“Budget-friendly” isn’t typically a descriptor you find next to “MacBook.” But at $599 — $499 with a student discount — Apple Inc.’s new MacBook Neo is the least expensive laptop it has ever offered. Expect its four colorful variants to start gracing college campuses and coffee shops very soon.

Apple’s strategy seems quite straightforward: A cheaper laptop puts it in direct competition with Google’s Chromebook, now a mainstay of classrooms globally, plus a whole universe of Windows-powered laptops. It could lock in the next generation of Apple laptop users.

© Bloomberg