Supply chain reports claim Apple will gain smartphone marketshare in 2016, 2017

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in iPhone
New supply chain reports suggest that the global smartphone market will expand 7 percent in both 2016 and 2017, with Apple both the only US-based company on the list, and closing the gap with Samsung.









According to supply chain monitor DigiTimes, Samsung Electronics will likely continue to lead as the number one vendor, and Apple will rank second and manage to narrow its annual shipment gap with Samsung. Apple's product mix will continue to dominate the high-end of sales, while Samsung's spans the range from near-free to flagship offerings.



The report claims that Samsung's shipments will at best stay flat in the second half of 2016 and the first quarter of 2017, with only a 2.2 percent growth in 2017 -- proportionately less growth than the market expansion.



Samsung had projected to manufacture between 12 and 13 million Galaxy Note 7 smartphones for the second half of 2016. However, after reports started gaining traction of a problematic design causing fires, the company adjusted its projected manufacturing volume and cut the number by around half in late-September.



Since Samsung is unlikely to be able to re-design and re-release a new flagship smartphone to replace the Galaxy Note 7 before the end of 2016, Digitimes predicts that Samsung's total smartphone production for the fourth quarter spanning all of its phones will drop from around 80 million units in total, estimated after Samsung cut its Note 7 manufacturing volume by half, to only 70-75 million units.



The Apple iPhone 7 family is expected to sell around 75 million units before the end of 2016, with some estimates putting that number closer to 100 million. Apple last held the crown for largest smartphone vendor in the fourth quarter of 2010.



Additionally, Apple's sales are expected to grow 12 percent in 2017, supported by the 2016 release of the iPhone 7 family, as well as the release of a next-generation phone late in the year.



Huawei, Oppo and Vivo are expected to take the next three positions in 2017. Indian vendors will hold three positions on the top 20, staying roughly in the same positions as they are currently.



While Digitimes has a notoriously bad track record for predicting specific details in new Apple products, it is a reliable supply chain monitor, drawing on many points of data from suppliers and component manufacturers.



Apple's next iPhone release is expected some time in 2017. The phone may feature a complete casing redesign with an edge-to-edge OLED display, with the Touch ID sensor, home button, and FaceTime camera concealed behind the screen.

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 9
    How? All the other OEMs will keep making the same cheap garbage and sales in India will skyrocket. Apple's sales might grow, their share of the high end might grow, but it seems pretty obvious that their marketshare will keep dropping like a stone around the world, unless they release cheaper iPhones.

    Apple doesn't care about that market. Since Samsung is starting to weaken (Note7 debacle + google competition), Apple also doesn't need those scraps at all.
  • Reply 2 of 9
    levilevi Posts: 344member
    Jesus christ look at the variance in estimates for 2016. Just throwing darts
    macxpressmike1SpamSandwichjony0lolliverwatto_cobracali
  • Reply 3 of 9
    macxpressmacxpress Posts: 5,801member
    levi said:
    Jesus christ look at the variance in estimates for 2016. Just throwing darts

    You can't go by supply chains for anything. Nobody knows how Apple orders things, why and how many they order (and for what purpose). Even Apple has said this. Like you said, this is just throwing shit at the wall to see if it sticks and then claim they said it first. I don't know why these subject matter experts keep relying on this inaccurate data. 
    SpamSandwichwatto_cobracali
  • Reply 4 of 9
    jungmarkjungmark Posts: 6,926member
    Digitimes. Enough said. Long term predictions are useless. Things change. 
    SpamSandwichwatto_cobracali
  • Reply 5 of 9
    NY1822NY1822 Posts: 621member
    So funny:
    Samsung: "shipments"
    Apple: "sell"
    cyberzombielolliverwatto_cobracali
  • Reply 6 of 9
    "The Apple iPhone 7 family is expected to sell around 75 million units before the end of 2016, with some estimates putting that number closer to 100 million." For all the negativity about the iPhones 7/Plus this year, the sell estimates for the iPhones continue to rise. Even before the Samsung explosion/implosion the iPhones sales number was high.
    watto_cobracali
  • Reply 7 of 9
    mike1mike1 Posts: 3,275member
    macxpress said:
    levi said:
    Jesus christ look at the variance in estimates for 2016. Just throwing darts

    You can't go by supply chains for anything. Nobody knows how Apple orders things, why and how many they order (and for what purpose). Even Apple has said this. Like you said, this is just throwing shit at the wall to see if it sticks and then claim they said it first. I don't know why these subject matter experts keep relying on this inaccurate data. 
    Yep. Don't forget as Apple changes suppliers for various components, the losing supplier claims orders are way down while nobody knows who the new supplier is yet.
    cali
  • Reply 8 of 9
    brucemcbrucemc Posts: 1,541member
    I expect the iPhone business to resume growth with the iPhone7 model / iPhone 6s storage bumps / SE lineup, but have no claim regarding marketshare, nor at this stage any interest.  

    A new iPhone's biggest competition is the iPhones the customers already have.
    watto_cobracali
  • Reply 9 of 9
    flaneurflaneur Posts: 4,526member
    MacBAir said:
    How? All the other OEMs will keep making the same cheap garbage and sales in India will skyrocket. Apple's sales might grow, their share of the high end might grow, but it seems pretty obvious that their marketshare will keep dropping like a stone around the world, unless they release cheaper iPhones.

    Apple doesn't care about that market. Since Samsung is starting to weaken (Note7 debacle + google competition), Apple also doesn't need those scraps at all.
    So now you know more than the supply-chain analysts in Taiwan. Are you by any chance working out of Korea, China or Taiwan as a vantage point?

    Anyway, you miss the point. Apple's approach of making the best possible, most desirable handset and OS will (or may) continue to attract the growing base of discriminating people who recognize the world standard when they see it. Samsung's disaster will contribute, but the main point is that the only US manufacturer among the top 20 OEMs has the growth secret at the top tier of the market. This secret is what DigiTimes is acknowledging, maybe even unconsciously, that makes the iPhone unstoppable at the top of the market.

    What is it?  I shouldn't have to mention to you that it's the holistic vision of what a mobile computer should look, feel, and operate like, given the production capability that you can marshall from a global network of the best suppliers, rather than piecing it all together in-house like Samsung mostly does. Samsung's insular approach blinds them and results in a pastiche of elements, rather than a harmonized instrument of interoperting digital clockwork, á la Apple. A mess-of-elements approach leads to Samsung's many failures, not only the hideous plastic textures of Galaxies in years past, or the greasy-glossy metallic-mirror glitzyness of the most recent models, but also their "features" like eye-scrolling or . . . you fill in the rest.

    So that's how Apple grows the share — making the best even more desirable by greater refinement, gaining reputation on that basis, while keeping the price about the same at the top of the market. The Asian manufactures haven't yet figured out this dedication to refinement of the whole product and how it performs.

    I don't think they will until they start undergoing the kind of mental alterations that led to Steve Jobs's insight that technology is supposed to increase your personal freedom and power while making you feel good about the tool you're using. That means no glitzy plastichrome or goofy camera bezels or any unnecessary elements or design fillips, and it means using humane software that doesn't frustrate or insult the user at the smallest level of detail, something that Microsoft and Google have yet to learn, and even Apple has yet to perfect, and they know it.

    The bottom of the market has nothing to do with Apple's growth at the top, as you probably know but refuse to acknowledge in order to throw some negativity on this story.
    edited October 2016 jony0watto_cobracali
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