Actually, in the comments to the article, he says he has an email from Flurry saying that the Android numbers Flurry is reporting include the Amazon Fire.
Kindle Fire is the only Android-based tablet with numbers worth reporting. And when I say "Android-based" I mean that very loosely. I think it bears repeating that Amazon's version of Android is based on the 2.3 release, but they stripped out everything that would benefit Google and replaced it with their own code. They tore out Google's "profit layer" and put in an Amazon "profit layer."
Google gets no revenue from Kindle Fire through Amazon sales of digital media or physical goods or App Store sales. Apps purchased in the Android Market will not run on the Kindle Fire. The Fire user must purchase the apps again in the Amazon App Store.
Worse, Google gets no purchase history or product affinity data from Kindle Fire. Amazon gets all of that. And that information, the data that lets Amazon know its customers and their shopping patterns better, is a goldmine. Because knowing your customer better allows you to more effectively market your products and services to them. This customer info is what Apple, Google, Facebook, and Amazon are all fighting to get. Google gets zero customer info from Kindle Fire.
Worst of all, Kindle Fire provides Google with zero browsing history from the Kindle Fire's proprietary Silk browser and Amazon controls any ads on the Kindle Fire. It's essentially an at-home sales terminal for Amazon goods and services. Google's strength is search. And they make the bulk of their profits from ads in their search results. 96% of Google's profits come from ads. None of which comes from Kindle Fire.
Google might consider the Kindle Fire to be part of the greater Android ecosystem. They could add Kindle Fire activation numbers to overall Android activation numbers. And why shouldn't they? Amazon sells the Fire at a loss, and they'll more than make up that loss though physical goods and digital media sales. All other Android manufacturers will find that $200 price point impossible to beat. And none of the other Android manufacturers have anything like Amazon's (or Apple's) ecosystem. Amazon has locked up the low end of the pad computing market. Done.
I wonder what Flurry's "iOS plus Android" activation count would have been without Kindle Fire activations...
It might be, and it might not be. If the bump is about 50% for several years running, then it means a lot. If its just one year before they're basing it on, then it may mean little, if previous years were much different. You can't assume the numbers mean little without knowing more about them.
No, it doesn't. Even if it's 50% on the dot for 5 straight years, we're talking about complicated market behavior here, and past growth on one specific weekend does not predict future growth. Every 6 months all these companies come out with 10 new products. The growth of the popularity of the Samsung Galaxy 1 over whatever the hell is replaced has no impact on the popularity of the Moto Razr vs the SGX2. What if Android's competitive position was stronger this year because the iPhone was released, oh 4 months later that in the past? What if it was weaker because of the same reason? What if the Razr drove people to buy Android? What if the iPhone launch in Hong Kong drove a spike this year that wasn't there last year? It's crap. TOTAL crap.
And yeah, the fact that you know nothing about them is EXACTLY why the numbers mean little. Dumb.
Flurry and other companies that do this work charge a pretty penny for their reports, which contain far more detail and info than they release to the public. As companies do buy them, or they would be out of business, they must be useful, and accurate enough for subscribers to use to base their own businesses upon.
Yup. It's all about the paying subscribers. None of whom are media outlets, I presume.
So, that sounds interesting. Your description is vague though. Can you spell out more definitely what you expect this to be?
While Apple is reported to be interested in a Siri-enabled iPod-nano type device, Google has been working on their own wearable Heads-up Display (HUD) according to rumors from last year and a couple of very recent reports. Rather than relying on a connection to another device, all components including cloud capabilities are fully contained in a pair of eyeglasses.
Earlier this year Google added a little more expertise to the program with one of Apple's Senior Prototype Engineers and founder of AWare Technologies, Richard DeVaul, jumping ship for a Google position.
A clue that that they may soon have a demonstrable product is in the latest Google Goggles update. It adds the ability for users to get constant visual monitoring of their surroundings, offering clues and links based on what it "sees" considering your location. The most recent claims are that they're already in final prototyping stages.
Imagine walking directions to a restaurant, plus menu specials or customer feedback, displayed on a self-contained and connected HUD. How many sci-fi movies does that remind you of, and what potential market for such a device?
That might have been more than you were curious about, and hope it didn't derail the thread. I know it's totally unrelated.
No, it doesn't. Even if it's 50% on the dot for 5 straight years, we're talking about complicated market behavior here, and past growth on one specific weekend does not predict future growth. Every 6 months all these companies come out with 10 new products. The growth of the popularity of the Samsung Galaxy 1 over whatever the hell is replaced has no impact on the popularity of the Moto Razr vs the SGX2. What if Android's competitive position was stronger this year because the iPhone was released, oh 4 months later that in the past? What if it was weaker because of the same reason? What if the Razr drove people to buy Android? What if the iPhone launch in Hong Kong drove a spike this year that wasn't there last year? It's crap. TOTAL crap.
And yeah, the fact that you know nothing about them is EXACTLY why the numbers mean little. Dumb.
No one was talking about future growth as far as I saw. We're talking about the numbers reported. If some want to extrapolate, that fine. But you're stating quite categorically that the numbers mean nothing. That may not be true at all, and your stating it is as bad as someone stating that they are definitely good. I don't know either way. Only Flurry does, and they charge for that information.
There is such a thing as constancy, and you're ignoring that. While its possible that things are different this year, IF for five years, we see a 50% bounce, then you need to do a lot of explaining and fact finding to show why it's not true this year. So far, I only see you speculating, which is always fun here, but doesn't disprove anything.
Dumb? Yes, it's dumb to state that reported numbers are useless without knowing that they are. Since you know nothing about how they were gathered, your statement is of no value.
While Apple is reported to be interested in a Siri-enabled iPod-nano type device, Google has been working on their own wearable Heads-up Display (HUD) according to rumors from last year and a couple of very recent reports. Rather than relying on a connection to another device, all components including cloud capabilities are fully contained in a pair of eyeglasses.
Earlier this year Google added a little more expertise to the program with one of Apple's Senior Prototype Engineers and founder of AWare Technologies, Richard DeVaul, jumping ship for a Google position.
A clue that that they may soon have a demonstrable product is in the latest Google Goggles update. It adds the ability for users to get constant visual monitoring of their surroundings, offering clues and links based on what it "sees" considering your location. The most recent claims are that they're already in final prototyping stages.
Imagine walking directions to a restaurant, plus menu specials or customer feedback, displayed on a self-contained and connected HUD. How many sci-fi movies does that remind you of, and what potential market for such a device?
That might have been more than you were curious about, and hope it didn't derail the thread. I know it's totally unrelated.
Well, we always derail threads if something interesting comes up.
I will withhold my full comment until further more definitive information is available. These reports are nothing more than speculations and optimistic wishful thinking. The real numbers have yet to come to light.
I will withhold my full comment until further more definitive information is available. These reports are nothing more than speculations and optimistic wishful thinking. The real numbers have yet to come to light.
If you mean the faucial numbers, only Apple's will come to light. The others are just twaddle, as shipped doesn't equal sold.
If you mean the faucial numbers, only Apple's will come to light. The others are just twaddle, as shipped doesn't equal sold.
We don't want that conversation again. Shipped usually means someone paid for the product, it was sold, whether it was Sprint or Target or your best friend's sister. . .
That's how Apple and most everyone else counts a sale.
It's pretty obvious that at least some Apple products remain around past their shelf life just as some competitors products do. Thus Best Buy's sale last weekend on a iPhone model still in their warehouses tho discontinued by Apple some time ago.
We don't want that conversation again. Shipped usually means someone paid for the product, it was sold, whether it was Sprint or Target or your best friend's sister. . .
That's how Apple and most everyone else counts a sale.
It's pretty obvious that at least some Apple products remain around past their shelf life just as some competitors products do. Thus Best Buy's sale last weekend on a iPhone model still in their warehouses tho discontinued by Apple some time ago.
No one in the industry doubts that when Apple says "sold", it means sold. In fact, there are articles in the financial press that come out time to time that press the very point that no one other than Apple is talking about sold. The numbers can't be compared. Even if we would want to use your metric, it doesn't matter, Apple's numbers still stand for sold, while everyone else's still stands for shipped, and we can see with a number of manufacturers, that in those cases, shipped is much higher than sold.
We don't want that conversation again. Shipped usually means someone paid for the product, it was sold, whether it was Sprint or Target or your best friend's sister. . .
That's how Apple and most everyone else counts a sale.
It's pretty obvious that at least some Apple products remain around past their shelf life just as some competitors products do. Thus Best Buy's sale last weekend on a iPhone model still in their warehouses tho discontinued by Apple some time ago.
You can bet that Apple got full price for those iPhone 4 32GBs but that some distributor along the line messed up and had to sell them to another distributor or sell them to customers (if it was BestBuy) to offload this out of data supply.
Shipped ≠ Sold. Again, these words are used in a very specific way. You can ship an item without having been given a guarantee of payment for the entire shipment, even if customers failed to buy them. Retail doesn't work that way.
No one in the industry doubts that when Apple says "sold", it means sold. In fact, there are articles in the financial press that come out time to time that press the very point that no one other than Apple is talking about sold. The numbers can't be compared. Even if we would want to use your metric, it doesn't matter, Apple's numbers still stand for sold, while everyone else's still stands for shipped, and we can see with a number of manufacturers, that in those cases, shipped is much higher than sold.
Samsung (as well as others) report channel sales. It's not channel shipped.
"SEOUL, Korea ? September 25th, 2011 ? Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd, a global leader in digital media and digital convergence technologies, today announced that the Samsung GALAXY S II (Model: GT-I9100) has achieved 10 million global channel sales, doubling from five million in just eight weeks."
That you or others might want to call this only shipped and believe that Apple sales revenue reported in quarterly results is only using sales to the end-user/consumer doesn't make it a fact.
Apple reports sales if they get paid. Samsung reports sales if they get paid. It doesn't matter who bought and paid for the product. Generally the conditions for a sale to have occurred and revenue recognized for either one happens when the product is shipped, in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles. Best Buy's purchase of Apple devices is counted just as surely as the one picked up at full retail in an Apple Store.
That makes shipped usually equal to sold. Before it left Apple or Samsung, someone took responsibility for paying the bill. It was a sale.
With that said, Apple may additionally choose to report estimated channel inventory on certain specific products during quarterly calls, thus allowing an educated guess as to the units that made their way to end-users. But their official sales numbers don't discriminate on where the product sale came from. Wal-mart's money is just as good as yours.
You can bet that Apple got full price for those iPhone 4 32GBs. . .
I have no doubt you're absolutely correct. Apple counted the sale, shipped to a warehouse somewhere (at whatever they considered full distributor/reseller price), even tho no end-user had purchased them. It was no matter to Apple. They had collected payment for them, thus sold.
Your mention that it's possible to ship product without selling it doesn't mean that's the norm. Of course it's possible, but Apple is clear that as far as they're concerned shipped generally means it's counted as a sale as they don't normally ship without payment arrangements being made. An exception here and there (if there is one) doesn't disprove that shipped normally = sold.
Finding one pink tick on a dog wouldn't mean that ticks aren't usually brown. I'll sit back and wait on an expected hair-of-the-dog twist on logic.
Samsung (as well as others) report channel sales. It's not channel shipped.
"SEOUL, Korea – September 25th, 2011 – Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd, a global leader in digital media and digital convergence technologies, today announced that the Samsung GALAXY S II (Model: GT-I9100) has achieved 10 million global channel sales, doubling from five million in just eight weeks."
That you or others might want to call this only shipped and believe that Apple sales revenue reported in quarterly results is only using sales to the end-user/consumer doesn't make it a fact.
Apple reports sales if they get paid. Samsung reports sales if they get paid. It doesn't matter who bought and paid for the product. Generally the conditions for a sale to have occurred and revenue recognized for either one happens when the product is shipped, in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles. Best Buy's purchase of Apple devices is counted just as surely as the one picked up at full retail in an Apple Store.
That makes shipped usually equal to sold. Before it left Apple or Samsung, someone took responsibility for paying the bill. It was a sale.
With that said, Apple may additionally choose to report estimated channel inventory on certain specific products during quarterly calls, thus allowing an educated guess as to the units that made their way to end-users. But their official sales numbers don't discriminate on where the product sale came from. Wal-mart's money is just as good as yours.
It's shipped. They say shipped, and are quoted as saying shipped. Even if it were channel sales, what does that mean? Nothing. Because the agreements between manufacturers and wholesalers, distributors and retailers is that products that don't sell can be returned, either for credit, or cash.
And as we know, these companies are having a hard time of unloading some of their products. And remember that these numbers don't include returns. And on some products, as we've been reading, the returns are very high. So if ten million of a product are actually sold, but 20% are returned, but not announced, but the grapevine shows it to be the case, is 2 million subtracted from the total? No.
Apple is one of the very rare companies who does report channel inventory apart form sales, and that's the problem with other companies. They just report the total, as they are unfortunately allowed to. So last quarter, Samsung was accused of stuffing the channel with phones and tablets. So was RIM, with phones.
But these things often come home to roost. Subsequent quarters show dramatically lower shipped numbers, supporting the suspicion that few of these items actually sold to the end user, which is the only "sale" that is real.
The problem is that some large companies with strong ties to distributers and retailers, who have large numbers of products for sale with these companies can manage to take returns without much being made of it, while companies who don't, are thrust into the spotlight.
So we see odd things happening. Like HP's problem with the Touchpad. And RIM's problems with the Playbook. Or Acer's failure to sell netbooks and tablets. But it takes a competitor to point out the failure of a Samsung product. An accusation that Samsung, despite questions from the press, refused to answer, giving credence to the accusation.
It's shipped. They say shipped, and are quoted as saying shipped.
SEOUL, Korea ? September 25th, 2011 ? Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd, a global leader in digital media and digital convergence technologies, today announced that the Samsung GALAXY S II (Model: GT-I9100) has achieved 10 million global channel sales. . .
Where do you get shipped from that?
Now whether retailers can return the purchased products for full credit if they don't sell, I have no doubt that some manufacturers might allow it. Is it the general rule, and specifically included in Samsung's reseller agreements? Just as you replied to the poster who questioned whether tech patents were too broad, unless you've seen most of these agreements you're simply guessing as to what they contain. An agreement or two that someone saw once upon a time isn't proof of any industry standard.
Even then, Samsung could be selling every Galaxy S2 they produce, and thus any return clause isn't any more meaningful than a similar Apple contract clause if it exists. There's no evidence to the contrary that I've seen. Instead the Galaxy S2 is consistently mentioned as one the the top-selling smartphones in the world.
Suggesting that someone-once-said there might be high return rates approaching 20% is more FUD than truth IMHO. I've never seen any reliable source that made that claim. I've only seen an unreliable, anonymous mention repeated for "eyes-on" value a few months back. But perhaps you have a current, reliable & named one showing these high returns? I'd love to see it.
SEOUL, Korea ? September 25th, 2011 ? Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd, a global leader in digital media and digital convergence technologies, today announced that the Samsung GALAXY S II (Model: GT-I9100) has achieved 10 million global channel sales. . .
Where do you get shipped from that?
Now whether retailers can return the purchased products for full credit if they don't sell, I have no doubt that some manufacturers might allow it. Is it the general rule, and specifically included in Samsung's reseller agreements? Just as you replied to the poster who questioned whether tech patents were too broad, unless you've seen most of these agreements you're simply guessing as to what they contain. An agreement or two that someone saw once upon a time isn't proof of any industry standard.
Even then, Samsung could be selling every Galaxy S2 they produce, and thus any return clause isn't any more meaningful than a similar Apple contract clause if it exists. There's no evidence to the contrary that I've seen. Instead the Galaxy S2 is consistently mentioned as one the the top-selling smartphones in the world.
Suggesting that someone-once-said there might be high return rates approaching 20% is more FUD than truth IMHO. I've never seen any reliable source that made that claim. I've only seen an unreliable, anonymous mention repeated for "eyes-on" value a few months back. But perhaps you have a current, reliable & named one showing these high returns? I'd love to see it.
Two quarters ago Samsung did say that they would no longer state how many tablets and phones they shipped. Suspicions were that their shipped numbers were a good deal higher than their sold numbers. If they are now stating sales to the channel, that's almost the same as stating shipped, which is what almost all other manufacturers are still stating.
Shipped means products that have left the manufacturers facilities, and are going anywhere else. It doesn't mean that they are paid for. Many products go out on consignment. They aren't paid for until they sell. The rest are returned.
Several places mentioned the high return rates. I remember that when this was announced for the HP Touchpad, at first, people didn't believe it either.
If they are now stating sales to the channel, that's almost the same as stating shipped, which is what almost all other manufacturers are still stating.
Shipped means products that have left the manufacturers facilities, and are going anywhere else. It doesn't mean that they are paid for. Many products go out on consignment. They aren't paid for until they sell. The rest are returned.
It's a channel SALE, Mel. You have no background reference for saying that payment arrangements weren't made before product left Samsung's custody, thus it was simply a shipment with no expectations for payment. You're simply throwing a bunch of maybe's around with no factual sources for your suppositions. Since when do accounting principles allow consignments to be counted as recognized revenue, a.k.a. a sale?
Apple also reports channel sales. Are you claiming Apple's numbers are simply shipped too, perhaps some only consignment agreements?? You apparently want the definition of a sale to mean shipped if it's anyone but Apple, and a retail end-user purchase if it's Apple products.
Rather than your mights and maybe's, why not use a standard industry explanation of a channel sale:
An aggregate of all sales generated in a particular period by all the means of distribution (own sales force, dealers, retailers, direct marketing, etc.) employed by a company to move its products to the market.
And just what constitutes a sale?
Let's go directly to the SEC for that.
". . .revenue should not be recognized until it is realized or realizable and earned.2 SFAC No. 5, paragraph 83(b) states that "an entity's revenue-earning activities involve delivering or producing goods, rendering services, or other activities that constitute its ongoing major or central operations, and revenues are considered to have been earned when the entity has substantially accomplished what it must do to be entitled to the benefits represented by the revenues" [footnote reference omitted]. Paragraph 84(a) continues "the two conditions (being realized or realizable and being earned) are usually met by the time product or merchandise is delivered or services are rendered to customers, and revenues from manufacturing and selling activities and gains and losses from sales of other assets are commonly recognized at time of sale (usually meaning delivery)."
The staff believes that revenue generally is realized or realizable and earned when all of the following criteria are met:
Persuasive evidence of an arrangement exists
Delivery has occurred or services have been rendered
The seller's price to the buyer is fixed or determinable
and
Collectibility is reasonably assured"
This last bold quote is the same found in nearly every manufacturer's 10-K or 10-Q SEC filing, some like Apple going on to state that those conditions are generally met when a product is shipped.
But what about a consignment. You apparently think that could be claimed as a sale?
Nope!
From an SEC Q&A:
Facts: Company Z enters into an arrangement with Customer A to deliver Company Z's products to Customer A on a consignment basis. Pursuant to the terms of the arrangement, Customer A is a consignee, and title to the products does not pass from Company Z to Customer A until Customer A consumes the products in its operations. Company Z delivers product to Customer A under the terms of their arrangement.
Question: May Company Z recognize revenue upon delivery of its product to Customer A?
Interpretive Response: No. Products delivered to a consignee pursuant to a consignment arrangement are not sales and do not qualify for revenue recognition until a sale occurs.
Your guesses about how things work don't jive with the SEC's regulations. I think the SEC might be a bit more reliable source Mel.
If you take the time to read this SEC document it might clear up a few of your misunderstandings on reporting requirements and standards, what constitutes a sale and how shipping and delivery plays into that. It's not that long an article and worth the read.
You're obviously a really smart guy Mel, but you're occasionally prone to posting things that some research might reveal as inaccurate or even completely untrue. That's really the only time we have these disagreements, when you expect whatever you write be accepted an an unquestioned "everyone knows" fact, no citations needed.
You may not like Google as a company, but "Googling" can still be your friend.
We've been through this before. There is a reason sale is qualified by the word channel. You can pretend you don't remember that conversation or claim that shipped = channel sale = sale but you are wrong.
Note they use sales 35 times but channel only once, and only in reference to channel supply. Again, you don't qualify sales with channel unless you are trying to imply something that will fool only the ignorant. They don't pull this kind of crap with SEC filings.
Comments
Actually, in the comments to the article, he says he has an email from Flurry saying that the Android numbers Flurry is reporting include the Amazon Fire.
Kindle Fire is the only Android-based tablet with numbers worth reporting. And when I say "Android-based" I mean that very loosely. I think it bears repeating that Amazon's version of Android is based on the 2.3 release, but they stripped out everything that would benefit Google and replaced it with their own code. They tore out Google's "profit layer" and put in an Amazon "profit layer."
Google gets no revenue from Kindle Fire through Amazon sales of digital media or physical goods or App Store sales. Apps purchased in the Android Market will not run on the Kindle Fire. The Fire user must purchase the apps again in the Amazon App Store.
Worse, Google gets no purchase history or product affinity data from Kindle Fire. Amazon gets all of that. And that information, the data that lets Amazon know its customers and their shopping patterns better, is a goldmine. Because knowing your customer better allows you to more effectively market your products and services to them. This customer info is what Apple, Google, Facebook, and Amazon are all fighting to get. Google gets zero customer info from Kindle Fire.
Worst of all, Kindle Fire provides Google with zero browsing history from the Kindle Fire's proprietary Silk browser and Amazon controls any ads on the Kindle Fire. It's essentially an at-home sales terminal for Amazon goods and services. Google's strength is search. And they make the bulk of their profits from ads in their search results. 96% of Google's profits come from ads. None of which comes from Kindle Fire.
Google might consider the Kindle Fire to be part of the greater Android ecosystem. They could add Kindle Fire activation numbers to overall Android activation numbers. And why shouldn't they? Amazon sells the Fire at a loss, and they'll more than make up that loss though physical goods and digital media sales. All other Android manufacturers will find that $200 price point impossible to beat. And none of the other Android manufacturers have anything like Amazon's (or Apple's) ecosystem. Amazon has locked up the low end of the pad computing market. Done.
I wonder what Flurry's "iOS plus Android" activation count would have been without Kindle Fire activations...
It might be, and it might not be. If the bump is about 50% for several years running, then it means a lot. If its just one year before they're basing it on, then it may mean little, if previous years were much different. You can't assume the numbers mean little without knowing more about them.
No, it doesn't. Even if it's 50% on the dot for 5 straight years, we're talking about complicated market behavior here, and past growth on one specific weekend does not predict future growth. Every 6 months all these companies come out with 10 new products. The growth of the popularity of the Samsung Galaxy 1 over whatever the hell is replaced has no impact on the popularity of the Moto Razr vs the SGX2. What if Android's competitive position was stronger this year because the iPhone was released, oh 4 months later that in the past? What if it was weaker because of the same reason? What if the Razr drove people to buy Android? What if the iPhone launch in Hong Kong drove a spike this year that wasn't there last year? It's crap. TOTAL crap.
And yeah, the fact that you know nothing about them is EXACTLY why the numbers mean little. Dumb.
Flurry and other companies that do this work charge a pretty penny for their reports, which contain far more detail and info than they release to the public. As companies do buy them, or they would be out of business, they must be useful, and accurate enough for subscribers to use to base their own businesses upon.
Yup. It's all about the paying subscribers. None of whom are media outlets, I presume.
So, that sounds interesting. Your description is vague though. Can you spell out more definitely what you expect this to be?
While Apple is reported to be interested in a Siri-enabled iPod-nano type device, Google has been working on their own wearable Heads-up Display (HUD) according to rumors from last year and a couple of very recent reports. Rather than relying on a connection to another device, all components including cloud capabilities are fully contained in a pair of eyeglasses.
Earlier this year Google added a little more expertise to the program with one of Apple's Senior Prototype Engineers and founder of AWare Technologies, Richard DeVaul, jumping ship for a Google position.
A clue that that they may soon have a demonstrable product is in the latest Google Goggles update. It adds the ability for users to get constant visual monitoring of their surroundings, offering clues and links based on what it "sees" considering your location. The most recent claims are that they're already in final prototyping stages.
Imagine walking directions to a restaurant, plus menu specials or customer feedback, displayed on a self-contained and connected HUD. How many sci-fi movies does that remind you of, and what potential market for such a device?
That might have been more than you were curious about, and hope it didn't derail the thread. I know it's totally unrelated.
No, it doesn't. Even if it's 50% on the dot for 5 straight years, we're talking about complicated market behavior here, and past growth on one specific weekend does not predict future growth. Every 6 months all these companies come out with 10 new products. The growth of the popularity of the Samsung Galaxy 1 over whatever the hell is replaced has no impact on the popularity of the Moto Razr vs the SGX2. What if Android's competitive position was stronger this year because the iPhone was released, oh 4 months later that in the past? What if it was weaker because of the same reason? What if the Razr drove people to buy Android? What if the iPhone launch in Hong Kong drove a spike this year that wasn't there last year? It's crap. TOTAL crap.
And yeah, the fact that you know nothing about them is EXACTLY why the numbers mean little. Dumb.
No one was talking about future growth as far as I saw. We're talking about the numbers reported. If some want to extrapolate, that fine. But you're stating quite categorically that the numbers mean nothing. That may not be true at all, and your stating it is as bad as someone stating that they are definitely good. I don't know either way. Only Flurry does, and they charge for that information.
There is such a thing as constancy, and you're ignoring that. While its possible that things are different this year, IF for five years, we see a 50% bounce, then you need to do a lot of explaining and fact finding to show why it's not true this year. So far, I only see you speculating, which is always fun here, but doesn't disprove anything.
Dumb? Yes, it's dumb to state that reported numbers are useless without knowing that they are. Since you know nothing about how they were gathered, your statement is of no value.
While Apple is reported to be interested in a Siri-enabled iPod-nano type device, Google has been working on their own wearable Heads-up Display (HUD) according to rumors from last year and a couple of very recent reports. Rather than relying on a connection to another device, all components including cloud capabilities are fully contained in a pair of eyeglasses.
Earlier this year Google added a little more expertise to the program with one of Apple's Senior Prototype Engineers and founder of AWare Technologies, Richard DeVaul, jumping ship for a Google position.
A clue that that they may soon have a demonstrable product is in the latest Google Goggles update. It adds the ability for users to get constant visual monitoring of their surroundings, offering clues and links based on what it "sees" considering your location. The most recent claims are that they're already in final prototyping stages.
Imagine walking directions to a restaurant, plus menu specials or customer feedback, displayed on a self-contained and connected HUD. How many sci-fi movies does that remind you of, and what potential market for such a device?
That might have been more than you were curious about, and hope it didn't derail the thread. I know it's totally unrelated.
Well, we always derail threads if something interesting comes up.
I will withhold my full comment until further more definitive information is available. These reports are nothing more than speculations and optimistic wishful thinking. The real numbers have yet to come to light.
If you mean the faucial numbers, only Apple's will come to light. The others are just twaddle, as shipped doesn't equal sold.
If you mean the faucial numbers, only Apple's will come to light. The others are just twaddle, as shipped doesn't equal sold.
We don't want that conversation again.
That's how Apple and most everyone else counts a sale.
It's pretty obvious that at least some Apple products remain around past their shelf life just as some competitors products do. Thus Best Buy's sale last weekend on a iPhone model still in their warehouses tho discontinued by Apple some time ago.
I will withhold my full comment until further more definitive information is available.
Can't prove it wrong and can't even reliably make up any lies without getting caught, so deciding not to comment at all.
Good man. That's the way to do it.
We don't want that conversation again.
That's how Apple and most everyone else counts a sale.
It's pretty obvious that at least some Apple products remain around past their shelf life just as some competitors products do. Thus Best Buy's sale last weekend on a iPhone model still in their warehouses tho discontinued by Apple some time ago.
No one in the industry doubts that when Apple says "sold", it means sold. In fact, there are articles in the financial press that come out time to time that press the very point that no one other than Apple is talking about sold. The numbers can't be compared. Even if we would want to use your metric, it doesn't matter, Apple's numbers still stand for sold, while everyone else's still stands for shipped, and we can see with a number of manufacturers, that in those cases, shipped is much higher than sold.
We don't want that conversation again.
That's how Apple and most everyone else counts a sale.
It's pretty obvious that at least some Apple products remain around past their shelf life just as some competitors products do. Thus Best Buy's sale last weekend on a iPhone model still in their warehouses tho discontinued by Apple some time ago.
You can bet that Apple got full price for those iPhone 4 32GBs but that some distributor along the line messed up and had to sell them to another distributor or sell them to customers (if it was BestBuy) to offload this out of data supply.
Shipped ≠ Sold. Again, these words are used in a very specific way. You can ship an item without having been given a guarantee of payment for the entire shipment, even if customers failed to buy them. Retail doesn't work that way.
No one in the industry doubts that when Apple says "sold", it means sold. In fact, there are articles in the financial press that come out time to time that press the very point that no one other than Apple is talking about sold. The numbers can't be compared. Even if we would want to use your metric, it doesn't matter, Apple's numbers still stand for sold, while everyone else's still stands for shipped, and we can see with a number of manufacturers, that in those cases, shipped is much higher than sold.
Samsung (as well as others) report channel sales. It's not channel shipped.
"SEOUL, Korea ? September 25th, 2011 ? Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd, a global leader in digital media and digital convergence technologies, today announced that the Samsung GALAXY S II (Model: GT-I9100) has achieved 10 million global channel sales, doubling from five million in just eight weeks."
That you or others might want to call this only shipped and believe that Apple sales revenue reported in quarterly results is only using sales to the end-user/consumer doesn't make it a fact.
Apple reports sales if they get paid. Samsung reports sales if they get paid. It doesn't matter who bought and paid for the product. Generally the conditions for a sale to have occurred and revenue recognized for either one happens when the product is shipped, in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles. Best Buy's purchase of Apple devices is counted just as surely as the one picked up at full retail in an Apple Store.
That makes shipped usually equal to sold. Before it left Apple or Samsung, someone took responsibility for paying the bill. It was a sale.
With that said, Apple may additionally choose to report estimated channel inventory on certain specific products during quarterly calls, thus allowing an educated guess as to the units that made their way to end-users. But their official sales numbers don't discriminate on where the product sale came from. Wal-mart's money is just as good as yours.
You can bet that Apple got full price for those iPhone 4 32GBs. . .
I have no doubt you're absolutely correct. Apple counted the sale, shipped to a warehouse somewhere (at whatever they considered full distributor/reseller price), even tho no end-user had purchased them. It was no matter to Apple. They had collected payment for them, thus sold.
Your mention that it's possible to ship product without selling it doesn't mean that's the norm. Of course it's possible
Finding one pink tick on a dog wouldn't mean that ticks aren't usually brown. I'll sit back and wait on an expected hair-of-the-dog twist on logic.
Samsung (as well as others) report channel sales. It's not channel shipped.
"SEOUL, Korea – September 25th, 2011 – Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd, a global leader in digital media and digital convergence technologies, today announced that the Samsung GALAXY S II (Model: GT-I9100) has achieved 10 million global channel sales, doubling from five million in just eight weeks."
That you or others might want to call this only shipped and believe that Apple sales revenue reported in quarterly results is only using sales to the end-user/consumer doesn't make it a fact.
Apple reports sales if they get paid. Samsung reports sales if they get paid. It doesn't matter who bought and paid for the product. Generally the conditions for a sale to have occurred and revenue recognized for either one happens when the product is shipped, in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles. Best Buy's purchase of Apple devices is counted just as surely as the one picked up at full retail in an Apple Store.
That makes shipped usually equal to sold. Before it left Apple or Samsung, someone took responsibility for paying the bill. It was a sale.
With that said, Apple may additionally choose to report estimated channel inventory on certain specific products during quarterly calls, thus allowing an educated guess as to the units that made their way to end-users. But their official sales numbers don't discriminate on where the product sale came from. Wal-mart's money is just as good as yours.
It's shipped. They say shipped, and are quoted as saying shipped. Even if it were channel sales, what does that mean? Nothing. Because the agreements between manufacturers and wholesalers, distributors and retailers is that products that don't sell can be returned, either for credit, or cash.
And as we know, these companies are having a hard time of unloading some of their products. And remember that these numbers don't include returns. And on some products, as we've been reading, the returns are very high. So if ten million of a product are actually sold, but 20% are returned, but not announced, but the grapevine shows it to be the case, is 2 million subtracted from the total? No.
Apple is one of the very rare companies who does report channel inventory apart form sales, and that's the problem with other companies. They just report the total, as they are unfortunately allowed to. So last quarter, Samsung was accused of stuffing the channel with phones and tablets. So was RIM, with phones.
But these things often come home to roost. Subsequent quarters show dramatically lower shipped numbers, supporting the suspicion that few of these items actually sold to the end user, which is the only "sale" that is real.
The problem is that some large companies with strong ties to distributers and retailers, who have large numbers of products for sale with these companies can manage to take returns without much being made of it, while companies who don't, are thrust into the spotlight.
So we see odd things happening. Like HP's problem with the Touchpad. And RIM's problems with the Playbook. Or Acer's failure to sell netbooks and tablets. But it takes a competitor to point out the failure of a Samsung product. An accusation that Samsung, despite questions from the press, refused to answer, giving credence to the accusation.
Meanwhile, no one doubts Apple statements.
It's shipped. They say shipped, and are quoted as saying shipped.
SEOUL, Korea ? September 25th, 2011 ? Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd, a global leader in digital media and digital convergence technologies, today announced that the Samsung GALAXY S II (Model: GT-I9100) has achieved 10 million global channel sales. . .
Where do you get shipped from that?
Now whether retailers can return the purchased products for full credit if they don't sell, I have no doubt that some manufacturers might allow it. Is it the general rule, and specifically included in Samsung's reseller agreements? Just as you replied to the poster who questioned whether tech patents were too broad, unless you've seen most of these agreements you're simply guessing as to what they contain. An agreement or two that someone saw once upon a time isn't proof of any industry standard.
Even then, Samsung could be selling every Galaxy S2 they produce, and thus any return clause isn't any more meaningful than a similar Apple contract clause if it exists. There's no evidence to the contrary that I've seen. Instead the Galaxy S2 is consistently mentioned as one the the top-selling smartphones in the world.
Suggesting that someone-once-said there might be high return rates approaching 20% is more FUD than truth IMHO. I've never seen any reliable source that made that claim. I've only seen an unreliable, anonymous mention repeated for "eyes-on" value a few months back. But perhaps you have a current, reliable & named one showing these high returns? I'd love to see it.
SEOUL, Korea ? September 25th, 2011 ? Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd, a global leader in digital media and digital convergence technologies, today announced that the Samsung GALAXY S II (Model: GT-I9100) has achieved 10 million global channel sales. . .
Where do you get shipped from that?
Now whether retailers can return the purchased products for full credit if they don't sell, I have no doubt that some manufacturers might allow it. Is it the general rule, and specifically included in Samsung's reseller agreements? Just as you replied to the poster who questioned whether tech patents were too broad, unless you've seen most of these agreements you're simply guessing as to what they contain. An agreement or two that someone saw once upon a time isn't proof of any industry standard.
Even then, Samsung could be selling every Galaxy S2 they produce, and thus any return clause isn't any more meaningful than a similar Apple contract clause if it exists. There's no evidence to the contrary that I've seen. Instead the Galaxy S2 is consistently mentioned as one the the top-selling smartphones in the world.
Suggesting that someone-once-said there might be high return rates approaching 20% is more FUD than truth IMHO. I've never seen any reliable source that made that claim. I've only seen an unreliable, anonymous mention repeated for "eyes-on" value a few months back. But perhaps you have a current, reliable & named one showing these high returns? I'd love to see it.
Two quarters ago Samsung did say that they would no longer state how many tablets and phones they shipped. Suspicions were that their shipped numbers were a good deal higher than their sold numbers. If they are now stating sales to the channel, that's almost the same as stating shipped, which is what almost all other manufacturers are still stating.
Shipped means products that have left the manufacturers facilities, and are going anywhere else. It doesn't mean that they are paid for. Many products go out on consignment. They aren't paid for until they sell. The rest are returned.
Several places mentioned the high return rates. I remember that when this was announced for the HP Touchpad, at first, people didn't believe it either.
If they are now stating sales to the channel, that's almost the same as stating shipped, which is what almost all other manufacturers are still stating.
Shipped means products that have left the manufacturers facilities, and are going anywhere else. It doesn't mean that they are paid for. Many products go out on consignment. They aren't paid for until they sell. The rest are returned.
It's a channel SALE, Mel. You have no background reference for saying that payment arrangements weren't made before product left Samsung's custody, thus it was simply a shipment with no expectations for payment. You're simply throwing a bunch of maybe's around with no factual sources for your suppositions. Since when do accounting principles allow consignments to be counted as recognized revenue, a.k.a. a sale?
Apple also reports channel sales. Are you claiming Apple's numbers are simply shipped too, perhaps some only consignment agreements?? You apparently want the definition of a sale to mean shipped if it's anyone but Apple, and a retail end-user purchase if it's Apple products.
Rather than your mights and maybe's, why not use a standard industry explanation of a channel sale:
An aggregate of all sales generated in a particular period by all the means of distribution (own sales force, dealers, retailers, direct marketing, etc.) employed by a company to move its products to the market.
And just what constitutes a sale?
Let's go directly to the SEC for that.
". . .revenue should not be recognized until it is realized or realizable and earned.2 SFAC No. 5, paragraph 83(b) states that "an entity's revenue-earning activities involve delivering or producing goods, rendering services, or other activities that constitute its ongoing major or central operations, and revenues are considered to have been earned when the entity has substantially accomplished what it must do to be entitled to the benefits represented by the revenues" [footnote reference omitted]. Paragraph 84(a) continues "the two conditions (being realized or realizable and being earned) are usually met by the time product or merchandise is delivered or services are rendered to customers, and revenues from manufacturing and selling activities and gains and losses from sales of other assets are commonly recognized at time of sale (usually meaning delivery)."
The staff believes that revenue generally is realized or realizable and earned when all of the following criteria are met:
Persuasive evidence of an arrangement exists
Delivery has occurred or services have been rendered
The seller's price to the buyer is fixed or determinable
and
Collectibility is reasonably assured"
This last bold quote is the same found in nearly every manufacturer's 10-K or 10-Q SEC filing, some like Apple going on to state that those conditions are generally met when a product is shipped.
But what about a consignment. You apparently think that could be claimed as a sale?
Nope!
From an SEC Q&A:
Facts: Company Z enters into an arrangement with Customer A to deliver Company Z's products to Customer A on a consignment basis. Pursuant to the terms of the arrangement, Customer A is a consignee, and title to the products does not pass from Company Z to Customer A until Customer A consumes the products in its operations. Company Z delivers product to Customer A under the terms of their arrangement.
Question: May Company Z recognize revenue upon delivery of its product to Customer A?
Interpretive Response: No. Products delivered to a consignee pursuant to a consignment arrangement are not sales and do not qualify for revenue recognition until a sale occurs.
Your guesses about how things work don't jive with the SEC's regulations. I think the SEC might be a bit more reliable source Mel.
If you take the time to read this SEC document it might clear up a few of your misunderstandings on reporting requirements and standards, what constitutes a sale and how shipping and delivery plays into that. It's not that long an article and worth the read.
http://www.sec.gov/interps/account/sab101.htm
You're obviously a really smart guy Mel, but you're occasionally prone to posting things that some research might reveal as inaccurate or even completely untrue. That's really the only time we have these disagreements, when you expect whatever you write be accepted an an unquestioned "everyone knows" fact, no citations needed.
You may not like Google as a company, but "Googling" can still be your friend.
It's a channel SALE, Mel.
We've been through this before. There is a reason sale is qualified by the word channel. You can pretend you don't remember that conversation or claim that shipped = channel sale = sale but you are wrong.
Here is Samsung's earning for Q3-2011.
- http://www.samsung.com/us/aboutsamsu...erence_eng.pdf (PDF, 800KB)
Note they use sales 35 times but channel only once, and only in reference to channel supply. Again, you don't qualify sales with channel unless you are trying to imply something that will fool only the ignorant. They don't pull this kind of crap with SEC filings.