Apple sold fewer iPhones than expected in its most recent quarter. It’s record sales of 51 million iPhones, still fell short of the 55 million forecast by analysts, signalling a slowdown industry-wide in high end smartphone sales.
Apple’s iPhone sales grew only 7 percent compared to a year ago, while the smartphone market itself grew 14 percent.
But Samsung also had a weak quarter, as did other phone makers leading to many reports Monday that the high end smartphone boom is fizzling.
Apple CEO Tim Cook, said part of the weak growth at Apple was due to short supply of the iPhone 5S. He also said some of the wireless carriers changed their phone upgrade policies in a manner that will hurt iPhone upgrades for about another 3 months and then return to business as usual.
But other see this as a wider problem. “Apple continues to target the market for high-end phones, even as demand accelerates for lower-cost models, particularly in emerging markets. But Apple is resisting the urge to release a truly low-cost phone that could crimp profitability,” said The Wall Street Journal.
BGR.com said, “There is little doubt now that the handset industry and Wall Street analysts have completely missed something essential about the phone market — some dreaded turning point was reached around the September-November time frame. The most likely explanation here is a sudden slowdown in high-end sales in affluent markets like North America and Europe..” said the web site, noting that smartphone chip maker Qualcomm also warned about softening demand for higher end phones.
The trend is a problem for Samsung as well. The New York Times noted Monday, “…the strength of Galaxy phones is fading. Despite the marketing blitz that Samsung put behind its flagship smartphones — the Galaxy S4 and the Note 3 — sales were weaker than expected over the holiday season.”
Also Monday, Apple reported sales of 26 million iPads during the quarter ending in December, up 14 percent over the same period last year.
Total Apple revenue rose to $57.6 billion from $54.5 billion last year while net profit for the quarter was flat at $13.1 billion.
Source: Apple
