscription bundle that would combine its still-in-progress TV shows, music and other subscription services.

One reason in favor: Subscriptions could make Apple a lot of money, Wall Street says.

“With iCloud, Apple Pay, Apple Music and other digital downloads driving this vast ecosystem, we believe this segment could top $50 billion of revenues by [the company’s 2020 fiscal year],” technology analyst Daniel Ives wrote in a research note last month.

“I think they absolutely should and need to expand services; it’s as much of a convenience for their users as anything else,” Stephen Beck, founder and managing partner of cg42, a management consultancy, told CBS MoneyWatch. “The difference is the value of those services: If you compare the way Amazon looks at Prime, the value of those services layer value on top of each other. Apple [services] feel smart and connected, but they’re independent of each other.”