IDC projects Apple unlikely to make market share gains against Android in coming years

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  • Reply 41 of 102
    appexappex Posts: 687member
    Gaining market share against Android is very easy:

    - USB port on iOS devices.
    - microSD and SDXC ports in iOS devices.
    - No sandboxing iOS.
    - No jailing iOS.
    - Mac tablet.
    - Reducing price to half. Not only of full devices, but also of RAM and SSD inside, which Apple charges twice or more than the original manufacturer.
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  • Reply 42 of 102
    mstone wrote: »
    Right now with 20% market share for iOS, and a user base that has the willingness to upgrade often, buy apps, media and accessories, there shouldn't be any concerns, but lets hope it does not fall below that level. I think that 10% is sort of a threshold that we definitely do not want to test. Somewhat surprisingly, Mac at 10% market share these days seems to be relatively robust.

    And don't forget... percentages are based on the total number of units sold in the market.

    If the iPhone dropped to 10% someday... that number would certainly be lower than the 15% they have today.

    BUT... if the smartphone market was 3 billion units a year... and Apple had 10%... that would mean Apple sold 300 million iPhones. And that's a big increase in units over what they sell today.

    We've seen this already. Apple's iPhone sales go up each year... but their percentage share stays roughly the same.

    That's because the market itself is growing. And that's the problem with looking percentages.

    I wouldn't say 10% market share would be bad for the iPhone... it could actually be good depending on the size of the market.

    Apple could comfortably sell 60-70 iPhones every quarter for the rest of our lives. And it wouldn't matter what their percentage of all other smartphone happened to be.
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  • Reply 43 of 102
    mstonemstone Posts: 11,510member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Michael Scrip View Post



    I wouldn't say 10% market share would be bad for the iPhone...

    If the market share drops too low, developers might start to abandon it, which could lead to a snowball effect. The smartphone industry will eventually start to plateau just like the PC industry has done and I'm hoping Apple has at least 20% market share when that begins to happen.

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  • Reply 44 of 102

    "Ignorant Data Collector"

    iOS Doesn't Count
    [/quote]

    ^^
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  • Reply 45 of 102
    anomeanome Posts: 1,545member
    asdasd wrote: »
    Those arguments are spurious since iOS is a platform. Similar arguments were made for the Mac during its 2% of the market era. iOS is in much better shape and in fact will I think win both market share and increase unit share over the next 4 years. Proof is that IDC think they won't.
    Don't quite agree with your platform argument. The "Ferrari vs Kia" argument is largely irrelevant, but that's not why.

    Part of the problem is that people are still seeing Apple as competing on software. It used to be Mac vs Windows, now it's iOS vs Android. Apple are actually competing against other hardware manufacturers. So it's really Apple vs Dell/Compaq/HP or Apple vs Samsung/Motorola/HTC... And even then, the argument about comparing crappy Android "not-terribly-smart" phones is also valid. Samsung make a lot of different types of phone to get a market share on the same scale Apple does with it's one platform and essentially one phone model.
    appex wrote: »
    Gaining market share against Android is very easy:

    - USB port on iOS devices.
    - microSD and SDXC ports in iOS devices.
    - No sandboxing iOS.
    - No jailing iOS.
    - Mac tablet.
    - Reducing price to half. Not only of full devices, but also of RAM and SSD inside, which Apple charges twice or more than the original manufacturer.
    Alll of these are stupid ideas. (Although, to be fair, iPhones and iPads do have USB ports, they just use a non-standard connector that does other stuff too.)

    And I'm not entirely sure what "jailing" is. I know what "jailbreaking" is, but it's really just hyperbolic rhetoric designed to make people sound edgy. Apple didn't imprison anything to start with.
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  • Reply 46 of 102
    Any od those smart analitics does not count with used devices. New phones tends to offer less and less new. Lot of iOS users wiil go for used iPhone 6 because of screen in comming yard. It is not the same on Android. Most people already have big one.
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  • Reply 47 of 102
    buzdotsbuzdots Posts: 452member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by SolipsismY View Post





    ... Nostradumbass predictions...

    Now THERE is the afternoon chuckle!

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  • Reply 48 of 102
    charlitunacharlituna Posts: 7,217member
    Android = 10 or so hardware companies so yeah it will have more market share. what matters most is the money. so what if "Android" has sold 1000 phones and Apple has sold only 100 if each Android phone makes 10 cents profit and the Apple phones make $1. Math works out in Apple's favor
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  • Reply 49 of 102
    davendaven Posts: 782member
    kdjohn3 wrote: »
    This is the same firm that predicted in 2011 that Windows Phone would overtake the iPhone by 2015. Why is anyone still paying attention to these clowns?

    http://www.zdnet.com/article/idc-windows-phone-to-overtake-iphone-sales-by-2015-what-do-you-think/#!

    I think it is entirely possible. After all, we have four more months to go in 2015. /s
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  • Reply 50 of 102
    icoco3icoco3 Posts: 1,474member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Geekmee View Post





    So essentially, they are operating a unsustainable business model.

     

    They are in a saturated market (multiple Android vendors) and they are racing to the bottom.  There will be those who are squeezed out of the market.  It is inevitable.    The market has changed and there will be casualties.  Blackberry, Nokia, Motorola...??  All once dominant yet where are they now.  Not the force they once were if at all.

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  • Reply 51 of 102
    charlituna wrote: »
    Android = 10 or so hardware companies

    More like 1200+

    http://opensignal.com/reports/2015/08/android-fragmentation/
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  • Reply 52 of 102
    jfc1138jfc1138 Posts: 3,090member

    All those segments that Do. Not. Make. Money. for their sellers? Android or whatever "white box" fantasy is welcome to them.

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  • Reply 53 of 102
    icoco3 wrote: »
    They are in a saturated market (multiple Android vendors) and they are racing to the bottom.

    They've technically reached the bottom (zero profits) and some are frantically digging beneath the bottom (negative profits).
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  • Reply 54 of 102
    mstone wrote: »
    If the market share drops too low, developers might start to abandon it, which could lead to a snowball effect. The smartphone industry will eventually start to plateau just like the PC industry has done and I'm hoping Apple has at least 20% market share when that begins to happen.

    Ok.. but you left out the 2nd part of my quote:

    "I wouldn't say 10% market share would be bad for the iPhone... it could actually be good depending on the size of the market."

    Like I said... market share is based on the size of the market at any given time. If the smartphone market grew to 3 billion units a year... and Apple was selling 300 million iPhones a year... they would have fallen to 10% market share... but also have record-setting iPhone sales.

    Developers were excited about the iPhone when there were far fewer iPhones being sold.

    The percentage doesn't matter as much as the actual units.

    You can't just look at the percentage without looking at what it is a percentage of.

    Question: Why do developers even bother making iPhone apps when they know Android has over 80% market share?

    Answer: iPhone apps make money thanks to iPhone owners spending lots of money. And the iPhone has never had a huge amount of market share.

    The iPhone could theoretically lose market share while simultaneously gaining users. And more users means more iPhone apps developers can sell.

    I dare a developer to abandon the iPhone just because there are a higher percentage of $50 Android phone sold in China and India. Because that's exactly what's happening.

    Even though Apple sells more iPhones every year... even more crappy Android "smartphones" are being pumped into the market... thus reducing the iPhone's market share.

    But that shouldn't matter to an iPhone developer... there are more than enough people buying iPhones.
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  • Reply 55 of 102
    [IMG ALT=""]http://forums.appleinsider.com/content/type/61/id/60605/width/350/height/700[/IMG]


    THIS the part of the smartphone market Apple is going to NEVER be interested in grabbing...
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  • Reply 56 of 102
    asdasdasdasd Posts: 5,686member
    appex wrote: »
    Gaining market share against Android is very easy:

    - USB port on iOS devices.
    - microSD and SDXC ports in iOS devices.
    - No sandboxing iOS.
    - No jailing iOS.
    - Mac tablet.
    - Reducing price to half. Not only of full devices, but also of RAM and SSD inside, which Apple charges twice or more than the original manufacturer.

    That's an android fantasy of what iOS should be.
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  • Reply 57 of 102
    asdasdasdasd Posts: 5,686member
    mstone wrote: »
    If the market share drops too low, developers might start to abandon it, which could lead to a snowball effect. The smartphone industry will eventually start to plateau just like the PC industry has done and I'm hoping Apple has at least 20% market share when that begins to happen.

    It probably needs to be 20%, and 50% of the high end, to dominate developer mindshare. As it does now.

    Apple does care about market share, they mention it when doing well. And unlike IDC I can see Apple continuing to grow as Android commoditises.

    The android market can't continue with thousands of loss making devices. However there are very few candidates for apple competitors if Apple does go mid market.
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  • Reply 58 of 102
    mstonemstone Posts: 11,510member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Michael Scrip View Post





    Ok.. but you left out the 2nd part of my quote:



    "I wouldn't say 10% market share would be bad for the iPhone... it could actually be good depending on the size of the market."

     

    I disagree with that assessment. There is only enough room in the market for maybe three platforms, so 10% is not good enough in my opinion.

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  • Reply 59 of 102
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by AppeX View Post



    Gaining market share against Android is very easy:



    - USB port on iOS devices.

    - microSD and SDXC ports in iOS devices.

    - No sandboxing iOS.

    - No jailing iOS.

    - Mac tablet.

    - Reducing price to half. Not only of full devices, but also of RAM and SSD inside, which Apple charges twice or more than the original manufacturer.

    Um... you forgot your "/sarcasm" tag.

     

    People might think that you're being serious in some planet or the other.

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  • Reply 60 of 102
    mstone wrote: »
    I disagree with that assessment. There is only enough room in the market for maybe three platforms, so 10% is not good enough in my opinion.

    You're getting too caught up in the percentage number... without looking at it in context.

    Which of the following matters more to a developer or the platform as a whole... the iPhone at 10% market share... or the iPhone selling 300 million units every year? And remember... these are high-end phones owned by people who spend billions of dollars on apps and games.

    That's more than enough new iPhones to keep developers interested... plus the 600 million existing iPhones that are already in people's hands.

    There are more iPhones out in the world today than there were a year ago... two years ago... three years ago... etc.

    And that's what developers are looking at. And case makers, accessory makers, and everyone else who supports the iPhone platform.
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