The mobile phone industry conference is more and more unwatchable, the "mysterious" marketing strategy of the Jobs period has now been completely abandoned by mobile phone manufacturers, in the first few days of the conference, the information of the new machine will be leaked out on the Internet, and the lack of innovation of mobile phone manufacturers has also made mobile phone "onlookers" lose interest. The day before Apple's 2022 spring conference, the new color of the iPhone 13 Pro was leaked in advance, which made the fruit powder feel bad, of course, now the fruit powder has no idea about the conference itself, just wait for the information summary at the end of the conference, or directly wait for the official sale to buy.
April, May, June is the off-season for smart phone sales, for Apple that only launches a new iPhone every year, the disadvantages are all obvious, Huawei, Honor, vivo, Xiaomi, OPPO and other mobile phone manufacturers launch new mobile phones much higher than Apple, which means that Huami OV, Glory and other mobile phone manufacturers can have more market stimulation means, and Apple can only sit and wait for the iPhone to go downhill in the year, until the next generation of new machines appear to improve.
Another problem unfavorable to Apple is the high price of the iPhone, an iPhone is at least more than 5,000 yuan, and the flagship machine of Huami OV is much cheaper than the iPhone, the high price of the iPhone will make it impossible for Apple to continue to expand the market scale, and the chain reaction brought about by this is that consumers cannot enter Apple's ecosystem, especially the App Store, Apple needs to let more consumers enter the Apple system.
As a result, Apple launched the iPhone low-end product line iPhone SE in the spring of 2016, however, the performance of the first generation of iPhone SE was not successful, Apple did not update the iPhone SE product line for 3 consecutive years, until the spring of 2020, Apple did not launch the iPhone SE2 generation again. On March 9, 2022, Apple updated the iPhone SE series again, launching the third generation of iPhone SE products, with a starting price of 3499 yuan, an increase of 200 yuan over the previous generation.
At the Spring Festival conference, Apple also launched the Cangling green version of the iPhone 13 Pro & 13 Pro Max and the green version of the iPhone 13 & 13 mini. Although the relevant parameters of the iPhone 13 have not changed, the Green Version of the iPhone 13 Pro has still made many fruit fans feel amazing.
IDC's Q4 2021 Q4 data shows that Apple ranked first with shipments of 17.2 million units. After 6 years, Apple has finally returned to the first throne in the Chinese market. Can the price increase of the iPhone SE and the "greening" of the iPhone 13 help Apple sit firmly on the first throne?
Huawei's vacancy makes it difficult for Apple to find a competitor in the high-end market. However, only in terms of shipments, Apple wants to sit firmly in the first place. In the Q4 quarter of 2021, the second-place Honor and Apple's shipments are only 3 million units apart, and the gap between vivo, OPPO, Xiaomi and Apple is not as large as huawei and other mobile phone manufacturers at the beginning, so from this point of view, Apple's position is not stable, especially Glory, the glory momentum after independence is very rapid, and the probability of its shipments exceeding Apple is very high.
For Apple, whether it ranks first is not the key, the key is to increase sales and market share. Unlike Huami OV and Glory, Apple not only makes money for hardware, but also makes money for software, and as the number of Apple terminal devices increases, the software side contributes more and more revenue to Apple.
Apple's fiscal first quarter of fiscal 2022 showed revenue from services of $19.516 billion, up 23.8% year-over-year. Hardware products such as iPhone, iPad, and Mac will fluctuate due to changes in products or environments, but service revenue has become Apple's most robust business line, and it will not decline due to poor sales of an Apple product.
Tim Cook has said at the earnings conference that in Q4 2021, Apple now has 1.8 billion active devices and more than 785 million paid subscribers across platforms. Cook has also previously said that the number of active devices on the iPhone worldwide has exceeded 1 billion.
Relying solely on the App Store, Apple Pay and other software ends can not bring benefits to Apple, only the increasing number of terminal devices can make Apple's revenue in the service business higher.
As a "pricing master", Apple also played a small trick in the iPhone SE product line this time, that is, the price increase of 200 yuan. To know that the starting price of the iPhone 13 mini is 300 yuan lower than the previous generation, why is the 3rd generation iPhone SE more expensive than the 2nd generation iPhone SE? Why didn't Apple set the price of the 3rd generation iPhone SE lower?
This is related to two factors: First, the smart phone industry is rising prices, Huami OV, Glory, Samsung and other mobile phone manufacturers are increasing prices, with the mainstream mobile phone manufacturers to drive, Apple naturally has the same example, rather than continue to reduce the price, because the iPhone SE is not Apple's main product.
Second, "eat" consumers. The reason why Apple can return to the market after 6 years, largely related to the user return, during the rise of Huawei, many fruit powder turned to Huawei, and now this part of the user is trying to return to the Apple camp, and users do not want to spend a high price to buy the iPhone 13 series, they can only choose the iPhone SE, Apple is "eating" the consumer's psychology, anyway, not afraid of consumers do not come, as long as they want to return to the iOS system, and do not want to spend high prices, iPhone SE is just right.
Apple's expectation for the 3rd generation iPhone SE is to continuously expand the iOS market, and the expectations for the iPhone 13 series are completely different. Launching the Green Version of the iPhone 13 Pro & 13 Pro Max and the Green Version of the iPhone 13 & 13 Mini is not very difficult for Apple, including chips, memory, batteries, cameras and other components can be shared with the iPhone 13 series, Apple only needs to redesign on the shell.
The new iPhone 13 series mainly stimulates older iPhone users. Not all of Apple's 1 billion active iPhone users worldwide are iPhone 13. There is a passage that apple's mobile phone is too used, indeed, there are many iPhone 6S, iPhone 8, iPhone XR and other fruit powder mobile phones from a few years ago are still in use. Many people may not be able to imagine that the iPhone 6S is a machine 7 years ago, and it can still be used now, on the one hand, it is the advantage of the iOS system, on the other hand, it is related to the maintenance of the old mobile phone, such as upgrading memory, changing the battery, etc. The old iPhone has no problem. This is simply unimaginable in terms of Android machines, how to use the Android machine 7 years ago to the present, it must be stuck, but the iPhone can be used.
The green version of the model is not scarce in the market, in fact, Android machines have long played out the color of the flower, much better than the iPhone. But the Green Edition of the iPhone 13 Pro & 13 Pro Max is also very good, and for female users, it undoubtedly hits the "red heart".
However, the embarrassing part is that, first, users who want to replace the new iPhone 13 may have been replaced as early as the end of last year, and the Green Edition of the iPhone 13 Pro & 13 Pro Max was launched too late. Second, the fragile mobile phone shell, so that users have to wear a mobile phone case to ensure that the mobile phone is not damaged, and once the mobile phone case is worn, the good-looking mobile phone is not much different, a long time, the advantages of the appearance are even more gone.
Considering the new color scheme launched by Apple for promotion, the specific sales of the Green Edition of the iPhone 13 Pro & 13 Pro Max depends on whether the market consumers accept it.
The tug-of-war between iOS and Android has changed in recent years, with more and more users turning to iOS. According to data from the Institute of Information and Communications Technology, in January 2022, domestic mobile phone brand shipments were 25.652 million units, down 24% year-on-year, accounting for 77.7% of mobile phone shipments in the same period. Three years ago, domestic mobile phone brand shipments accounted for 94.2% of mobile phone shipments in the same period. Among the non-domestic mobile phone brands, it is obvious that Samsung has seen high growth, but Apple. According to the financial report, in the Q4 quarter of 2021, Apple's revenue in Greater China was $25.783 billion, an increase of 21% year-on-year.
iPhone SE price increases, iPhone 13 "green" are Apple's means of stimulating the off-season sales of smartphones, if Huami OV and Glory fail to make a coping strategy, it is indeed likely to let Apple grab more markets. After all, the same is spending three or four thousand yuan to buy a mobile phone, whether it is to buy Apple, or to buy Android, in the past, consumers may choose Android, but now may waver.
Of course, even if Apple cuts the price again, the market of more than 3,000 yuan can not do Huami OV and glory, even if the Apple mobile phone is good, the user has no money is in vain. Apple's purpose is to make old fruit powder become new users, in fact, Huami OV and Glory are also facing this problem, that is, how to let old users change to new. Apple's core advantage is not just the iPhone, but a complete set of Apple products, mobile phones, tablets, notebooks, headphones, smart watches and iOS systems, which is why old users can't do without Apple.
In the past two years, the phenomenon of "war of words" of mobile phone manufacturers has become less and less, and the situation of "touching porcelain" Apple has become more and more rare, which may be a good thing for the industry, mobile phone manufacturers have more energy to focus on products and services, as long as they are hard enough, they are likely to surpass Apple.
Perhaps, Apple is not like Huami OV and Glory, pay attention to market rankings, they just want to sell goods and make money, look, the iPhone SE will increase the price by 200 yuan.