It's actually been losing traction. That's all it's been doing since intro.
https://forums.macrumors.com/posts/12888819/
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Apple Tops Nokia to Become World's Top Smartphone Vendor
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It's actually been losing traction. That's all it's been doing since intro.
https://forums.macrumors.com/posts/12888819/
How does Apple know how many iPhones Bob's cellphone emporium has sold to customers ?
Surely they must have those numbers to report actual sales, or are you talking about channel sales ?
It's like kdarling says, Apple doesn't have a clue about unit sales to consumers beyond what they themselves sell or what their partners report back, if they even do.
How does Apple know how many iPhones Bob's cellphone emporium has sold to customers ?
Surely they must have those numbers to report actual sales, or are you talking about channel sales ?
It's like kdarling says, Apple doesn't have a clue about unit sales to consumers beyond what they themselves sell or what their partners report back, if they even do.
Duh. Apple sells every iphone they make.
Well, one way or another Apple reports sales when it issues its quarterly numbers, so they must be getting reports from their partners.
This is like Ford bragging about the F series being the best selling pickup in the country even though the Silverado and Sierra combined outsell the F series. Apple is scared ******** of Android and they're doing everything they can to stifle competition. 550k activations a day baby, stick that in your I.V. jobs.
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Then why is my local carrier's stores fell furnished in phones ? Why can I just walk-in to the local Apple store and walk out with an iPhone ?
Not so duh now uh ?
Yes, channel sales. They know how many they sold to Bob's CellPhone Emporium, and they report that. Exactly what kdarling was saying.
Waiting to hear positive spin on this from the trolls on the forum. Nokia still sold significantly more phones total than Apple? Even though they are crashing and burning, they are still the largest phone seller overall worldwide?
Windows 7/8 is going to completely change the market and save Nokia?
At what point does denial transform into pathology?
Windows 7/8 is going to completely change the market and save Nokia?
At what point does denial transform into pathology?
Then why is my local carrier's stores fell furnished in phones ? Why can I just walk-in to the local Apple store and walk out with an iPhone ?
Not so duh now uh ?
Go ask your local carrier how many they sell. I'll be they sell every single iphone and restock the shelves full every day.
It's not Nokia that Apple is worried about. It's HTC and Sumsung that will eat Apple for lunch this decade. That's why Apple is suing them out of fear. If you can't beat them fairly then sue them is Apples motto.
If you read the conference call they list how many were sold and how many are in the channel. Not exactly as kdarling was saying...
Yes, you're right! Why didn't I think of that. Every iPhone they stock is freshly arrived from the morning shipment and all stock is complete depleted at the end of the day. They always manage to have the exact number of phones they need for a day in every store they have.
Seriously, I don't know what I was thinking... Apple even said themselves they had no unsold inventory the channels during their earning... oh wait, no, they did say they had inventory in the channels and you're wrong. Silly me.
And again, they don't know about every channels, only their own and those of partners who report back. The rest are assumed as sales as soon as they leave Apple.
Ah, I see. OK, so Apple knows exactly how many they sold (and that's the majority of the total), but with partners they only know channel sales (not a precise figure as I would like, but best they can do). Thanks for the clarification, both of you.
Oh, boy. I think you meant "If you can't beat them fairly, build a device that mimics theirs and try to sell as many as you can before getting sued."
And you know this as a fact because...??? How about to be an actual Apple partner you have to report sales to end user? Now I don't know this as an actual fact, but it seems more logical. See my point?
You haven't read the news some years ago, have you?
Nokia blatanly killed an entire market with some interesting business tactic. They killed their plant in Bochum, Germany (which was profitable) just to cheat the EU for subventional payments and build a new plant in Romania.
A real smart ass move to kill every sale in Germany - with more than 20 million buyers every year.
So in short this is not a story of Apple's strength but a story of Nokia's weakness.
I don't know it as a fact, it's just logical. Not everyone who sells iPhones are actual Apple partners. I have seen quite a few flea market sellers with good iPhone stock. I very much doubt they had any ties to Apple and are simply 3rd party resellers being counted as "full sales" once the phones are shipped to them.
It's also not a sure thing that every carrier reports back to Apple. We'd have to see the actual agreements to know. Anyway, it would be definately hard for Apple to have numbers from every reseller out there. kdarling isn't wrong, in all logic.
How does Apple know how many iPhones Bob's cellphone emporium has sold to customers ?
Surely they must have those numbers to report actual sales, or are you talking about channel sales ?
It's like kdarling says, Apple doesn't have a clue about unit sales to consumers beyond what they themselves sell or what their partners report back, if they even do.
They absolutely have a clue. They know how many they ship and what they need to pump into the market to keep a steady supply without leaving a glut of iphones on shelves.
The numbers they publish are channel inventory numbers and they set a target for how many they want available to ensure there's supply to meet demand. It doesn't mean there's a huge backlog of inventory that's going unsold that they have no clue about. From their earning call:
"We ended the quarter with about 5.9 million iPhones in channel inventory, a sequential increase of about 700,000 to support strong iPhone demand, carrier addition and expanded distribution. We remained within our target range of 4 to 6 weeks of iPhone channel inventory."
So if they stopped supply and people kept buying at the same rate, stocks in the sales channel would be depleted within a month to a month and a half. I would think they'd have a pretty good idea of what they're selling to end users within a very small margin of error.
How does Apple know how many iPhones Bob's cellphone emporium has sold to customers ?
Surely they must have those numbers to report actual sales, or are you talking about channel sales ?
It's like kdarling says, Apple doesn't have a clue about unit sales to consumers beyond what they themselves sell or what their partners report back, if they even do.
Actually they do, they get a record of every single serial number of every iPhone that reaches a consumer. So they simply look at the number of new serial numbers that are activated through iTunes and they know exactly how many iPhones they have sold.
I bet you could have figured out that out on your own
Apple reports both Sales and Channel numbers separately.. Would be hard to do if they were the same thing.
Thank you for agreeing with me. That is exactly what I've been saying.
Too bad your wrong
Thank you for agreeing with me. That is exactly what I've been saying.
If they know how many they shipped, and they know how many are in the channel, they surely know how many were sold.
If you shipped 100 to Bob's Discount the previous quarter, and shipped another 50 in the last quarter, then you can assume Bob sold at least 50 and has an inventory of 100.
How is that hard to understand?
Thank you for agreeing with me. That is exactly what I've been saying.
lol. I wasn't agreeing with you, but that's ok.
Seeing the graph, I don't understand how this statement was made in the original post:
"each company's (samsung and htc) smartphone shipments remains about half that of Apple's."
Seems like samsung smartphone shipment is actually close to 80%-90% of Apple iphone shipment? If the current trajectory is maintained by apple, samsung, and htc, I see apple losing the top spot.
Well of course, but those are still "sales"... it isn't stock waiting to be returned to Apple if it doesn't sell.
The difference is that when a corporation talks about sales and shipments, they are two different things... Shipments to partners don't equal actual sales because the stock can usually be returned to the manufacture if it doesn't sell.
If a non-partner buys up a little stock, then they are liable to sell them, they have no contract with Apple, which means Apple sees it an actual sale.
If Any of the phones being pushed in the channel were not selling (returned to Apple), then the numbers would balance themselves out in the next quarter's results.
You are correct that we do not know exactly what Apple requires of their resellers, but since they have the ability to tell us how many units are in the channel, they would also know how many have sold - there is no other way they can come up with a channel inventory number without knowing how many are no longer in the channel.
Here are the facts,
5.9 million in the channel at the end of the quarter (EOQ)
5.2 million in the channel at the beginning of the quarter (BOQ)
20.34 million units "moved"
If you want to assume "moved" means shipped, then
Sold = (Shipped - EOQ) + BOQ
Sold = (20.34M - 5.9M) + 5.2M
Sold = (14.44M) + 5.2M
Sold = 19.64M
If you want to assume "moved" means sold, then
Shipped = Sold + (EOQ - BOQ)
Shipped = 20.34M + (5.9M - 5.2M)
Shipped = 20.34M + (0.7M)
Shipped = 21.04M
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To be "sold" typically depends on the shipping method whether the accounting the company is using is FOB Shipping Point or FOB Destination point. Sold for accounting is based on when shipped but that can vary based upon the two different ways to account for it explained above.
When you order online and it's a 2 weeks wait. They don't count that as a sale until they ship it.
Also if the company ships the phone to a retailer that is usually counted as sold.
The key is what is in customers hands really. So the whole "sold" thing is just accounting talk. Sure samsung sold 2M galays tabs and they'll book that revenue but really they prob put 100K in peoples hands.
I don't think anything has changed. Battle of ecosystems? What kind of metric is that? It is still about profit and Apple clearly leads there.Though the thing is the game has changed. Apple changed it. It's now not a battle of devices, but a battle of eco-systems. This is what Apple changed for the industry.
And you know what ? In the battle for eco-systems, Apple can sell as many devices as they like, other eco-systems are bigger and growing faster.
In the end, who cares. There's plenty of eyes for everyone to profit off of. Nokia killed itself with the Elop move and basically telling their users that if they bought Nokia devices right now, they were buying into a dead eco-system.
Otherwise I would agree that there's enough for everyone to profit of.
correct. In financial reporting, Sales is done in the context of the reporting entity (How much Apple sold, not how much reached real users). In reporting, Shipped is normally used for sold (rather than "leaving a best-buy store with a receipt").
The principle is that of ownership and balancing your books. From a reporting perspective I believe this is how it works: either the Seller (apple) has ownership of a physical product or the Buyer (best-buy/att/joe smith). Once Apple relinquishes ownership of a product (usually when it reaches the destination point and signed-off), there must be a balancing entry on the books, otherwise you have something un-accounted for... therefore you place a entry under Sales. (on the receiver's books you also must have a new entry).
I think this is common practice for most cases... it get's tricky when you deal with consignment and services.
Weather it gets out of Best-buy inventory to a real customer or if Best-buy actually *pays* for the product is different matter (from a financial reporting perspective). (paying is more an A/R thing).
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