Apple overtakes Fitbit to become world's largest wearables vendor, study says [u]
Citing a boom in Apple Watch sales, market research firm Strategy Analytics in a report released Thursday said Apple overtook Fitbit to become the world's largest wearables vendor for the first quarter of 2017.
According to Strategy Analytics data, Apple sold an estimated 3.5 million Apple Watch units during the three-month period ending in March, up 59 percent from 2.2 million units sold during the same time last year. The performance was good enough to capture 16 percent of the global market.
Helping Apple secure the number one spot was Fitbit's massive year-over-year decline. In the first quarter of 2016, the firm shipped 4.5 million units, a figure that fell to 2.9 million units in March. The company is apparently feeling the effects of a trend toward full-fledged smartwatch devices like Apple Watch and products marketed by Samsung.
Fitbit previously commanded the wearables sector with relatively low-cost fitness bands and related accessories dedicated to tracking steps, counting calories and monitoring user heart rate. Higher end devices in the company's catalog incorporate GPS run tracking and larger displays for interfacing with a host smartphone. That could soon change, as images leaked earlier this week claimed to show a Fitbit smartwatch allegedly slated for release this fall.
"Fitbit shipped 2.9 million wearables worldwide in Q1 2017, falling a huge 36 percent annually from 4.5 million in Q1 2016," said Cliff Raskind, director at Strategy Analytics. "Fitbit has lost its wearables leadership to Apple, due to slowing demand for its fitnessbands (sic) and a late entry to the emerging smartwatch market. Fitbit's shipments, revenue, pricing and profit are all shrinking at the moment and the company has a major fight on its hands to recover this year."
Fitbit's sluggish quarter pushed Xiaomi into second place. With only two products in its quiver -- the Mi Band and Mi Band 2 -- Xiaomi managed to ship an estimated 3.4 million units to take 15.5 percent of the market for the first three months of 2016.
The Strategy Analytics report comes on the heels of Apple's earnings report for its second fiscal quarter of 2017. Discussing Apple's results in a conference call on Tuesday, CEO Tim Cook said Apple Watch sales nearly doubled from 2016. Together with AirPods and Beats headphones sales, Apple's wearables business is now the size of a Fortune 500 company, Cook said.
Update: Fitbit has issued a response to the report, saying it sold 3 million devices in the first quarter.
According to Strategy Analytics data, Apple sold an estimated 3.5 million Apple Watch units during the three-month period ending in March, up 59 percent from 2.2 million units sold during the same time last year. The performance was good enough to capture 16 percent of the global market.
Helping Apple secure the number one spot was Fitbit's massive year-over-year decline. In the first quarter of 2016, the firm shipped 4.5 million units, a figure that fell to 2.9 million units in March. The company is apparently feeling the effects of a trend toward full-fledged smartwatch devices like Apple Watch and products marketed by Samsung.
Fitbit previously commanded the wearables sector with relatively low-cost fitness bands and related accessories dedicated to tracking steps, counting calories and monitoring user heart rate. Higher end devices in the company's catalog incorporate GPS run tracking and larger displays for interfacing with a host smartphone. That could soon change, as images leaked earlier this week claimed to show a Fitbit smartwatch allegedly slated for release this fall.
"Fitbit shipped 2.9 million wearables worldwide in Q1 2017, falling a huge 36 percent annually from 4.5 million in Q1 2016," said Cliff Raskind, director at Strategy Analytics. "Fitbit has lost its wearables leadership to Apple, due to slowing demand for its fitnessbands (sic) and a late entry to the emerging smartwatch market. Fitbit's shipments, revenue, pricing and profit are all shrinking at the moment and the company has a major fight on its hands to recover this year."
Fitbit's sluggish quarter pushed Xiaomi into second place. With only two products in its quiver -- the Mi Band and Mi Band 2 -- Xiaomi managed to ship an estimated 3.4 million units to take 15.5 percent of the market for the first three months of 2016.
The Strategy Analytics report comes on the heels of Apple's earnings report for its second fiscal quarter of 2017. Discussing Apple's results in a conference call on Tuesday, CEO Tim Cook said Apple Watch sales nearly doubled from 2016. Together with AirPods and Beats headphones sales, Apple's wearables business is now the size of a Fortune 500 company, Cook said.
Update: Fitbit has issued a response to the report, saying it sold 3 million devices in the first quarter.
Comments
The link: https://www.ted.com/talks/simon_sinek_how_great_leaders_inspire_action
Unlike smart phones which are essential modern devices, one can easily get by without a fitness tracker/smart watch - logically people who do seek them out will be more discerning, and less likely to buy junky options (especially considering the wrist's location and association with projected wealth.) Those junky options were always drawer fillers, they never took on a trojan horse role for fitbit's more expensive offerings. It would not surprise me at all if cheap fitbit devices were the entry point for people that go on to purchase apple watches. (Anecdotally I have seen this transition several times, they start on a cheap fitness tracker, then if they "like it and use it" they switch to the more capable apple watch.)
As for fitbit's decline in sales, that was expected. Cheap brands were eating their low end 'gifting' (read: junk) product and those happy with their fitbit had little reason to purchase again - there have never been any legitimate upgrades to the fitbit line. This is entirely opposite to the apple watch which sees significant iterative improvements.
Fitbit's technology has always been far behind that of every major player in the market (motorola, lg, samsung, etc) they owe their entire legitimacy to the high volume of sales made on their less-than-$100 fitness tracker. The suggestion of an "early lead" was mistaken, as they were already at their technological apex.
By the time the second gen came around, I was seeing a new one about every three weeks.
Over the past couple of months, I'm noticing "new" arms at about the rate of two a week. And I don't live in a particularly affluent area of the country, either (though we are graced with an Apple Store).
The media or Wall Street are really killers when it comes to low-selling products. Can't a company sell a product that isn't a huge hit simply because that's what the company is interested in? I can't really afford a Tesla and most people can't. It's not the most convenient product for current users. However, I'd hate to see Tesla closing down or going out of business because I think it's great that some company is trying hard to change daily transportation. I'm not saying anything like, "Musk is stupid for trying to sell electric cars" or "What a waste of time." Someone has a dream so why try to crush it because I don't entirely agree with a pure electric car. To me, hybrids make more sense, but that's just my dream. Still, an all-electric vehicle has some appeal to me.
Apple should keep trying to sell AppleWatch and keep improving it so maybe it will become a product that more people want in the future. If Apple ever solves the blood sugar measurement problem it will really make a huge difference to those who need some device like that. It really sucks some people are so negative about things because they don't fully understand other people's dreams or goals.
/AppleLifer
Good thing I don't visit that toxic hellstew.
So while the Apple Watch is slowly gaining momentum and has started to be a real generator for Apple, Android Wear has done nothing but lose money for Google and their partners and is locked in a death spiral. The last hope - Android Wear 2.0 - came and went and didn't make a bit of difference. And this is despite Android Wear preceding the Apple Watch by more than a year, and independent Android smartwatch efforts from Samsung and Sony - that weren't Google's Android Wear but were rather tablet Android loaded onto a watch - by more than 2 years.
Google really blew it. They didn't advertise the platform, so even most Android device owners don't know that Android Wear exists. Their initial version of the product - voice remotes for your phone - was horrible. They never released phone or SMS apps customized for the watch - i.e. Hangouts or Voice apps that would work independently of the phone - and still haven't. They also failed to create a gateway tier of cheap Fitbit type devices that could have been a gateway to the platform for like $70 that would have only provided fitness tracking and notification mirroring features. They had the opportunity to do so by buying Jawbone - which has since gone belly up - but chose to be stubborn and fail. Oh well. For most of the population, smartwatch is going to be analogous to Apple Watch just as MP3 player basically meant iPod. That is the difference between a company that actually knows how to design and market products - Apple - and a company who really only knows search and ads in Google. Android Wear was designed around getting more people to use voice search to collect more voice search data. That is one reason why it was doomed from the start and you can just go from there.