Upon the iPhone's five-year anniversary, Strategy Analytics says the smartphone has cumulatively earned Apple $150 billion. The next five years, it warns, are going to be tougher.
The Apple iPhone debuted five years ago June 29, and since then has earned
Apple cumulative revenues of $150 billion, according to a new report from
research firm Strategy Analytics. The firm estimates that over the years, Apple
has shipped 250 million iPhones worldwide.
The iPhone portfolio has become a huge generator of cash and profit for
Apple, Neil Mawston, Strategy Analytics executive director, said in a June 27
statement. A quarter of a billion iPhones have been shipped cumulatively
worldwide in the first five years since launch and Apple reaches its fifth
birthday at the top of its game.
The launch of the iPhone was meaningful not only for Apple but for the
mobile industry and beyond. Featuring the first touch-based user interface, it
attracted a tremendous number of dollars and eyeballs, effortlessly expanding
the smartphone market beyond mobile professionals.
Over the last five years,
the
iPhone has slimmed down, sped up, learned to speak and received a complete
makeover.
Mawston warns, however, that the next five years are likely to prove more
challenging for Apple and the iPhone.
Some mobile operators are becoming
concerned
about the high level of subsidies they spend on the iPhone, said Mawston,
while Samsung is expanding its popular Galaxy portfolio and providing Apple
with more credible competition.
Indeed, not only do shipments of Android smartphones exceed those of iOS-running
devices, but Samsung alone, on the strength of its Galaxy line, now also ships
more smartphones than Apple. While Apple grew nearly 89 percent year over year
during the first quarter of 2012, shipping 35.1 million smartphones according
to IDC, Samsung grew an astounding 267 percent, shipping 42.2 million units, up
from 11.5 million a year earlier.
Samsung began selling its newest smartphone, the Galaxy S III, in the United
States June 21, after debuting it weeks earlier in 28 countries. Though with
weakened inventories, due to high demand, its now available from T-Mobile and
Sprint, and by late July will be available from Verizon, AT&T and U.S.
Cellular.
Apple, by contrast, made the iPhone available in the United States
exclusively through AT&T for several years before finally extending it to
Verizon Wireless in early 2011 and Sprint toward the end of that year.
It's rumored that the next iPhone, expected to arrive in the fall, will be
available from T-Mobile and U.S. Cellular as well. While Apples patent
disputes with Samsung highlight the California companys belief that the South
Korean device maker has borrowed from it too heavily, Applewhich is also
expected to finally increase the display size of the next iPhoneappears to be
learning a few things from Samsung as well.
Strategy Analytics expects global handset shipments to grow by just 4
percent during the second quarter of 2012, though the second half of the year will
be stabilized by an improved pipeline of major new models, particularly
Apples iPhone 5.
The industrys most important driver, however, will be Long-Term
Evolution (LTE) 4G technology, which the firm expects will double global
handset shipments in 2013.
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