If it wasn't for Apple we'd still be using this... Nokia N87 dual slider, cancelled prototype because of Apple.
![]()
Wow - those buttons - I get confused just looking at them...
If it wasn't for Apple we'd still be using this... Nokia N87 dual slider, cancelled prototype because of Apple.
![]()
Wow - those buttons - I get confused just looking at them...
This a result of more than 4 years of incompetency, disorganization, complacency, arrogance and just plain lack of skills.
Nokia were getting too complacent even before Apple showed up, then they waved off Apple as a non-competitor, big mistake and even a bigger mistake was that they didn't see that touchscreen was the future!
If it wasn't for Apple we'd still be using this... Nokia N87 dual slider, cancelled prototype because of Apple.
Image
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.
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).
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
Well, channel-stuffing is illegal. It's perfectly okay to place inventory
in the channel, but it's fraudulent to account for that as a sale if it's not likely to be sold. I'm not exactly sure what is considered "over the line", but it's likely that Apple is erring on the conservative side, because being forced by the SEC to restate earnings due to channel-stuffing would obliterate Apple stock value.
Well of course, but those are still "sales"... it isn't stock waiting to be returned to Apple if it doesn't sell....
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
I'd now like to turn to the iPhone. We were thrilled to sell a record 20.3 million iPhones compared to 8.4 million in the previous June quarter. This represents 142% year-over-year growth, which is more than double IDC's latest published estimate of 67% growth for the global smartphone market overall in the June quarter. Recognized revenue from iPhone handset and accessory sales were $13.3 billion during the quarter compared to $5.3 billion in the year ago quarter, an increase of 150%. We continue to experience very strong year-over-year iPhone sales growth in all of our operating segments. iPhone sales momentum in the Asia-Pacific region was particularly robust with sales almost quadrupling year-over-year. We continue to increase our overall iPhone manufacturing capacity in the quarter. We were pleased to launch a number of new carrier relationships. And by the end of the quarter, iPhone was available through 228 carriers in 105 countries, compared to 186 carriers in 90 countries as of the end of the March quarter. 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.
The Company sold 20.34 million iPhones in the quarter, representing 142 percent unit growth over the year-ago quarter. Apple sold 9.25 million iPads during the quarter, a 183 percent unit increase over the year-ago quarter. The Company sold 3.95 million Macs during the quarter, a 14 percent unit increase over the year-ago quarter. Apple sold 7.54 million iPods, a 20 percent unit decline from the year-ago quarter.
Apple is not the reason behind this.
I am sure Apple has nothing to do with Apple becoming the number 1 smartphone vendor in the world.
Apple has to do in being successful. It is not the reason for being number one.
So if Apple was not successful, they would still be number one?
Not surprising.
Apple changed the face of mobile in 2007. With what we're seeing now, however, they actually changed tech itself as we know it - new distribution models, breathing new life into software-as-commodity, etc. This isn't just about mobile. The iPad is bringing us into a new phase of computing. The entire game has changed thanks to Apple.
Reason: different thinking. The user is no longer regarded as an extension of the device. The device is becoming an extension of the user. A few players are still having a difficult time with this concept.
Again those are only Apple's channels. As soon as it leaves their warehouse they have no way to count them. They could be in inventory at one of the carriers.
Fact that Apple is only telling you those numbers means that they are hiding the real ones. Apple could get a pretty good count on sells by just looking at activation on iTunes. Have the IMEI numbers counted on first activation just like Google does with Android phones and you can get an exact number.
For example Google can release an exact number for Google handsets and I am willing bet they could give an exact break down by model if they wanted to.
Apple could do it as well if they choose. Now yes your numbers can give a rough idea but not exact and have a lot of room to play in them. They only can get what carrier choose to report back to them.
Knight and Kdarling are right.
Either way the numbers are impressive. No one is discounting that. 20 million iPhones is very impressive. It was only a few years ago that 20 mil total number of smart phones sold in a year was though to be insane. now there are 20 mil smart phones phones activated in under a month (android apple, BB, Palm, WP7 ect)
As soon as the disturber pays Apple for the phones they can count it as sold. Apple has their money. Does not matter if it is sitting in disturbers inventory. It been sold as far as Apple is concerned.
Now if it is in Apple warehouse, and said company promised to buy them but has not taken delivory it is still in the channel and can not stuff it.
What I don't understand is how can they use the term sold, and then give the exact number in channel inventory, if they can't keep track of when the end user buys them ? I don't know how it works in other countries, but last time I checked, here in the good ole US of A, sold means sold to end user. Especially when they can give the number that's in inventory.
Maybe they should have just said sales were "smooth."
theregister.com has some more numbers. Nokia didn't only drop behind Apple, they dropped behind Samsung as well. And according to theregister, they had a profit margin of -4.5%. That's a minus. In other words, every single customer buying a Nokia phone actually cost the company money![]()
That's probably true, and smart business policy, but it's still impressive growth. I'll bet not even Apple expected to have 20-times that number in short order. And none of the competitors in the phone space expected them to do well at all.
Absolutely, it's hugely impressive. Not only becoming the #1 leader in the sector by units sold, but to do so with a high-end, high margin device is incredible.
And exactly which ecosystem is bigger? Which has more apps, media content, 3rd party peripheral/accessory support, developer support, and user base than iOS?
I'll give you, that Android is/was growing faster, but that will change as well.
well that charge shows how explosive the growth of the smartphone market has been and really only Nokia really failed to capitalize on it. Everyone else had a huge amount of growth in the past 2 years compared to Nokia which has a loss.
Also I see Samsung could end up taking top spot from Apple based on it as it is growing faster.
It's actually been losing traction. That's all it's been doing since intro.
https://forums.macrumors.com/posts/12888819/
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.
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.
Otherwise I would agree that there's enough for everyone to profit of.
sold means Apple sold them to lets say AT&T, Best buy ect hell even their own Apple stores those to Apple are their end users in this case. We are end users for like Best Buy but not Apple manufacturing division. You are getting confused with what seem logical compared to what it really means. 2 very different things.
Remember Apple does not know the exact inventory of what is in AT&T, Best Buy and so on. And those places are not going to want to hand that exact number back to Apple.
But what does channel inventory mean then if Apple is reporting units sold AND inventory in the channel (aka currently unsold)?
Well, channel-stuffing is illegal. It's perfectly okay to place inventory
in the channel, but it's fraudulent to account for that as a sale if it's not likely to be sold. I'm not exactly sure what is considered "over the line", but it's likely that Apple is erring on the conservative side, because being forced by the SEC to restate earnings due to channel-stuffing would obliterate Apple stock value.
But what does channel inventory mean then if Apple is reporting units sold AND inventory in the channel (aka currently unsold)?
Again those are only Apple's channels. As soon as it leaves their warehouse they have no way to count them. They could be in inventory at one of the carriers.
Fact that Apple is only telling you those numbers means that they are hiding the real ones. Apple could get a pretty good count on sells by just looking at activation on iTunes.
Have the IMEI numbers counted on first activation just like Google does with Android phones and you can get an exact number. For example Google can release an exact number for Google handsets and I am willing bet they could give an exact break down by model if they wanted to.