I've said it before, 70% of the US economy is driven by the "consumer," but 50% of the US economy is driven by the wealthiest top 10% of the consumers!
Apple knows this.
Google/Android, MS/Windows make crap software.
HP/Samsung/Sony, etc., make crap hardware.
Combine crap software and crap hardware and you get what you deserve....crap!
Well you have to admit that Apple has a whole lot of its eggs in one basket, namely the iPhone and iPad. If sales were to collapse on either one of those products Apple would be in trouble quickly. Just like stock portfolios companies sometimes need to be diversified. Samsung, for example, could fall flat on its face in mobile, lose market share, see sales of phones plummet, and still keep going building TVs and refrigerators. If iPhones suddenly fell out of favor what would Apple have to fall back on, Macintosh sales?
Another thing, Samsung Electronics Apple-like profits didn't really start occurring until their Galaxy brand took off. And I'm sure they make decent money supplying components for iPhone and iPad. Plus we keep hearing about how margins in the TV business are slim, so I can't imagine Samsung is making a lot of money off their TVs. Are they more diversified than Apple? Yeah, but I think it's pretty clear that mobile is a big part of their business now.
Well you have to admit that Apple has a whole lot of its eggs in one basket, namely the iPhone and iPad. If sales were to collapse on either one of those products Apple would be in trouble quickly. Just like stock portfolios companies sometimes need to be diversified. Samsung, for example, could fall flat on its face in mobile, lose market share, see sales of phones plummet, and still keep going building TVs and refrigerators. If iPhones suddenly fell out of favor what would Apple have to fall back on, Macintosh sales?
Important note. Some 67% of Samsung Electronics profits were from smartphones; Apple's about 54%. Both are making money, but I would bet that Samsung is more vulnerable to losing the lower end of the market, which Apple doesn't even compete in, and since Samsung has less of the high end market than Apple, it will be a quicker slide in profitability than for Apple. It's all about ASP of devices and margins, and Apple is handily winning that battle, and with much less advertising costs.
There's no indication that either of those are going to fall "flat" anytime soon and I'm pretty certain Apple has some pretty smart people innovating and taking a look at future market trends. They also have the iTunes store (apps, music, video) which makes more money by itself than most tech companies.
It helps if you actually follow the conversation before making a comment on the obvious.
Ah, I assumed you were questioning why Apple couldn't do the same. My bad. Anyway I think next month will prove that Apple is doing just fine even with the onslaught of cheap hardware flooding the market.
Whatever you do, avoid talking about how many more androids were sold world-wide during that same period as opposed to iOS devices. Any guesses, 5 to 1, 10 to 1? It's only a matter of time. When there are 100 androids to every 1 iOS device, then everyone will wonder why we used iPad's at all? Just like we do with iPod's now. Reading the tea leaves is as easy as going to some chinese web site and looking up what kind of phablets are out there. Apple is so far behind it is almost funny.
Provides great opportunity for Apple when all those billions of people want to upgrade from their toy to a nice phone.
Important note. Some 67% of Samsung Electronics profits were from smartphones; Apple's about 54%. Both are making money, but I would bet that Samsung is more vulnerable to losing the lower end of the market, which Apple doesn't even compete in, and since Samsung has less of the high end market than Apple, it will be a quicker slide in profitability than for Apple. It's all about ASP of devices and margins, and Apple is handily winning that battle, and with much less advertising costs.
Also I think it's fair to say that Apple has more brand loyalty and Samsung does. I wish there was another company that could challenge them on the android side. Maybe it will be LG?
[QUOTE] [B][SIZE=4]Alert: Mobile Traffic and Sales Surge on Christmas Day 2013 Holiday Benchmark Staff - 9am EST December 26, 2013 [/SIZE][/B] Here are the online shopping trends we saw for Wednesday, December 25, Christmas Day from the IBM Digital Analytics Benchmark.
Overall Christmas Day online sales were up 16.5 percent over the same period last year. Let’s take a closer look at some of the key drivers:
[LIST] [*] [B]Mobile Traffic and Sales: [/B]Mobile traffic was the highest we've seen over this holiday season, accounting for 48 percent of all online traffic, up 28.3 percent compared to the same period last year. Mobile sales also remained strong, approaching 29 percent of all online sales, up 40 percent over 2012. [*] [*] [B]Smartphones Browse, Tablets Buy:[/B] Smartphones drove 28.5 percent of all online traffic compared to tablets at 18.1 percent, making it the browsing device of choice. When it comes to making the sale, tablets drove 19.4 percent of all online sales, more than twice that of smartphones, which accounted for 9.3 percent. Tablet users also averaged $95.61 per order, versus smartphone users, who averaged $85.11 per order. [*] [*] [B]iOS vs. Android: [/B]As a percentage of total online sales, iOS was more than five times higher than Android, driving 23 percent vs. 4.6 percent for Android. On average, iOS users spent $93.94 per order, nearly twice that of Android users, who spent $48.10 per order. iOS also led as a component of overall traffic with 32.6 percent vs. 14.8 percent for Android. [*] [*] [B]The Social Influence - Facebook vs. Pinterest: [/B]Shoppers referred from Facebook averaged $72.01 per order, versus Pinterest referrals, which drove $86.83 per order. However, Facebook referrals converted sales at nearly four times the rate of Pinterest referrals, perhaps indicating stronger confidence in network recommendations. [*] [/LIST]
Today's updates are based on the cloud-based IBM Digital Analytics Benchmark, the industry’s only real-time, cloud-based digital analytics platform that tracks millions of transactions and analyzes terabytes of raw data from approximately 800 retail sites nationwide. Visit www.ibm.com/benchmark for real-time data alerts, or follow the hashtag #SmarterCommerce. [/QUOTE]
If my calculations and the numbers and relationships in this article are accurate, then I think that [B][I]we are experiencing a revolution in the way buying is being done,[/I][/B] consider:
100.0% == All Online Sales 71.0% == Non-Mobile Online Sales (Desktop, Laptop) - 40% over 2012 29.0% == Mobile Online Sales (Tablets and Phones) + 40% over 2012 19.4% == Tablet Online Sales 16.2% == iPad Online Sales
That's worth repeating: [B][I]The iPad accounted for 16.2% of[COLOR=blue] all online sales [/COLOR]on Christmas Day 2013... [/I][/B] All Online Sales includes desktop computers, laptop computers, tablets and phones,
Yes, Virginia... The iPad is just a [I]consumption [/I] device -- but then, [I]buying things is [COLOR=blue]consumption[/COLOR][/I]...
And to quote late US Senator "Fritz" Hollings: [B][I]"Da's a whole lot a consuming' goin' out dare!"[/I][/B]
Exactly. These devices just came onto the market. Most Android devices that are still counted as "marketshare" are old devices that don't do much. Those are the ones that I've come into contact with. I have a Nexus 7 (not a phone I know), but the thing can't hold a charge and is getting progressively slower. My employee's Android phone (Motorola) freezes up when you pick up the phone and sometimes crashes. My friend's Android phone (another Motorola), can't keep a charge no matter how long you charge it. I get people ask me all the time what to do and I can only tell them to take it back to the Verizon/ATT store and get a replacement.
I realize there are some great Android devices out there and I have a few. Amazon Kindle is a great UI but not native Android I know. I'm a Google Glass Explorer and I find that to be a great piece of hardware. I really don't like the UI of the stock Android on the Nexus 7 and like I said, I have issues there.
It just seems that more of my circle have more problems with their Android devices and can't find decent resolution to those problems other than to wait until their contract expires and get another device they can afford which is often, another Android device. They don't need all the bells and whistles and just get what's cheapest at the time. That may be the Motorola X or Nexus 5 or something... but most consumers are confused by all this *choice* and assume one device is the same as the other because of the spec sheet. I just know the people I tell to get an iPhone too and listen are happy they did, even if it costs a little more.
Ah, I assumed you were questioning why Apple couldn't do the same. My bad. Anyway I think next month will prove that Apple is doing just fine even with the onslaught of cheap hardware flooding the market.
I'm more interested in how companies will evolve their mobile hardware/software and how the market will react when a budget device is more than enough.
For example, in the 2nd half of 2014, Qualcomm will be releasing an efficient and low cost SoC, the Snapdragon 410. This SoC uses 4x Cortex A53 cores (ARMv8 64-bit), an Adreno 306 GPU (OpenGL ES 3.0, full HD playback, 13MP camera support), and Qualcomm's global LTE chip.
I don't what to make of Android. Seems that Google has lost control of Android. It's Samsung's baby at this point. Oracle, who owns Java, has won a seemingly important decision against Google for not licensing Java. Google seems to be moving to Chrome OS.
Android is less a product and more a marketing label. The variations among devices running Android seems quite functionally vast as are the versions and configurations of Android running on them. If one were to itemize the functionality one receives with devices running Android, it would be represented by quite sparse-in-places 3D matrix of Device x Android Version x Function
iOS, however, has far fewer variations and it is relatively simple to detail what functionality one gets.
Well you have to admit that Apple has a whole lot of its eggs in one basket, namely the iPhone and iPad. If sales were to collapse on either one of those products Apple would be in trouble quickly. Just like stock portfolios companies sometimes need to be diversified. Samsung, for example, could fall flat on its face in mobile, lose market share, see sales of phones plummet, and still keep going building TVs and refrigerators. If iPhones suddenly fell out of favor what would Apple have to fall back on, Macintosh sales?
I think Apple's mac business makes more money than Samsung's TV business...
I'm more interested in how companies will evolve their mobile hardware/software and how the market will react when a budget device is more than enough.
For example, in the 2nd half of 2014, Qualcomm will be releasing an efficient and low cost SoC, the Snapdragon 410. This SoC uses 4x Cortex A53 cores (ARMv8 64-bit), an Adreno 306 GPU (OpenGL ES 3.0, full HD playback, 13MP camera support), and Qualcomm's global LTE chip.
I'm not following your thought between paragraphs. What does that example have to do with the first paragraph? Are you saying that anything less than those specs are not enough for people today? Furthermore, could you point to the source where Qualcomm's low-cost and power efficient SoC will be 4-core, which is what I assume is what you means by 4x. So far I have seen no 4-core that is more power efficient or lower-cost than what a 2-core chip can be. Note that all the big.LITTLE only ever have two cores running at once and use different microarchitecture in a heterogeneous design.
It seems to me that today's HW is more than capable in terms of HW specs. It's good SW that is still the issue for most vendors.
PS: Why would "full HD playback" be in hat list? What devices being released today can't decode 1080p video?
Well you have to admit that Apple has a whole lot of its eggs in one basket, namely the iPhone and iPad. If sales were to collapse on either one of those products Apple would be in trouble quickly. Just like stock portfolios companies sometimes need to be diversified. Samsung, for example, could fall flat on its face in mobile, lose market share, see sales of phones plummet, and still keep going building TVs and refrigerators. If iPhones suddenly fell out of favor what would Apple have to fall back on, Macintosh sales?
I think Apple's mac business makes more money than Samsung's TV business...
Yes! And we may be seeing the start of a disruption of what comprises a Personal Computer -- more specifically a Mac....
Let me be the first to show the prosumer variant of the Mac Pro...
Apple will have a majority share of all cell phone subscribers in the US by the middle of 2015, according to a straight line extrapolation of their current growth (http://www.asymco.com/2013/12/13/how-many-americans-will-be-using-an-iphone/). They currently have a little over 25%, up from 17.5% a year ago and 10.2% two years ago.
Android user are expecting everything must be free, and they are never going to spend any penny.
The concept if 'free' reeks of charity, Marxism, foolishness or a underlying subsidy price model. Google and their followers were too damn lazy to build a mobile OS from scratch so they jumped on Linix for a free software ride. In fairness Linix/Androud do work well but it does sacrifice some software engineering originality of form and design.
Comments
I've said it before, 70% of the US economy is driven by the "consumer," but 50% of the US economy is driven by the wealthiest top 10% of the consumers!
Apple knows this.
Google/Android, MS/Windows make crap software.
HP/Samsung/Sony, etc., make crap hardware.
Combine crap software and crap hardware and you get what you deserve....crap!
Because Google is not in the business of making money off hardware. Get a clue.
It helps if you actually follow the conversation before making a comment on the obvious.
Well you have to admit that Apple has a whole lot of its eggs in one basket, namely the iPhone and iPad. If sales were to collapse on either one of those products Apple would be in trouble quickly. Just like stock portfolios companies sometimes need to be diversified. Samsung, for example, could fall flat on its face in mobile, lose market share, see sales of phones plummet, and still keep going building TVs and refrigerators. If iPhones suddenly fell out of favor what would Apple have to fall back on, Macintosh sales?
Important note. Some 67% of Samsung Electronics profits were from smartphones; Apple's about 54%. Both are making money, but I would bet that Samsung is more vulnerable to losing the lower end of the market, which Apple doesn't even compete in, and since Samsung has less of the high end market than Apple, it will be a quicker slide in profitability than for Apple. It's all about ASP of devices and margins, and Apple is handily winning that battle, and with much less advertising costs.
There's no indication that either of those are going to fall "flat" anytime soon and I'm pretty certain Apple has some pretty smart people innovating and taking a look at future market trends. They also have the iTunes store (apps, music, video) which makes more money by itself than most tech companies.
Provides great opportunity for Apple when all those billions of people want to upgrade from their toy to a nice phone.
[QUOTE]
[B][SIZE=4]Alert: Mobile Traffic and Sales Surge on Christmas Day 2013
Holiday Benchmark Staff - 9am EST December 26, 2013
[/SIZE][/B]
Here are the online shopping trends we saw for Wednesday, December 25, Christmas Day from the IBM Digital Analytics Benchmark.
Overall Christmas Day online sales were up 16.5 percent over the same period last year. Let’s take a closer look at some of the key drivers:
[LIST]
[*] [B]Mobile Traffic and Sales: [/B]Mobile traffic was the highest we've seen over this holiday season, accounting for 48 percent of all online traffic, up 28.3 percent compared to the same period last year. Mobile sales also remained strong, approaching 29 percent of all online sales, up 40 percent over 2012.
[*]
[*] [B]Smartphones Browse, Tablets Buy:[/B] Smartphones drove 28.5 percent of all online traffic compared to tablets at 18.1 percent, making it the browsing device of choice. When it comes to making the sale, tablets drove 19.4 percent of all online sales, more than twice that of smartphones, which accounted for 9.3 percent. Tablet users also averaged $95.61 per order, versus smartphone users, who averaged $85.11 per order.
[*]
[*] [B]iOS vs. Android: [/B]As a percentage of total online sales, iOS was more than five times higher than Android, driving 23 percent vs. 4.6 percent for Android. On average, iOS users spent $93.94 per order, nearly twice that of Android users, who spent $48.10 per order. iOS also led as a component of overall traffic with 32.6 percent vs. 14.8 percent for Android.
[*]
[*] [B]The Social Influence - Facebook vs. Pinterest: [/B]Shoppers referred from Facebook averaged $72.01 per order, versus Pinterest referrals, which drove $86.83 per order. However, Facebook referrals converted sales at nearly four times the rate of Pinterest referrals, perhaps indicating stronger confidence in network recommendations.
[*]
[/LIST]
Today's updates are based on the cloud-based IBM Digital Analytics Benchmark, the industry’s only real-time, cloud-based digital analytics platform that tracks millions of transactions and analyzes terabytes of raw data from approximately 800 retail sites nationwide. Visit www.ibm.com/benchmark for real-time data alerts, or follow the hashtag #SmarterCommerce. [/QUOTE]
http://www-01.ibm.com/software/marketing-solutions/benchmark-hub/dec26.html
If my calculations and the numbers and relationships in this article are accurate, then I think that [B][I]we are experiencing a revolution in the way buying is being done,[/I][/B] consider:
100.0% == All Online Sales
71.0% == Non-Mobile Online Sales (Desktop, Laptop) - 40% over 2012
29.0% == Mobile Online Sales (Tablets and Phones) + 40% over 2012
19.4% == Tablet Online Sales
16.2% == iPad Online Sales
That's worth repeating: [B][I]The iPad accounted for 16.2% of[COLOR=blue] all online sales [/COLOR]on Christmas Day 2013... [/I][/B] All Online Sales includes desktop computers, laptop computers, tablets and phones,
Yes, Virginia... The iPad is just a [I]consumption [/I] device -- but then, [I]buying things is [COLOR=blue]consumption[/COLOR][/I]...
And to quote late US Senator "Fritz" Hollings: [B][I]"Da's a whole lot a consuming' goin' out dare!"[/I][/B]
How many years has this excuse by Android lovers/Apple haters been constantly repeated? Six? Seven years now?
Exactly. These devices just came onto the market. Most Android devices that are still counted as "marketshare" are old devices that don't do much. Those are the ones that I've come into contact with. I have a Nexus 7 (not a phone I know), but the thing can't hold a charge and is getting progressively slower. My employee's Android phone (Motorola) freezes up when you pick up the phone and sometimes crashes. My friend's Android phone (another Motorola), can't keep a charge no matter how long you charge it. I get people ask me all the time what to do and I can only tell them to take it back to the Verizon/ATT store and get a replacement.
I realize there are some great Android devices out there and I have a few. Amazon Kindle is a great UI but not native Android I know. I'm a Google Glass Explorer and I find that to be a great piece of hardware. I really don't like the UI of the stock Android on the Nexus 7 and like I said, I have issues there.
It just seems that more of my circle have more problems with their Android devices and can't find decent resolution to those problems other than to wait until their contract expires and get another device they can afford which is often, another Android device. They don't need all the bells and whistles and just get what's cheapest at the time. That may be the Motorola X or Nexus 5 or something... but most consumers are confused by all this *choice* and assume one device is the same as the other because of the spec sheet. I just know the people I tell to get an iPhone too and listen are happy they did, even if it costs a little more.
Ah, I assumed you were questioning why Apple couldn't do the same. My bad. Anyway I think next month will prove that Apple is doing just fine even with the onslaught of cheap hardware flooding the market.
I'm more interested in how companies will evolve their mobile hardware/software and how the market will react when a budget device is more than enough.
For example, in the 2nd half of 2014, Qualcomm will be releasing an efficient and low cost SoC, the Snapdragon 410. This SoC uses 4x Cortex A53 cores (ARMv8 64-bit), an Adreno 306 GPU (OpenGL ES 3.0, full HD playback, 13MP camera support), and Qualcomm's global LTE chip.
^^^ This!
Well you have to admit that Apple has a whole lot of its eggs in one basket, namely the iPhone and iPad. If sales were to collapse on either one of those products Apple would be in trouble quickly. Just like stock portfolios companies sometimes need to be diversified. Samsung, for example, could fall flat on its face in mobile, lose market share, see sales of phones plummet, and still keep going building TVs and refrigerators. If iPhones suddenly fell out of favor what would Apple have to fall back on, Macintosh sales?
I think Apple's mac business makes more money than Samsung's TV business...
I'm not following your thought between paragraphs. What does that example have to do with the first paragraph? Are you saying that anything less than those specs are not enough for people today? Furthermore, could you point to the source where Qualcomm's low-cost and power efficient SoC will be 4-core, which is what I assume is what you means by 4x. So far I have seen no 4-core that is more power efficient or lower-cost than what a 2-core chip can be. Note that all the big.LITTLE only ever have two cores running at once and use different microarchitecture in a heterogeneous design.
It seems to me that today's HW is more than capable in terms of HW specs. It's good SW that is still the issue for most vendors.
PS: Why would "full HD playback" be in hat list? What devices being released today can't decode 1080p video?
Considering Apple makes at least 1/3 of all PC profits in the world that's probably true.
To give to their small children who don't buy anything. Wouldn't want to give them something nice to break either.
Yes! And we may be seeing the start of a disruption of what comprises a Personal Computer -- more specifically a Mac....
Let me be the first to show the prosumer variant of the Mac Pro...
The Mac Muff
While Apple devices may never win marketshare...
Apple will have a majority share of all cell phone subscribers in the US by the middle of 2015, according to a straight line extrapolation of their current growth (http://www.asymco.com/2013/12/13/how-many-americans-will-be-using-an-iphone/). They currently have a little over 25%, up from 17.5% a year ago and 10.2% two years ago.
The concept if 'free' reeks of charity, Marxism, foolishness or a underlying subsidy price model. Google and their followers were too damn lazy to build a mobile OS from scratch so they jumped on Linix for a free software ride. In fairness Linix/Androud do work well but it does sacrifice some software engineering originality of form and design.