[UK] Is a price drop inevitable?

[MikeDTyke]

This has happened before and will happen again.

Apple releases iPod, world + dog condemns it as an overly expensive toy.
Apple releases iPod Mini, world condemns it as a pretty expensive toy.
Apple releases iPod Nano, world condemns it as a cool expensive toy.
Apple releases iPod Nano 2, world condemns it as the best iPod ever, buys it in the 10's of millions.
Apple releases iPod Nano 3(phatty), world has pretty much shut up, except for the dozen Zune fanatics out there, none of which in squirting distance of each other.

Apple releases iPhone, world + dog condemns it as an overly expensive toy.
You know what's coming next...

Apple starts at the highest price it thinks it can get away with in the market, targeting power users, early adopters in the first iteration, with each following iteration, capacity goes up, price comes down, people buy an exponentially larger number.

If it's too expensive for you, stop whinging, Apple's never going to see your comment, nor take any hindrance. They're working to the schedule above, come back when they hit your sweet spot.

M.

 

[synth3tik]

If anything there will be a price increase in the US because of the weak dolla dolla bill.

 

[Stella]

If anything there will be a price increase in the US because of the weak dolla dolla bill.

A guaranteed way to dampen iPhone sales in Europe.

 

[DogcowUK]

Having a "premium product" which gets labelled as "an expensive toy" is besides the point, who cares, not me... as long as it sells! The point is the iPhone is not selling well in the UK

 

[lordgaino]

With regards to the sales figures, dont forget that there is a no-mans-land period of 3-6 months where people are waiting for their existing contracts to expire before buying that shiny new iphone.

 

[MikeDTyke]

With regards to the sales figures, dont forget that there is a no-mans-land period of 3-6 months where people are waiting for their existing contracts to expire before buying that shiny new iphone.

I'd second that, in the UK it's very common to renew a contract as soon as it's up to get a shiney new phone, so i'd say there's a large percentage of monthly contract people, still in contract. Whereas in the US and i admit my dataset could be skewed, only have a few friends over there. They say they don't update their contract as soon as its out of the minimum period. They're not so much about the new shiny phone as long as the exisiting one is working fine and they're not feeling ripped off by their monthly bill.

So i'd surmise there's a higher percentage of americans outside of their contract at any particular time and so more readily interested when the game changer comes along.

M.

 

[Project]

I think people are being VERY presumptuous.

1 - we have no idea what Apples/O2s targets are
2 - we have no idea whether sales are meeting these targets

No official figures published? None were in the US until the earnings call a couple months after the launch.

 

[samab]

I think people are being VERY presumptuous.

1 - we have no idea what Apples/O2s targets are
2 - we have no idea whether sales are meeting these targets

No official figures published? None were in the US until the earnings call a couple months after the launch.

Which is precisely why we can't trust any of the "official targets" after the fact.

The best example is --- "after the fact" --- O2 said activations surpassed their internal targets of 3000 activations on the first day. That's total bogus numbers because Carphone was also predicting that they would sell 10000 iphones on first day. So --- was O2 essentially expecting 7000 unlockers? Or O2 expecting massive computer crashes on the activation server --- thus only 30% of the buyers would activate on the first day?

Both Apple and AT&T had posted "official" numbers on the first weekend --- via their own press releases --- that makes them official. Those first weekend numbers were also given 3 weeks after launch when Q2 results were released in July.