Android is not a company, therefor there are no profits to be counted for. If, however, you are trying to say that the 100 or so companies that release Android devices have now acquired 40% of the world's mobile handset profits, then that's an extremely ridiculous comparison to make against the profit of a single company.
I'm sorry, but a company with a tiny profit margin is not a successfully run company at all. If you are barely making any money on the products you're selling then you are skating on very thin ice... The focus of your company is not producing high quality products, but selling the cheapest possible crap you can get away with. In turn, the people who buy your products will have a very low loyalty rate, therefor you must strive towards flooding the market and hope to grab more market share just to sustain your business.
It's a chart that compares the profit margins of Apple, Microsoft, Amazon and Walmart. Quite a discrepancy! Yet, which one of these is an unsuccessful company?
Second, a small profit margin is not all about crappy products. I don't think I need to explain that.
That does not mean profits are not important. But, notwithstanding the slappy rants herein, there is more nuance to the discussion than you are suggesting.
The Mac never went away. You are bastardizing a marketing slogan used for a marketing session: "Back to the Mac".
The Mac is selling OK, but it is dwarfed by the dominant platform. That has never ever been different. The Mac is a classic niche product. It always was, and it looks like it always will be.
, since he likely doesn't care about the non-Google Android devices -- as I stated previously, my contention is that Google doesn't see them, cannot count them, and wouldn't bother talking about them in press releases.
When talking about "subscribing to a wireless service", Rubin was specifically addressing phones under contract, which is IMO quite inaccurate.
.
I see where you are coming from but your logic is out:
"since he likely doesn't care about the non-Google Android devices"
- sure he does , he wants to show that android has a massive market share so people actually start designing better apps for it. Just like ES said in his statement recently.
"When talking about "subscribing to a wireless service", Rubin was specifically addressing phones under contract, which is IMO quite inaccurate. "
if they can only see activations and figures from google services like you say , how are they getting the figures from Asia in the figures in the article below ? they certainly are getting counted somehow and they don't have any google marketplace activations.
it's either recorded at point of sale point - for all andoid devices across countries., (more likely - there are no repeat activations recorded) or the device phones home with IMEI and counted that way. Or can you explain how the Asian numbers are recorded in another way ?
Hyundai outsells Mercedes. Which would you rather drive?
To continue the analogy, young members of our family truly hate their Hyundai's, but have to keep driving them because they have to use Crickets for pre-paid gas.
To be fair, my Mercedes 4S has never seen more than a 2Mbps wifi connection since 5.0.1 on any wifi system. Luckily the 3GS continues to work well, so not everyone (the most important member of the family) is pissed. After the "let me research the problem and subsequent hang-up" by Express Support, I'm going to give them a chance and wait for 5.1, otherwise it's off to the Mercedes Bar.
I'm thankful this holiday season for my 4-6Mbps ATT 3G connection... with grandfathered unlimited data.
Solipsism, Andy Rubin was perfectly clear about that months ago. It was never one day. His tweet announcing 500K was "there are now 500K Android devices activated every day, and it's growing at 4.4% w/w".
So I agree he qualified his statement more than I thought. He shows a grow pattern. However, he is not as clear as Jobs statement, or as accurate. Jobs stated a very specific "for the last 30 days" and Rubin claimed a "growing at" which doesn't mean he has to be including anything for the past week and could even be projecting the future growth of Android activations.
Everything from Google execs just seems to be clever statements with multiple meanings. Take Schmidt's comment about releasing a tablet of the highest quality in 6 months. Again, not stating anything that has happened but projecting a future that may never come. And how do you define "of the highest quality"? Surely a tablet that cost $1 million to make is of a higher quality than the iPad but we both know he's talking about a tablet at a particular price point. You can read Amazon reviews of the Fire to see people think it's high quality for a $199 tablet. We can't they just announce unambiguous data for has happened over the past 30, 90 or 365 days? Surely you can see the difference.
Unfortunately, the article is wrong. First of all, Google itself announced $2.5B in mobile ad revenues, not $5B (which is a wild guesstimate from the author of the article). Out of that, a majority comes from iOS devices, which defeats the thesis of the article itself.
So, the article is pretty much a laughing matter, or rather a laughing stock.
But, not withstanding your inaccurate and hyperbolic rants, people here (and elsewhere) should give Android more dues.
I see where you are coming from but your logic is out:
"since he likely doesn't care about the non-Google Android devices"
- sure he does , he wants to show that android has a massive market share so people actually start designing better apps for it. Just like ES said in his statement recently.
"When talking about "subscribing to a wireless service", Rubin was specifically addressing phones under contract, which is IMO quite inaccurate. "
if they can only see activations and figures from google services like you say , how are they getting the figures from Asia in the figures in the article below ? they certainly are getting counted somehow and they don't have any google marketplace activations.
it's either recorded at point of sale point - for all andoid devices across countries., (more likely - there are no repeat activations recorded) or the device phones home with IMEI and counted that way. Or can you explain how the Asian numbers are recorded in another way ?
That's Gruber's and Daniel's guess. They thought (or knew better but wanted you to believe otherwise) Google must be including forked Asian versions since he couldn't otherwise explain the Google activation numbers to some of the Apple faithful. Asian buyers with licensed Android versions have access to their Android Market just as North America and Europe do. Just do a search for "Android Market Japan" or "Android Market Korea" if you're doubting.
Who cares if it's 700,000 per day when half of those are garbage phones? Has anyone here ever been to Asia and seen the boatloads of Android phones they sell there that aren't even running Froyo and are locked to the carrier so you can't even install Apps from the Android Market (the carrier blocks this ability).
These are basically "feature phones" that happen to run Android. This is why developer support is still higher for iOS than Android. Developers know where the money is, and they're not going to develop for a platform where half of the devices sold will never be able to download/install their App.
Apple is on track to post 330,000 activations per day for this quarter (iPhone only, excluding iPad sales). People might look and say that's half of Android, but in reality it's more impressive for several reasons:
- It's by a single company vs dozens of companies.
- They represent high-end devices only, not cheap ass carrier locked phones.
- They represent customers who will actually go out and spend money on Apps - great for devs.
I wonder why they never break that 700,000 figure down by device type of manufacturer/region?
Who cares if it's 700,000 per day when half of those are garbage phones? Has anyone here ever been to Asia and seen the boatloads of Android phones they sell there that aren't even running Froyo and are locked to the carrier so you can't even install Apps from the Android Market (the carrier blocks this ability). . .
I wonder why they never break that 700,000 figure down by device type of manufacturer/region?
Perhaps because as you said in your first sentence: Who cares? It doesn't affect how you spend your money.
Do people get some sort of inflated self worth because the company of the phone they buy sells more units? Makes more profit? Has more market share?
Their self-worth is directly tied to the claims they can make about Apple. If Apple is not Number One, then they too are inferior.
And Apple is Number One in a VERY limited world, which is getting increasingly smaller. Apple's first claim to Number One was the iPod. But that market is now dying. Then it was the iPhone. But that is being quickly relegated to second-tier. All they have left is the iPad, but that too is looking like it has shrinking market share.
Apple fans will once again have to accept he scrappy underdog role. But that will be hard to do given that Apple is one of Wall Street's biggest.
"Oh, and Google is likely also making a bundle on its "free" product -- about $5 billion by a reasonable estimate."
So it's an estimate, not a statement of fact. And where is this reasonable source?
I estimate that Google's revenue from services on Android OS are well below $1 billion.
I estimate that Google is in the hole with Android related acquisitions and development.
I estimate that Google makes more from ads on the iPhone than they do from everything that happens on all Android-based devices.
Analyst's "reasonable" estimates for the iPhone this quarter is 36 million units.
Analyst's "reasonable" estimates for the iPhone in 2012 is 190 million units.
Analyst's "reasonable" estimates for the iPad this quarter is 81 million units.
With an average retail price of about $650 we're talking about $176 billion for 2012 and that's without even counting other iOS based devices Apple activates. You think that might be just a tad higher than $5 billion?
Based on revenue to profit ratios Apple's iPhone 4S bested Google's estimate for the year in just the first weekend. Android is winning¡
That's Gruber's and Daniel's guess. They thought (or knew better but wanted you to believe otherwise) Google must be including forked Asian versions since he couldn't otherwise explain the Google activation numbers to some of the Apple faithful. Asian buyers with licensed Android versions have access to their Android Market just as North America and Europe do. Just do a search for "Android Market Japan" or "Android Market Korea" if you're doubting.
DrDroppio makes a strong argument as to why forked versions of Android wouldn't be included (and I'm inclined to agree with his reasoning) but it's certainly not conclusive.
Those numbers seem a bit high to me. If you add the Android and Apple ones together that means a million people activating a new phone or tablet every damn day. How can that be right? How often do people replace their phones anyway?
If the number was the US only, it would mean everybody here getting a new phone once per year (assuming a population of 365 million phone owners, which is high).
But these are worldwide numbers, and there are 20 times more people worldwide.
So is that one person in every 20 getting a new phone once a year? (J-Rag, please check the arithmetic). Seems likely, or even low, but I don't have enough info for these calculations. For example, I am using very rough population stats, rather than exact phone-owner stats.
Andy is reporting the numbers for pre-christmas week. This is not representative of the overall performance this quarter. The actual average activation number for this quarter will much less. Max 550k but more likely ~500K or even less given more competition from new iphone and a range of cheap new windows phones.
Note that Andy always quotes activations for all DEVICES, not just phones. Currently Analysts like Horace Dediu expect Apple to sell about 58M IOS devices this quarter. This is about 636K iPhones, iPads and iPod Touche activations per day.
yeah, I said that. I don't think it will be as low as 550K but he does get away with picking the week before Christmas ( similar last year), and ignoring the week after Christmas, when sales would be lower. Apple is then measured on its sales per day actually measured.
Comments
Just curious... if you're always so "doom and gloom" about Apple... what are your feelings about RIM or Nokia?
I'm not doom adn gloom about Apple, but I'll throw in some predictions anyways (Hey - anybody working on that prediction calendar?)
Nokia will make large amounts of sales of Win7 phones. They will do OK.
RIM will be gone as we know it within 24 months.
Where did Rubin specifically state most of that?
There was no mention at all of "Google services".
See post #67
It's a nice statistic... but it hardly puts Apple in a corner.
There will be a time lag before the devs start developing for Android first. Maybe 6 months?
Might I borrow a response methodology from one of the other? questionable members here to respond to that?
The full content of my response (this post) is as follows:
According to CBS News. Thats no laughing matter. Specially when mainstream news are re-affirming that Android has crushed the iPhone.
"Android crushes iPhone, makes Google $5 billion"
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505124_162-57346049/android-crushes-iphone-makes-google-$5-billion/
This doesn't make any sense!?
Android is not a company, therefor there are no profits to be counted for. If, however, you are trying to say that the 100 or so companies that release Android devices have now acquired 40% of the world's mobile handset profits, then that's an extremely ridiculous comparison to make against the profit of a single company.
I'm sorry, but a company with a tiny profit margin is not a successfully run company at all. If you are barely making any money on the products you're selling then you are skating on very thin ice... The focus of your company is not producing high quality products, but selling the cheapest possible crap you can get away with. In turn, the people who buy your products will have a very low loyalty rate, therefor you must strive towards flooding the market and hope to grab more market share just to sustain your business.
I don't entirely agree.
To wit, take a look at this: http://ycharts.com/companies/AMZN/pr...=MSFT,AAPL,WMT
It's a chart that compares the profit margins of Apple, Microsoft, Amazon and Walmart. Quite a discrepancy! Yet, which one of these is an unsuccessful company?
Second, a small profit margin is not all about crappy products. I don't think I need to explain that.
That does not mean profits are not important. But, notwithstanding the slappy rants herein, there is more nuance to the discussion than you are suggesting.
Notice the Mac is back
The Mac never went away. You are bastardizing a marketing slogan used for a marketing session: "Back to the Mac".
The Mac is selling OK, but it is dwarfed by the dominant platform. That has never ever been different. The Mac is a classic niche product. It always was, and it looks like it always will be.
, since he likely doesn't care about the non-Google Android devices -- as I stated previously, my contention is that Google doesn't see them, cannot count them, and wouldn't bother talking about them in press releases.
When talking about "subscribing to a wireless service", Rubin was specifically addressing phones under contract, which is IMO quite inaccurate.
.
I see where you are coming from but your logic is out:
"since he likely doesn't care about the non-Google Android devices"
- sure he does , he wants to show that android has a massive market share so people actually start designing better apps for it. Just like ES said in his statement recently.
"When talking about "subscribing to a wireless service", Rubin was specifically addressing phones under contract, which is IMO quite inaccurate. "
if they can only see activations and figures from google services like you say , how are they getting the figures from Asia in the figures in the article below ? they certainly are getting counted somehow and they don't have any google marketplace activations.
it's either recorded at point of sale point - for all andoid devices across countries., (more likely - there are no repeat activations recorded) or the device phones home with IMEI and counted that way. Or can you explain how the Asian numbers are recorded in another way ?
http://209.157.64.200/focus/chat/2667688/posts?page=2
Hyundai outsells Mercedes. Which would you rather drive?
To continue the analogy, young members of our family truly hate their Hyundai's, but have to keep driving them because they have to use Crickets for pre-paid gas.
To be fair, my Mercedes 4S has never seen more than a 2Mbps wifi connection since 5.0.1 on any wifi system. Luckily the 3GS continues to work well, so not everyone (the most important member of the family) is pissed. After the "let me research the problem and subsequent hang-up" by Express Support, I'm going to give them a chance and wait for 5.1, otherwise it's off to the Mercedes Bar.
I'm thankful this holiday season for my 4-6Mbps ATT 3G connection... with grandfathered unlimited data.
Solipsism, Andy Rubin was perfectly clear about that months ago. It was never one day. His tweet announcing 500K was "there are now 500K Android devices activated every day, and it's growing at 4.4% w/w".
And here's his tweet.
- https://twitter.com/#!/arubin/status/85660213478309888
So I agree he qualified his statement more than I thought. He shows a grow pattern. However, he is not as clear as Jobs statement, or as accurate. Jobs stated a very specific "for the last 30 days" and Rubin claimed a "growing at" which doesn't mean he has to be including anything for the past week and could even be projecting the future growth of Android activations.Everything from Google execs just seems to be clever statements with multiple meanings. Take Schmidt's comment about releasing a tablet of the highest quality in 6 months. Again, not stating anything that has happened but projecting a future that may never come. And how do you define "of the highest quality"? Surely a tablet that cost $1 million to make is of a higher quality than the iPad but we both know he's talking about a tablet at a particular price point. You can read Amazon reviews of the Fire to see people think it's high quality for a $199 tablet. We can't they just announce unambiguous data for has happened over the past 30, 90 or 365 days? Surely you can see the difference.
According to CBS News. Thats no laughing matter. Specially when mainstream news are re-affirming that Android has crushed the iPhone.
"Android crushes iPhone, makes Google $5 billion"
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505124_162-57346049/android-crushes-iphone-makes-google-$5-billion/
Unfortunately, the article is wrong. First of all, Google itself announced $2.5B in mobile ad revenues, not $5B (which is a wild guesstimate from the author of the article). Out of that, a majority comes from iOS devices, which defeats the thesis of the article itself.
So, the article is pretty much a laughing matter, or rather a laughing stock.
But, not withstanding your inaccurate and hyperbolic rants, people here (and elsewhere) should give Android more dues.
I see where you are coming from but your logic is out:
"since he likely doesn't care about the non-Google Android devices"
- sure he does , he wants to show that android has a massive market share so people actually start designing better apps for it. Just like ES said in his statement recently.
"When talking about "subscribing to a wireless service", Rubin was specifically addressing phones under contract, which is IMO quite inaccurate. "
if they can only see activations and figures from google services like you say , how are they getting the figures from Asia in the figures in the article below ? they certainly are getting counted somehow and they don't have any google marketplace activations.
it's either recorded at point of sale point - for all andoid devices across countries., (more likely - there are no repeat activations recorded) or the device phones home with IMEI and counted that way. Or can you explain how the Asian numbers are recorded in another way ?
http://209.157.64.200/focus/chat/2667688/posts?page=2
That's Gruber's and Daniel's guess. They thought (or knew better but wanted you to believe otherwise) Google must be including forked Asian versions since he couldn't otherwise explain the Google activation numbers to some of the Apple faithful. Asian buyers with licensed Android versions have access to their Android Market just as North America and Europe do. Just do a search for "Android Market Japan" or "Android Market Korea" if you're doubting.
According to CBS News. Thats no laughing matter. Specially when mainstream news are re-affirming that Android has crushed the iPhone.
"Android crushes iPhone, makes Google $5 billion"
And the iPhone makes Apple $10 billion. Your point?
These are basically "feature phones" that happen to run Android. This is why developer support is still higher for iOS than Android. Developers know where the money is, and they're not going to develop for a platform where half of the devices sold will never be able to download/install their App.
Apple is on track to post 330,000 activations per day for this quarter (iPhone only, excluding iPad sales). People might look and say that's half of Android, but in reality it's more impressive for several reasons:
- It's by a single company vs dozens of companies.
- They represent high-end devices only, not cheap ass carrier locked phones.
- They represent customers who will actually go out and spend money on Apps - great for devs.
I wonder why they never break that 700,000 figure down by device type of manufacturer/region?
Who cares if it's 700,000 per day when half of those are garbage phones? Has anyone here ever been to Asia and seen the boatloads of Android phones they sell there that aren't even running Froyo and are locked to the carrier so you can't even install Apps from the Android Market (the carrier blocks this ability). . .
I wonder why they never break that 700,000 figure down by device type of manufacturer/region?
Perhaps because as you said in your first sentence: Who cares? It doesn't affect how you spend your money.
Do people get some sort of inflated self worth because the company of the phone they buy sells more units? Makes more profit? Has more market share?
Their self-worth is directly tied to the claims they can make about Apple. If Apple is not Number One, then they too are inferior.
And Apple is Number One in a VERY limited world, which is getting increasingly smaller. Apple's first claim to Number One was the iPod. But that market is now dying. Then it was the iPhone. But that is being quickly relegated to second-tier. All they have left is the iPad, but that too is looking like it has shrinking market share.
Apple fans will once again have to accept he scrappy underdog role. But that will be hard to do given that Apple is one of Wall Street's biggest.
According to CBS News. Thats no laughing matter. Specially when mainstream news are re-affirming that Android has crushed the iPhone.
"Android crushes iPhone, makes Google $5 billion"
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505124_162-57346049/android-crushes-iphone-makes-google-$5-billion/
Does it hurt a lot??
According to CBS News. Thats no laughing matter. Specially when mainstream news are re-affirming that Android has crushed the iPhone.
"Android crushes iPhone, makes Google $5 billion"
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505124_162-57346049/android-crushes-iphone-makes-google-$5-billion/
"Oh, and Google is likely also making a bundle on its "free" product -- about $5 billion by a reasonable estimate."
So it's an estimate, not a statement of fact. And where is this reasonable source?
I estimate that Google's revenue from services on Android OS are well below $1 billion.
I estimate that Google is in the hole with Android related acquisitions and development.
I estimate that Google makes more from ads on the iPhone than they do from everything that happens on all Android-based devices.
Analyst's "reasonable" estimates for the iPhone this quarter is 36 million units.
Analyst's "reasonable" estimates for the iPhone in 2012 is 190 million units.
Analyst's "reasonable" estimates for the iPad this quarter is 81 million units.
With an average retail price of about $650 we're talking about $176 billion for 2012 and that's without even counting other iOS based devices Apple activates. You think that might be just a tad higher than $5 billion?
Based on revenue to profit ratios Apple's iPhone 4S bested Google's estimate for the year in just the first weekend. Android is winning¡
That's Gruber's and Daniel's guess. They thought (or knew better but wanted you to believe otherwise) Google must be including forked Asian versions since he couldn't otherwise explain the Google activation numbers to some of the Apple faithful. Asian buyers with licensed Android versions have access to their Android Market just as North America and Europe do. Just do a search for "Android Market Japan" or "Android Market Korea" if you're doubting.
DrDroppio makes a strong argument as to why forked versions of Android wouldn't be included (and I'm inclined to agree with his reasoning) but it's certainly not conclusive.
Those numbers seem a bit high to me. If you add the Android and Apple ones together that means a million people activating a new phone or tablet every damn day. How can that be right? How often do people replace their phones anyway?
If the number was the US only, it would mean everybody here getting a new phone once per year (assuming a population of 365 million phone owners, which is high).
But these are worldwide numbers, and there are 20 times more people worldwide.
So is that one person in every 20 getting a new phone once a year? (J-Rag, please check the arithmetic). Seems likely, or even low, but I don't have enough info for these calculations. For example, I am using very rough population stats, rather than exact phone-owner stats.
Andy is reporting the numbers for pre-christmas week. This is not representative of the overall performance this quarter. The actual average activation number for this quarter will much less. Max 550k but more likely ~500K or even less given more competition from new iphone and a range of cheap new windows phones.
Note that Andy always quotes activations for all DEVICES, not just phones. Currently Analysts like Horace Dediu expect Apple to sell about 58M IOS devices this quarter. This is about 636K iPhones, iPads and iPod Touche activations per day.
yeah, I said that. I don't think it will be as low as 550K but he does get away with picking the week before Christmas ( similar last year), and ignoring the week after Christmas, when sales would be lower. Apple is then measured on its sales per day actually measured.