I wonder if you chime in on most of the other tech sites, where (they believe) Google has already won the smartphone wars with its 80% market share.
Is it informative, or even intellectually honest, to compare the market shares of the iPhone and a piece of garbage phone from Pantech? Of course not. Then why do tech bloggers persist in doing so? And why do you object to the author pointing out their persistent distortions?
I sure hope Google hasn't 'won' the smartphone wars. I hope nobody does for the foreseeable future- but that they all keep on trying.
Where am I objecting to the author? If anything I immediately agree with him. Android has 80ish percent market share. Check, and agreed. 66% of those are low end phones. Check, and agreed (though I don't agree they are 'junk'). Where's the problem? If anything I'd accuse the author of rehashing and restating the obvious. I would bet that neither of those statistics really surprise anyone, including the people that wrote articles about market share in the first place.
When you point out that even with the remaining numbers after those junk phones aren't included, Android still has more, the immediate response is, of course, 'well most of those non-junk phones are junk too!' So if you're so hell bent on trying to make the argument pro Apple no matter what, why not just agree that 'No phone compares to Apple!' That makes it easy. Apple has 100% of the Apple market share. Apple wins!!!!!! Or change the topic to from one where Apple does win, such as profits- which are pretty darn important. Apple wins there too! I'll also agree that the more Android phones you choose not to count, the higher Apples market share gets.
Apple is doing very well in the high end segment and within that segment are doing better than the competition in many aspects, and certainly in the granddaddy of them all, profits! That does not mean that the rest of the market doesn't still exist or should be ignored.
Fantastic Vanilla Android, only surpassed by iOS7;
Guaranteed updates.
16gb storage.
AI needs someone with a little more knowledge. I mean: "Go away", "trash", "junk"?
Not that I do not believe Motorola can make a good phone, but again they marketing to check list buyers, people who buy on price only and add up the check marks to see if it has more of something that other companies offer. Motorola is not really targeting Apple. They said it publicly they are not trying to take on the premium spaces, why because apple owns it with its entire ecosystem. Motorola is targeting Samsung in the mid range. There is no good solutions there, and Motorola is trying to compete in the middle which is kind of smart since there are lots of buyer and it is growing every year. The only question is will they success since their wagon is hitch to Android and we all see the data on Andriod and who well like it is for the everyday user.
Fantastic Vanilla Android, only surpassed by iOS7;
Guaranteed updates.
16gb storage.
AI needs someone with a little more knowledge. I mean: "Go away", "trash", "junk"?
You are confusing a) phones that sold in this summer’s Q3 with b) a device Google just announced. You’re also assuming it will sell.
It remains to be seen if Google can build this, if carriers will sell it, and how much Motorola will lose pushing these into the market. Notice that the Moto X failed miserably, just like every other Nexus-branded phone. Google isn’t great at hardware.
However, it’s pretty important for Google to make this work, because next year Samsung will begin taking away its half of Android’s installed base to Tizen, and Google can’t really rely on LG, HTC, Sony and other Android licensees because they’re all losing money, and they already pay Microsoft for patent royalties so might just as well shift to Windows Phone (which has its own major disadvantages).
So Google is really on the hook to make this work. And If the Moto G turns out successful and sells 100M units this year, Google will become the cheap alternative to the iPhone, and it will only lose most of its search profits to subsidize such a profitless phone distribution operation. But in the end, Google will have an installed base that begins to be comparable to the iPhone, but running the specs of iPhone 4 from 2010. If it can pull that off in 2014, it will only be 4 years behind.
If it can’t, Android will be facing very serious problems.
But go back to reading sites that tell you what IDC wants you to think: that Android is 81% of the "smartphone" market. 2014 will be such a surprise for you! It’s more exciting when you don’t see what’s coming.
The relevance is that Samsung has more funds to reinvest back into the business as any first year business student could tell you.
Have you used those heated toilet seats with the dual spray jets? I used those in Japan, damn they're better than what we have in the west!
You need to read the balance sheets and cash flow on apple and samsung again. Also, Samsung has been spending tremendous billions on R&D, advertising and capex and has less to show for that than Apple. As Jobs once said, if writing software was as easy as writing a check, Microsoft could do it.
And yes, every toilet in Japan has a bidet, even in the 7-11s. Usually with a chooshy-seat warmer, and a button that makes a rushing water sound so nobody can hear your business. But If you lift the seat and inspect, those water jets are usually quite filthy, and I wouldn’t really want that being sprayed back up on my nether-regions.
How come there aren't articles constantly being written about how Porsche is losing market share to Kia and Toyota and how it's killing Porsche's automobile business. What is so darn important about platform market share? Most of the companies selling Android devices are barely making anything from all that huge amount of market share although there must be some companies selling decent products that consumers are happy to be using. Should it matter to anyone if Casio is selling more watches than, say, Movado, Tag Heuer or Rolex?
That's the point. Apple continues to be very successful in its chosen market. In general, you can't be both high-end of the market and market volume leader. Many people don't need, don't want or can't afford high-end so they buy something more modest, Apple only does high-end so they don't get those sales. It doesn't matter to Apple so long as they continue to dominate the high-end and take good margins from it - that's what success looks like.
Some of the criticism comes from short memories. Apple dominated all parts of the music player business with the iPod. The iPhone and iPad dominated their markets when they were new but competitors appeared and their market share slipped. I think the surprising thing is Apple's initial dominance, not the emergence of competitors successful particularly in the parts of the market where Apple chooses not to compete.
I would take the Mac, not the iPod, as the 'usual' model for Apple. A much cheaper/less capable device can manage some things adequately so there's a space for lower-end devices that Apple chooses not to sell. And that's rational: businesses are in business to make money (ie profit), selling product is just a difficult means to that end. So, given the choice of making many devices at tiny margins or fewer at sufficiently better margins to provide more profit overall, Apple's position looks pretty good.
Your list of phones well illustrates the delusion of many Android fans who think the higher end models of HTC, Motorola and LG are representative of the "81% marketshare." If that were the case, Apple’s App Store wouldn’t be dominate, and Google Play wouldn’t be a rummage sale of a bunch of adware.
That’s also the point of the article: the higher end (for Android, anyway) is only 20% of these numbers. And the phones you seem to think are selling in quantity (because none of those companies would dare to say how many they are actually selling!) are actually selling in such low quantities that they hardly even shift the ASP of the Android market.
Where did I say that those phones made up the 81%? What I said was that those phones are being sold in addition to the phablets, which alone are outselling the iPhone.
. . . Where's the problem? If anything I'd accuse the author of rehashing and restating the obvious. I would bet that neither of those statistics really surprise anyone, including the people that wrote articles about market share in the first place.
The author's point is not obvious to the tech bloggers who obsess about market share and nothing else. See here and here for examples. "Android" is portrayed as an all-consuming, undifferentiated mass, glossing over the significant differences between "Android phones." The argument of these tech bloggers is that Android's alleged "network effect" will inevitably swamp iOS. But if 2/3 of the phones aren't part of that "network," because they are not used as smart phones, this argument is really a lot of bunk.
Careful with statistics. IDC says its phablet estimates went from 3% to 21% yoy. That’s 5.6m to 54.8m! Sounds great, but that’s largely due to Samsung taking its Galaxy S3 from 4.7" to 5" with the Galaxy S4. See how one can create phenomenal "growth figures" simply by shifting an arbitrary boundary definition?
That’s also what’s happening when IDC compares iPhones against 172 million cheap phone shipments. What’s next: do we start counting TV shipments in with tablets so the iPad’s share "goes down" even faster in the "screen market?"
IDC already includes lots of "toys" (the analyst’s word) in its tablet figures. Don’t willingly be fooled just because you like the sound of Apple losing. It doesn’t make it so.
I agree that the way way IDC is counting this is leading to much of this growth, however this still doesn't take away from the fact that large screen phones (>= 5") are seeing significant growth. No one is forcing a Galaxy SIII user to upgrade to a S4 if they don't like the screen size. You seem to know Asia and if you've spent time in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan you will have seen the large number of Samsung Note devices in use, and despite what I read routinely, it's nearly always the wealthy who use them. If wealthy Asians aren't in Apple's strike zone, I don't know who is.
I believe Apple is passing up an opportunity by not competing in the large screen smartphone space. Feel free to disagree, but next year, I suspect Apple is going to do very well if they release one or more large phones. I blame Tim Cook for not getting this done sooner.
I agree that the way way IDC is counting this is leading to much of this growth, however this still doesn't take away from the fact that large screen phones (>= 5") are seeing significant growth. No one is forcing a Galaxy SIII user to upgrade to a S4 if they don't like the screen size. You seem to know Asia and if you've spent time in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan you will have seen the large number of Samsung Note devices in use, and despite what I read routinely, it's nearly always the wealthy who use them. If wealthy Asians aren't in Apple's strike zone, I don't know who is.
I believe Apple is passing up an opportunity by not competing in the large screen smartphone space. Feel free to disagree, but next year, I suspect Apple is going to do very well if they release one or more large phones. I blame Tim Cook for not getting this done sooner.
Here's the thing, if you want a flagship Sammy, you have to get a 5" one and not because you want it for the size.
Blaming Cook is pointless. Apple releases devices on its schedule and when the products are ready.
Here's the thing, if you want a flagship Sammy, you have to get a 5" one and not because you want it for the size.
Blaming Cook is pointless. Apple releases devices on its schedule and when the products are ready.
That really goes both ways. If you want a flagship iOS phone (not that there's any other type...) you have to get a 4" screen. I fully expect the larger iPhone models to outsell the 4" models when they go on sale.
That really goes both ways. If you want a flagship iOS phone (not that there's any other type...) you have to get a 4" screen. I fully expect the larger iPhone models to outsell the 4" models when they go on sale.
As long as they release a 5" as a complement to the 4", I'll be fine. Also note the Note didn't outsell the GS3 so I don't think a larger iPhone will outsell the 4" iPhone, all things being equal.
Does the article say that's the cut off point for low to high end? Furthermore, the ASPs in the article are the prices the manufacturer receives, not the retail prices.
Android manufacturers take less profit than Apple as well (due to more competition in the space), so that drives ASPs down. A high-end Android phone can have an ASP of $350-500 (Nexus 5 has high end specs but Google sells for only $350), whereas low-end Android phones drive the average down due to their sub-$200 cost...
Maybe take a statistics or math course, and then you'll be able to deduce that the $215 spoken of isn't the price where low end becomes high end, but rather the average when you factor in the 66% of phones which cost around $100-$150....
Does the article say that's the cut off point for low to high end? Furthermore, the ASPs in the article are the prices the manufacturer receives, not the retail prices.
Android manufacturers take less profit than Apple as well (due to more competition in the space), so that drives ASPs down. A high-end Android phone can have an ASP of $350-500 (Nexus 5 has high end specs but Google sells for only $350), whereas low-end Android phones drive the average down due to their sub-$200 cost...
Maybe take a statistics or math course, and then you'll be able to deduce that the $215 spoken of isn't the price where low end becomes high end, but rather the average when you factor in the 66% of phones which cost around $100-$150....
So basically you're saying there is no mid range and only high/low end. Interesting deduction there.
So basically you're saying there is no mid range and only high/low end. Interesting deduction there.
I don't know the last time you went shopping, but the mid-range is rather small, at least in the West. High end phones are so subsidized that mid-range phones hardly make sense, and their presence in the market is minimal. Non-subsidized 'high-end' Android phones can be had for $350 (Nexus 5) to $500 (multiple Chinese phones).
I don't know the last time you went shopping, but the mid-range is rather small, at least in the West. High end phones are so subsidized that mid-range phones hardly make sense, and their presence in the market is minimal. Non-subsidized 'high-end' Android phones can be had for $350 (Nexus 5) to $500 (multiple Chinese phones).
So what defines these market segments? Price? Spec list?
Comments
I wonder if you chime in on most of the other tech sites, where (they believe) Google has already won the smartphone wars with its 80% market share.
Is it informative, or even intellectually honest, to compare the market shares of the iPhone and a piece of garbage phone from Pantech? Of course not. Then why do tech bloggers persist in doing so? And why do you object to the author pointing out their persistent distortions?
I sure hope Google hasn't 'won' the smartphone wars. I hope nobody does for the foreseeable future- but that they all keep on trying.
Where am I objecting to the author? If anything I immediately agree with him. Android has 80ish percent market share. Check, and agreed. 66% of those are low end phones. Check, and agreed (though I don't agree they are 'junk'). Where's the problem? If anything I'd accuse the author of rehashing and restating the obvious. I would bet that neither of those statistics really surprise anyone, including the people that wrote articles about market share in the first place.
When you point out that even with the remaining numbers after those junk phones aren't included, Android still has more, the immediate response is, of course, 'well most of those non-junk phones are junk too!' So if you're so hell bent on trying to make the argument pro Apple no matter what, why not just agree that 'No phone compares to Apple!' That makes it easy. Apple has 100% of the Apple market share. Apple wins!!!!!! Or change the topic to from one where Apple does win, such as profits- which are pretty darn important. Apple wins there too! I'll also agree that the more Android phones you choose not to count, the higher Apples market share gets.
Apple is doing very well in the high end segment and within that segment are doing better than the competition in many aspects, and certainly in the granddaddy of them all, profits! That does not mean that the rest of the market doesn't still exist or should be ignored.
So people can realize hoe pathetic this editorial is:
http://9to5google.com/2013/11/13/motorola-makes-moto-g-official-at-international-online-unveiling/
In the Android world, 199$ can give you:
AI needs someone with a little more knowledge. I mean: "Go away", "trash", "junk"?
Not that I do not believe Motorola can make a good phone, but again they marketing to check list buyers, people who buy on price only and add up the check marks to see if it has more of something that other companies offer. Motorola is not really targeting Apple. They said it publicly they are not trying to take on the premium spaces, why because apple owns it with its entire ecosystem. Motorola is targeting Samsung in the mid range. There is no good solutions there, and Motorola is trying to compete in the middle which is kind of smart since there are lots of buyer and it is growing every year. The only question is will they success since their wagon is hitch to Android and we all see the data on Andriod and who well like it is for the everyday user.
So people can realize hoe pathetic this editorial is:
http://9to5google.com/2013/11/13/motorola-makes-moto-g-official-at-international-online-unveiling/
In the Android world, 199$ can give you:
AI needs someone with a little more knowledge. I mean: "Go away", "trash", "junk"?
You are confusing a) phones that sold in this summer’s Q3 with b) a device Google just announced. You’re also assuming it will sell.
It remains to be seen if Google can build this, if carriers will sell it, and how much Motorola will lose pushing these into the market. Notice that the Moto X failed miserably, just like every other Nexus-branded phone. Google isn’t great at hardware.
However, it’s pretty important for Google to make this work, because next year Samsung will begin taking away its half of Android’s installed base to Tizen, and Google can’t really rely on LG, HTC, Sony and other Android licensees because they’re all losing money, and they already pay Microsoft for patent royalties so might just as well shift to Windows Phone (which has its own major disadvantages).
So Google is really on the hook to make this work. And If the Moto G turns out successful and sells 100M units this year, Google will become the cheap alternative to the iPhone, and it will only lose most of its search profits to subsidize such a profitless phone distribution operation. But in the end, Google will have an installed base that begins to be comparable to the iPhone, but running the specs of iPhone 4 from 2010. If it can pull that off in 2014, it will only be 4 years behind.
If it can’t, Android will be facing very serious problems.
But go back to reading sites that tell you what IDC wants you to think: that Android is 81% of the "smartphone" market. 2014 will be such a surprise for you! It’s more exciting when you don’t see what’s coming.
The relevance is that Samsung has more funds to reinvest back into the business as any first year business student could tell you.
Have you used those heated toilet seats with the dual spray jets? I used those in Japan, damn they're better than what we have in the west!
You need to read the balance sheets and cash flow on apple and samsung again. Also, Samsung has been spending tremendous billions on R&D, advertising and capex and has less to show for that than Apple. As Jobs once said, if writing software was as easy as writing a check, Microsoft could do it.
And yes, every toilet in Japan has a bidet, even in the 7-11s. Usually with a chooshy-seat warmer, and a button that makes a rushing water sound so nobody can hear your business. But If you lift the seat and inspect, those water jets are usually quite filthy, and I wouldn’t really want that being sprayed back up on my nether-regions.
How come there aren't articles constantly being written about how Porsche is losing market share to Kia and Toyota and how it's killing Porsche's automobile business. What is so darn important about platform market share? Most of the companies selling Android devices are barely making anything from all that huge amount of market share although there must be some companies selling decent products that consumers are happy to be using. Should it matter to anyone if Casio is selling more watches than, say, Movado, Tag Heuer or Rolex?
That's the point. Apple continues to be very successful in its chosen market. In general, you can't be both high-end of the market and market volume leader. Many people don't need, don't want or can't afford high-end so they buy something more modest, Apple only does high-end so they don't get those sales. It doesn't matter to Apple so long as they continue to dominate the high-end and take good margins from it - that's what success looks like.
Some of the criticism comes from short memories. Apple dominated all parts of the music player business with the iPod. The iPhone and iPad dominated their markets when they were new but competitors appeared and their market share slipped. I think the surprising thing is Apple's initial dominance, not the emergence of competitors successful particularly in the parts of the market where Apple chooses not to compete.
I would take the Mac, not the iPod, as the 'usual' model for Apple. A much cheaper/less capable device can manage some things adequately so there's a space for lower-end devices that Apple chooses not to sell. And that's rational: businesses are in business to make money (ie profit), selling product is just a difficult means to that end. So, given the choice of making many devices at tiny margins or fewer at sufficiently better margins to provide more profit overall, Apple's position looks pretty good.
Your list of phones well illustrates the delusion of many Android fans who think the higher end models of HTC, Motorola and LG are representative of the "81% marketshare." If that were the case, Apple’s App Store wouldn’t be dominate, and Google Play wouldn’t be a rummage sale of a bunch of adware.
That’s also the point of the article: the higher end (for Android, anyway) is only 20% of these numbers. And the phones you seem to think are selling in quantity (because none of those companies would dare to say how many they are actually selling!) are actually selling in such low quantities that they hardly even shift the ASP of the Android market.
Where did I say that those phones made up the 81%? What I said was that those phones are being sold in addition to the phablets, which alone are outselling the iPhone.
. . . Where's the problem? If anything I'd accuse the author of rehashing and restating the obvious. I would bet that neither of those statistics really surprise anyone, including the people that wrote articles about market share in the first place.
The author's point is not obvious to the tech bloggers who obsess about market share and nothing else. See here and here for examples. "Android" is portrayed as an all-consuming, undifferentiated mass, glossing over the significant differences between "Android phones." The argument of these tech bloggers is that Android's alleged "network effect" will inevitably swamp iOS. But if 2/3 of the phones aren't part of that "network," because they are not used as smart phones, this argument is really a lot of bunk.
Careful with statistics. IDC says its phablet estimates went from 3% to 21% yoy. That’s 5.6m to 54.8m! Sounds great, but that’s largely due to Samsung taking its Galaxy S3 from 4.7" to 5" with the Galaxy S4. See how one can create phenomenal "growth figures" simply by shifting an arbitrary boundary definition?
That’s also what’s happening when IDC compares iPhones against 172 million cheap phone shipments. What’s next: do we start counting TV shipments in with tablets so the iPad’s share "goes down" even faster in the "screen market?"
IDC already includes lots of "toys" (the analyst’s word) in its tablet figures. Don’t willingly be fooled just because you like the sound of Apple losing. It doesn’t make it so.
I agree that the way way IDC is counting this is leading to much of this growth, however this still doesn't take away from the fact that large screen phones (>= 5") are seeing significant growth. No one is forcing a Galaxy SIII user to upgrade to a S4 if they don't like the screen size. You seem to know Asia and if you've spent time in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan you will have seen the large number of Samsung Note devices in use, and despite what I read routinely, it's nearly always the wealthy who use them. If wealthy Asians aren't in Apple's strike zone, I don't know who is.
I believe Apple is passing up an opportunity by not competing in the large screen smartphone space. Feel free to disagree, but next year, I suspect Apple is going to do very well if they release one or more large phones. I blame Tim Cook for not getting this done sooner.
Here's the thing, if you want a flagship Sammy, you have to get a 5" one and not because you want it for the size.
Blaming Cook is pointless. Apple releases devices on its schedule and when the products are ready.
Here's the thing, if you want a flagship Sammy, you have to get a 5" one and not because you want it for the size.
Blaming Cook is pointless. Apple releases devices on its schedule and when the products are ready.
That really goes both ways. If you want a flagship iOS phone (not that there's any other type...) you have to get a 4" screen. I fully expect the larger iPhone models to outsell the 4" models when they go on sale.
As long as they release a 5" as a complement to the 4", I'll be fine. Also note the Note didn't outsell the GS3 so I don't think a larger iPhone will outsell the 4" iPhone, all things being equal.
Doing some quick math, that means high end Androids make up 34% of their 81% market share, or 27.5% of the overall market... Still higher than iOS.
[IMG ALT=""]http://forums.appleinsider.com/content/type/61/id/34947/width/350/height/700[/IMG]
So any Android selling > $215 is high-end now?
So any Android selling > $215 is high-end now?
Does the article say that's the cut off point for low to high end? Furthermore, the ASPs in the article are the prices the manufacturer receives, not the retail prices.
Android manufacturers take less profit than Apple as well (due to more competition in the space), so that drives ASPs down. A high-end Android phone can have an ASP of $350-500 (Nexus 5 has high end specs but Google sells for only $350), whereas low-end Android phones drive the average down due to their sub-$200 cost...
Maybe take a statistics or math course, and then you'll be able to deduce that the $215 spoken of isn't the price where low end becomes high end, but rather the average when you factor in the 66% of phones which cost around $100-$150....
So basically you're saying there is no mid range and only high/low end. Interesting deduction there.
So basically you're saying there is no mid range and only high/low end. Interesting deduction there.
I don't know the last time you went shopping, but the mid-range is rather small, at least in the West. High end phones are so subsidized that mid-range phones hardly make sense, and their presence in the market is minimal. Non-subsidized 'high-end' Android phones can be had for $350 (Nexus 5) to $500 (multiple Chinese phones).
So what defines these market segments? Price? Spec list?
DED