As Apple showed from 2001-2007, it was doing more than fine with Mac OS X, Macs, Pro software and the iPod. Now, I don't think Apple wants to lose the 50% of its revenue that comes from iOS devices, but I also don't think Apple will be in dire straights if iOS loses a bit of share to others.
Apple can lose market share and still increase revenue. The smartphone market is growing as owners of "dumb phones" are finally upgrading to smart phones now that they are becoming more consumer friendly. Back in the days of RIM/Palm/WinMO dominance, the smartphone was a niche device -- not something you'd see in grandma's hand -- that has changed. When markets are growing everyone can win.
As I said before, the numbers from some recent studies are showing phones "shipped" but not sold to consumers. When carriers get a bunch of stock of phones that they can't sell they start offering 2 for 1 deals to get customers to sign up for a two-year contract. In the tablet market Samsung touted their 2M units of Galaxy tabs sold -- when pressed for how many were actually sold to consumers they would not even give the number only saying it was "quite small". Ultimately, you will see a surge in sales for those GalaxyTabs as Best Buy and others dump them for ridiculously low prices.
Number of units sold is just one statistic -- the other important ones are:
- Average sales price to consumer by phone model
- Average subsidy paid to manufacturer by phone model
- Customer satisfaction ratings by phone model after 3 months of use
The things we will probably never know because the manufacturers won't break the information down for us are:
- Revenue for manufacturer by phone model
- Profit for manufacturer by phone model
Anyway -- I'm not switching to Verizon, but I am very interested to see what Verizon customers do now that they have the choice of iPhone or Droid -- specifically with regards to number of units and average sales price.