Apple’s iPhone X is selling at dramatically lower rates than expected. According to data via Nikkei, Apple will sell around 20 million iPhone X handsets during the March quarter, though that figure, originally, was meant to be more like 45 million.
And this has placed Samsung in an awkward position, as Apple’s ONLY supplier of OLED, as it means the company has had to reduce its production and try and fob off the surplus panels to other phone brands in order to bridge the gap.
Overall, there has been a 60% drop in production of OLED panels for the iPhone X off the back of weaker than expected demand for the handset. But when you factor in the price of the iPhone X, I find it hard to believe that no one saw this coming?
Samsung was clearly confident about the iPhone X; it invested $12 billion in its OLED plant.
Apple can get away with a lot of things, but, it turns out, not charging $1000 for a phone. And now it seems like punters are voting with their wallets. This is why Apple sold more iPhone 8 units than iPhone X units in the past six months.
Price. It’s all about price – and value for money. Two things the iPhone X lacks almost exclusively. It’s too expensive and it doesn’t really offer users anything they can’t get elsewhere for around half the price (see: OnePlus 5T).
I’ve said all along that the iPhone X was too expensive. I mean, $1000 for a handset is just insane – you can buy a desktop PC, a decent one, for that much money. Hell, you could even buy a car – or lease one for six months for that much.
And this, I believe, is the root cause of Apple’s iPhone X problems. It’s just too expensive. And when you can get handsets with similar specs and performance for 50-60% less, why the hell would you pay for the iPhone X? If you’re rich, fine, but for anyone outside the 1% it doesn’t really make much fiscal sense.
Not that this will change anything for Apple’s 2018 plans.
by rgoodwin via Featured Articles
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