FollowThe fairly recent launch of the iPhone 5 was accepted warmly initially. However, the buzz cooled down gradually as people were disappointed that there wasn’t anything revolutionary being offered, in contrast to the hype and rumors preceding the launch. This is not something which affected Apple since the sales of the iPhone 5 still keep the smart phone in the top seller list of every dealer. However, in comparison to the legacy phones, the iPhone 5 did not deliver satisfactory returns to the company.
The only question remains, is Android really being influential in the smart phone business, on both manufacturers and consumers? The Q4 2012 results agree to this statement. With around 150 million Android phones sold worldwide during the last quarter of 2012, it seems that this number overshadows the sales figure of Apple during the same time period: 47 million. Couple this with the fact that Android shares 70% of the global smart phone market while Apple owns only 22%, the situation seem worrisome for Apple now. However, the main factor to consider here is the market share vs. profit ratio.
It is a well known fact that all Apple products have a premium price, with the iPhones being no exception. So, even though there are numerous Android phones flooding the market, Apple is clearly getting triple the profit by selling one iPhone. So, even with a smaller market share, Apple rejoices with the best profit figures that any company in the U.S. Keeping in line with news related to the U.S., the iPhone 5 took 39% of the market share in the country for Q4 2012, while leading Android manufacturers like Samsung could take about 30% of the share. Thus, it is clear that it is very difficult for a company to enjoy both market share and profit success at the same time, at least in the case of smart phones.
