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Apple's US Market Share Slips in 1Q 2009
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I'd love to see where on the chart the new iMacs/minis were released.
I'd love to see where on the chart the new iMacs/minis were released.
People have an idea when Apple's products are going to be renewed and stopped buying them before hand. If this shows a chart that ends just before this then yes of course the amount of sales would be lower. If this includes weeks of purchases that would show up on the graph and it is still lower, then I would take it with more than a grain of salt.
I'd love to see where on the chart the new iMacs/minis were released.
People have an idea when Apple's products are going to be renewed and stopped buying them before hand. If this shows a chart that ends just before this then yes of course the amount of sales would be lower. If this includes weeks of purchases that would show up on the graph and it is still lower, then I would take it with more than a grain of salt.
Yeah, because they are a NGO and want to keep people using computers happy. They don't care about making money. They charge almost 2000 for an MBA to distribute the profits among poor people.
If Apple grows market share-wise, then it is great news and MS should be scared to death. If Apple shrinks, then Apple does not care about market share and just make great products. You fanboys are hilarious.
It's funny how a couple of simple graphs can control coversation.
The ones presented here says nothing about the price of the hardware sold, profit margins, ad spending, brand value, customer satisfaction or anything else. Raw, per unit market share, is not all that matters. Remember:
The ones presented here says nothing about the price of the hardware sold, profit margins, ad spending, brand value, customer satisfaction or anything else. Raw, per unit market share, is not all that matters. Remember:
"Facts are meaningless. You could use facts to prove anything thats even remotely true"
- Homer Simpson
- Homer Simpson
Considering how long it took apple to do product refreshes, and how disappointing those were when they finally came, I'm not surprised at all.
With price increases on some models, I wouldn't be surprised if we see their market share drop even more.
Apple is really missing the boat in this economy. They absolutely could offer a decent netbook and a decent headless mac, and they could get away with prices higher than the bargain basement ones others are offering (even a $499 netbook looks dirt cheap compared to Apple's 999 and 1299 notebook starting prices).
With price increases on some models, I wouldn't be surprised if we see their market share drop even more.
Apple is really missing the boat in this economy. They absolutely could offer a decent netbook and a decent headless mac, and they could get away with prices higher than the bargain basement ones others are offering (even a $499 netbook looks dirt cheap compared to Apple's 999 and 1299 notebook starting prices).
$499 is feasible if the mini-tablet has less flash memory than the $399 iPod touch. From that the price will go up a few hundred dollars depending on capacity and other hardware features.
Well, he has a point, in a way.
But there's a fine balance between "make the very best computing experience possible, period" and "make a computer cheap enough to win massive market share".
In my opinion, Apple consistently leans a little too far toward the former. For example the Mac Mini uses 2.5" laptop hard drives in order to shave that extra fraction of an inch in size. If they'd gone with standard 3.5" desktop drives, the unit cost would be quite a bit cheaper, ... but they'd be a tiny bit bigger. For some reason, Apple didn't want that.
But if Apple came out with a dirtcheap $499 netbook with 1GB RAM, how does it explain why it charges $1299 for a small laptop with 2GB RAM and a Core 2 Duo?
If Apple did a netbook, they would probably do it for like $699 and that defeats the purpose, for most anyway.
Dell "MacBook Mini" 9 all the way, haha.
I have a hard time believing that you would be making this point if the presented result was a 0.1% increase in Apple's market share. Whether this is noise or not, the truth is that Apple's growth has stopped. People don't need 1.5 K computers to check their email and, as already stated, most people are happy with a $300-400 computer.
I don't think this is all about netbooks, the prices of laptops in general have fallen a lot over the past few years while apple stuck to 999$ for the cheapest macbook. That being said it could have been a good move for them since cheaper laptops have lower profit margins and might take customers away from their existing line-up.
Apple tends to let other manufacturers discover a market, then they look at what's wrong with those products, and launch their own take on the same concept. You might argue that they "missed the boat" with cellphones by 20 years, but once they got around to making one, it was a smash hit. Same with automatic backup and system restore, Windows had it for aeons before Apple got around to creating Time Machine... but Apple's version, as always, looks much slicker and is much more intuitive. Just like fast user switching, another Windows first... so Apple had to do one better and make it a 3D effect.
Being first is great, but being the best is what really matters.
Steve Jobs' achilles' heel is his penchant for cost-prohibitive, experimental products. He did it with the Lisa, he did it again with NeXT, both awesome machines for their time with lots of innovative features but with pricetags that scared everyone away except a small group who happened to be both rich and eccentric computer geeks. If it weren't for the more business-oriented people around him, he'd probably still be working on some computer equivalent to a Koenigsegg.
Apple is all about making premium computers, why would they lower their margins and make a basic computer priced at the competions level? They have the Mac mini as their low-end computer, and that one is also priced higher than the competition. Design + Software = High margins.
It's lite Porche making a budget model..
You're effectivly diluting the brand and thereby lowering the user experience and overall appeal. They would get lower profits, in exchange for larger market share. Why, in your opinon should they do this?
As for the news, of course highpriced computers suffer during a recession.
A 10" tablet is cheaper to make than a laptop, and with the iPhone OS Apple would have the additional AppStore revenue.
Money against marketing
I think the reason why apple is not entering the netbook market is pure marketing.
First of all they want to be a fancy brand. When people want a macbook they will save the money and buy it later. They look on the long term. Apple does as well. Prefers to offer also more quality (look at the numbers of crashes.)
This brings me to a second point. When Apple would lower prices, more people would buy. More marketshare can be horrible. IMO the kernel is not as protected as everyone claims. The software is not so airtight as they claim it to be. When i hear people, they would like an apple because 'its virus-free'. The faster the market share rises, the faster this CAN appear not to be true (I dont say it will). I just think they want to play safe. A lot of people use Apple for graphical design, or that is also the marketing around it. Combine that with virusses and a rather inactive antivirus market, and you will see this share drop.
Notice also the iphone is all about marketing. Its MARKETED as one of the top class mobile devices. They cannot permit themselves to lower prices.
I think the reason why apple is not entering the netbook market is pure marketing.
First of all they want to be a fancy brand. When people want a macbook they will save the money and buy it later. They look on the long term. Apple does as well. Prefers to offer also more quality (look at the numbers of crashes.)
This brings me to a second point. When Apple would lower prices, more people would buy. More marketshare can be horrible. IMO the kernel is not as protected as everyone claims. The software is not so airtight as they claim it to be. When i hear people, they would like an apple because 'its virus-free'. The faster the market share rises, the faster this CAN appear not to be true (I dont say it will). I just think they want to play safe. A lot of people use Apple for graphical design, or that is also the marketing around it. Combine that with virusses and a rather inactive antivirus market, and you will see this share drop.
Notice also the iphone is all about marketing. Its MARKETED as one of the top class mobile devices. They cannot permit themselves to lower prices.
I wouldn't expect them to price the same as the competition. But even if they met them HALFWAY, that would make a huge difference and be much more competitive.
They would make a basic computer because it would sell like crazy, even if it wasn't as cheap as the competition.
Right now apple's laptops start at 999 when PCs can be had for 299. Is a basic mac laptop for 599 or 699 really so outlandish a notion?
Right. Lets set a few things straight.
Apple aren't actually after market share. Apple make high-end computers for people with the cash. They do not make budget computers. People who are interested in/can afford an Apple computer are in the "high-end" market segmet. That is they are the people who have a little more money (or spend everything they have, like me) to spend on stuff than the rest of us have. They value other things than joe schmoe like aestetics, form, ease-of-use, customer service and brand value over processor power, amount memory etc. It is that segment towards which apple targets the majority of its products and they don't make up alot of the total market. The majority of the market want a cheap computer. They focus on price instead of other variables. These are the customers Dell, HP and especially Acer are after. They advertise their products with a competitive price (look at any HP ad, the price is always big and in-your-face, atleast here in Finland) wereas I have never seen a price in an ad that apple has made themselfves.
Going to the graph, you can see that Q3 has usually been Apples strong quarter and Q4, Q1 always have a decline in market share compared to Q3. Market share starts to climb in Q2 again. This seasonal variation combined with what the economy looks like right now makes me believe that the market share decline compared to Q1 of 2008 is becuase the high-end segment has reduced in size less people are willing to shell out the for an Apple computer. They'd rather pay less and get a netbook and save their money incase they loose their jobs.
It's not about the netbooks... it's just marketing. Netbooks are really laptops that are small.
Apple aren't actually after market share. Apple make high-end computers for people with the cash. They do not make budget computers. People who are interested in/can afford an Apple computer are in the "high-end" market segmet. That is they are the people who have a little more money (or spend everything they have, like me) to spend on stuff than the rest of us have. They value other things than joe schmoe like aestetics, form, ease-of-use, customer service and brand value over processor power, amount memory etc. It is that segment towards which apple targets the majority of its products and they don't make up alot of the total market. The majority of the market want a cheap computer. They focus on price instead of other variables. These are the customers Dell, HP and especially Acer are after. They advertise their products with a competitive price (look at any HP ad, the price is always big and in-your-face, atleast here in Finland) wereas I have never seen a price in an ad that apple has made themselfves.
Going to the graph, you can see that Q3 has usually been Apples strong quarter and Q4, Q1 always have a decline in market share compared to Q3. Market share starts to climb in Q2 again. This seasonal variation combined with what the economy looks like right now makes me believe that the market share decline compared to Q1 of 2008 is becuase the high-end segment has reduced in size less people are willing to shell out the for an Apple computer. They'd rather pay less and get a netbook and save their money incase they loose their jobs.
It's not about the netbooks... it's just marketing. Netbooks are really laptops that are small.
That's amazingly shortsighted. Even if Apple made more money than Dell, they sold fewer computers, which means, fewer Snow Leopard copies in a few months, fewe iWorks copies, fewer name-the-Mac-only-software-you-want copies. Microsoft, on the other hand, is going to be making more money. Not only that: nobody will be looking at ACD if they need an external monitor if they don't own a Mac.
Given that a huge part of Apple revenue comes from software that only works on their computers, it is important for Apple to keep as many computers out there as they can.
Finally, something that anyone in economics know: The money that you don't earn is money that you loose.
The only reason HP is now ahead of Dell is because of those Microsoft ads
Yeah, MS is stupid enough to actually think that.Sure, that's what apple DOES do. But the question is what apple SHOULD do.
I'd argue that some strategic "budget" machines, both laptop and desktop could be done and still have a good profit margin for the company, and would increase revenues and profits for the company. But we'll never know if that's right until Apple actually gives it a shot.
Why do you guys even care about Apple's marketshare? I mean really, as long as they aren't failing, I don't care if they have 50% or 1%.
They make products that some people buy. They have never cared about what people want, why would they start now? If they don't want to make a netbook, they won't just because people want them to.
They make products that some people buy. They have never cared about what people want, why would they start now? If they don't want to make a netbook, they won't just because people want them to.
I wish I could see one with out any competition... just apple. I wanna see something that shows the "real world numbers"
Now is apples chance to be less greedy and lower their prices (a lot) and give us a affordable computer.
LOL. Good catch. Perhaps Apple should just sell the OS like Microsoft and let the others make the hardware. I would be happy with that if they can't lower their prices on hardware.