Xiaomi Surpasses Apple to Become Number Two Worldwide Smartphone Vendor in Q2 2021

[Michael Scrip]

You know full well Apple is the sole App Store operator for iPhone and iPad apps.

And?

It's Apple's platform. It's their terms, their development tools, their APIs, their app reviewers, their data centers, etc.

And yes... they run the store. It's their choice.

Google can do whatever they want with their platform, too. That's their choice.

It's funny... earlier I made a joke about people saying "Apple has a monopoly on their own stuff"

And you just said it. Congrats.

 

[ian87w]

I don’t think Apple cares.

The fact that Apple's prices are hugely marked up way above their announced prices in markets where Xiaomi dominates show how little Apple cares. As a brand perception, Apple is way beyond Xiaomi's reach at the moment.

And I don't know how selling a $1000 phone will help Xiaomi. Somebody who can afford $1000 phone wouldn't be bothered with buying a Xiaomi. I got the invitation to buy the Mi 11 Ultra at almost $1200 on launch. I simply laughed. At that price, might as well get the iPhone 12 Pro that have proper software support longevity.

 

[Macaholic868]

Who in their right mind would by a new iPhone the quarter before the release of the next model unless you want an iPhone and have to because it’s either your first phone or a needed replacement for an existing device? Everybody knows you’ll get more phone for your money in September. Wake me up when 3rd quarter results are in.

 

[Dr@g0n]

Yes, if I sell 1 of my Hermès bag I can buy the whole bag store in the market next to my house =) so 1 = 100 =))

 

[senttoschool]

I’ve never seen a Xiaomi mobile device in the wild in my life 🤷‍♂️😂

That’s because you think the world doesn’t exist beyond USA.

 

[zlt1228]

I am from China. Here all of the Huawei phones below 570 USD are out of stock due to sanctions. In China people typically buy 300 dollar phones, which Xiaomi makes a lot with relatively high specs compared to the competition (OPPO, Vivo). So there is really no surprise that they managed to capture that market.

 

[falainber]

Well that is Apple's choice isn't it? Or is that Apple being monopolistic too by choosing their to only let Apple be Apple in that market space pricing? (those third biggest smartphone maker in the world monopolistic villains!).

Fyi, when I switched from the Galaxy to an iPhone 6+, one of the tough things to get used to was the lack of apps compared to my previous Android. Hey, how'd these last years work out for Apps availability for the platforms.

Another fyi (not that data will necessarily be important to you):

Gross Profit Margins (rounded to nearest point)
Apple: 38%
Samsung Electronics: 38% (oh no!)
Microsoft: 70+%
Google: 50+%
(it's all there in quarterly P/Ls.....oh no!).

Third fyi, Apple could become a lower cost seller. They'd decrease GP but would offset it with increased volume. But that would be a shame as Apple would no longer be what it is now: the best Consumer Electronics Ecosystem Experience seller in the history of the planet. You'd be sad by that too, right?

You can't compare profit margins for companies that make money in different markets (software vs hardware vs advertising). The only product which profit margin is relevant to this discussion is smartphones and we all know that on smartphones Apple makes much more profits than, say, Samsung. And on significanntly lower volume. Which translates to higher prices, which translate to lower market share, which may eventually translate to irrelevance (Macs being a notable example of that).

 

[shadowv4x]

Exactly.

I counted over 60 smartphones on Xiaomi's website.

HoLY. That's a lot, what are they trying to do?
According to me, a smartphone company should have one or two top-line series (like Samsung S and Note and Apple's main iPhone) and one or two mid-range series (SE for Apple). That's all the world needs.

(as someone pointed out samsung does have a lot of phones after all)

 

[Arceus1234]

name me a phone except for the iPhone that gives you updates for 5-6 years of support and updates and is usable for 5-6 years

 

[Arceus1234]

HoLY. That's a lot, what are they trying to do?
According to me, a smartphone company should have one or two top-line series (like Samsung S and Note and Apple's main iPhone) and one or two mid-range series (A for Samsung/SE for Apple). That's all the world needs.

did you forget the f series? the m series? Samsung releases 1 phone almost every 2 weeks

 

[One2Grift]

You can't compare profit margins for companies that make money in different markets (software vs hardware vs advertising). The only product which profit margin is relevant to this discussion is smartphones and we all know that on smartphones Apple makes much more profits than, say, Samsung. And on significanntly lower volume. Which translates to higher prices, which translate to lower market share, which may eventually translate to irrelevance (Macs being a notable example of that).

Correct, comparing differing companies GP is tricky because as we don't know the whole operation cost story. The cost specific line items and sub line items etc etc is something we won't see. The only thing we know is the P/L statements(for public companies). Who doesn't for certain know are people saying it on media or even posting boards except restating what's in the P/L as well as data company estimates.(unless someone on here is a high placed accountant at Apple ). As such we know on the upper line level that Apple the company and Samsung Electronics the company have essentially the same revenue/cost of providing product. We also definitely know that Google and Microsoft on that top line level have substantially higher revenue/cosy of providing product. But what we also know is Apple has massively! more revenue than Samsung Electronics, Microsoft or Google. You can take any two of these, add them together, and Apple does roughly that number in revenue. Yet we also know that Google and Microsoft have higher stock PE multiples than Apple. This typically indicates their GP / NP generation is expected to be maintained and grown at a higher rate than Apple. (read and check out that one yourself. I'm happy to hear a differing view on it. I do invest and own Apple and Google).

To the second part, you are also correct. Maybe Apple in its present biz plan form will not survive. I wouldn't bet a spare nickel on that but no one knows 5 years from now what the biz climate will be. That's the nature of business for Apple, Google and everyone else. Their biz plans can always be interrupted and crater. Ultimately, if you don't like Apple's plan, products or pricing? Don't buy an Apple device, simple. That's every user's choice. No one needs Apple (or for that matter Google). Regardless, the issue I have with your point (other than trying to state as fact Apple overcharges) is the monopoly item. That is a demonstrably, easily proven, falsity.

 

[bmot]

The sad thing is that there is no other competition to Apple than android devices. This market is so monotonous and one dimensional. All the competition uses the same OS, and an OS defines a smartphone more than its exterior. I find it fascinating that most people just go with it and don’t give a thing. I guess that’s why it is working.
Imagine if every cars interior is built by the same manufacturer and only the outside is built by the company that sells the car. It would be ridiculous.

 

[ariusbb]

I thought the title would be here:
BBK Electronics is the #1 Worldwide Smartphone Vendor

 

[ian87w]

HoLY. That's a lot, what are they trying to do?
According to me, a smartphone company should have one or two top-line series (like Samsung S and Note and Apple's main iPhone) and one or two mid-range series (A for Samsung/SE for Apple). That's all the world needs.

Samsung is the same at the lower end, with a plethora of A, M, and F series phones, many are overlapping each other.

The game in the lower end is to maintain customer's awareness at any point in the year, at least that's the theory. Thus Xiaomi and the whole BBK gang (Realme, Oppo, Vivo), are constantly releasing new phones, refreshing the previous models every 5 to 6 months. Most of them are basically the same phone, but with different cosmetics and newer Android version. Thus whenever someone goes into a store, they see "oh look, that's a new model, I'll get that."

At least that's the theory.

Both Xiaomi and Oppo are indeed trying to be premium (Mi 11 Ultra and Find X3 Pro, both are in the $1000 price range). But they forgot the software side. They're still in the mindset of being an ODM company. These companies are severely lacking in software support though, with majority of their phones get no or just one major Android upgrade. They're too focused in selling new phones and acquiring new customers.

 

[pasamio]

Yup. “Market share = sole deciding factor of monopoly” argument sets foot here as well. If that’s the case, Google should not be charged with anti competitive behaviours.

Thankfully that’s not the case, for now.

Google with Android managed to undercut the commercial mobile operating system market by introducing a zero cost platform in Android with free developer tooling and an iterative approach over the years to move features from the core OS over to their paid Google Mobile Services. The Epic v Google suit details a situation where Google threatened Android OEM's with refusing to license GMS if they bundled the Fortnite Launcher, not dissimilar to Microsoft threatening to refuse to license Windows to OEMs who shipped Netscape.

Google already lost to EU regulators on monopoly charges relating to the GMS bundling a few years back, I could have sworn I saw something recent that claimed whilst AOSP is free, consumers essentially expect what is in GMS to be on the device anyway.

In terms of marketshare, Android is really the only OEM mobile operating system these days with almost 100% of the market of shipping devices. Even the feature phones run Android these days.

 

[ian87w]

The sad thing is that there is no other competition to Apple than android devices. This market is so monotonous and one dimensional. All the competition uses the same OS, and an OS defines a smartphone more than its exterior. I find it fascinating that most people just go with it and don’t give a thing. I guess that’s why it is working.
Imagine if every cars interior is built by the same manufacturer and only the outside is built by the company that sells the car. It would be ridiculous.

Who wants to compete with Android? Anybody starting a new smartphone OS will face a challenge of zero apps vs the mature Google Play Store. Microsoft failed, Blackberry failed, Palm failed. It's been done, and the market simply chose to stick with mature platforms.

Want somebody to blame? Blame Google for giving out Android for free. Basically no OEM will want to spend the money for a competing OS when the cost of adopting Android is zero. Samsung tried with Tizen, and it didn't work. None of the OEMs have competency in software. Apple is in a unique position in that they are both software and hardware company.

 

[hagar]

14% market share is exactly why Apple-only apps like iMessage, FaceTime, … and even iWork don’t make a chance to be anything more than a niche (except in the US). Luckily they realised this and opened up Apple Music and ATV+.

 

[One2Grift]

It’s good to have options. One size doesn’t fit all.

It's good to have choice. But it is also worth considering that mass variations make for a more difficult support model. It's not impossible but it is more difficult. Anyone who works in support, something I do these days for better or worse, will tell you this truism.
Everything that's good almost always come with its negatives in one form or another.

 

[huge_apple_fangirl]

Yup. “Market share = sole deciding factor of monopoly” argument sets foot here as well. If that’s the case, Google should not be charged with anti competitive behaviours.

Thankfully that’s not the case, for now.

First of all, Google does have the majority of smartphone OS market share, so…?

Secondly, where Google actually is a monopoly is not in mobile (which they don’t care about anyways), it’s in search. I think it’s 92% market share (outside China). I wish Apple would make its own, privacy-oriented search engine. Unfortunately, with Google paying them $12 billion a year to be default search engine, that’s unlikely to happen.

 

[iHorseHead]

not even for free I would want that phone

Who asked you? No one. Nobody would give you anything for free anyways.

 

[iHorseHead]

I’m typing this on my fully supported iPhone 6s I purchased in 2015.

With an awful battery life, right?

 

[iHorseHead]

I’ve never seen a Xiaomi mobile device in the wild in my life 🤷‍♂️😂

I see plenty 😂😂😂😂😂🙊🥰

 

[NavySilver]

As long as Huawei tanks, I'm pretty happy. Doesn't matter if Xiaomi is the one stealing its lunch.

 

[Michael Scrip]

14% market share is exactly why Apple-only apps like iMessage, FaceTime, … and even iWork don’t make a chance to be anything more than a niche (except in the US). Luckily they realised this and opened up Apple Music and ATV+.

Very true.

14%... if you just look at that number alone... it sounds tiny.

But with a billion iPhones... a few hundred million iPads... and a hundred million Macs... it's kinda hard to feel bad for Apple and their "niche" ecosystem...

 

[shadowv4x]

Samsung is the same at the lower end, with a plethora of A, M, and F series phones, many are overlapping each other.

The game in the lower end is to maintain customer's awareness at any point in the year, at least that's the theory. Thus Xiaomi and the whole BBK gang (Realme, Oppo, Vivo), are constantly releasing new phones, refreshing the previous models every 5 to 6 months. Most of them are basically the same phone, but with different cosmetics and newer Android version. Thus whenever someone goes into a store, they see "oh look, that's a new model, I'll get that."

At least that's the theory.

Both Xiaomi and Oppo are indeed trying to be premium (Mi 11 Ultra and Find X3 Pro, both are in the $1000 price range). But they forgot the software side. They're still in the mindset of being an ODM company. These companies are severely lacking in software support though, with majority of their phones get no or just one major Android upgrade. They're too focused in selling new phones and acquiring new customers.

Yeah. My old Realme [Oppo] phone had only one major update (Android 9->10) and then they just dropped support. Unimpressed. I've heard that Samsung's A series phones have 3 OS upgrades and 4 years of security patches. Hopefully they stay true to their word.