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Apple introduces the iPhone 5C in September 2013 for buyers at the low end. The 5C is priced at $99.

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Apple offers a new way to buy iPhones directly from Apple with financing in September 2015. This will change the way iPhones are sold, giving more control over the sale of iPhones to Apple. It will enable Apple to stabilize core sales for iPhones by encouraging upgrades every year. The monthly payments are $32.41 for 2 years for the cheapest iPhone. Apple is taking aim at the average upgrade time which is increasing- it went up to 26.3 months in 2015 from 18.2 months in 2010, according to a telecom consultant. With the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus sales surged for Apple in the first 3 quarters of 2015 by 50% from the prior year period. It will be harder for Apple to generate this kind of sales increase as the new iPhones introduced in September 2015- the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus have better cameras and "3-D Touch," only incrementally different. A 16 gigabyte iPhone 6s would cost $778, about the same as the $649 price and Apple Care coverage of $129. The way iPhones were sold through wireless carriers kept the price hidden with higher wireless service charges- 2 years of a Verizon wireless 3 gigabye data plan ended up costing users twice the amount of the $649 price of the iPhone. Now the competition among wireless carriers will shift to pricing cuts and changing their pricing strategies. The result of the changes is likely to be increasing shifts from one carrier to another as Apple allows direct buyers to choose the carrier they want....

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Apple gets 19% of its sales in China with a manufacturing base that includes 1 million people employed in one Chinese city. In an effort to promote Make in China China is giving Huawei more room to compete with Apple. Huawei is bringing out a new 5G phone as an alternative and has banned use of Aplle iphones in government agencies. This means about 56 million people will have to turn to locally made products. China presents this move as an effort to protect data and cybersecurity. Yet Apple has a share price increase of 46% this year even in an environment in which US and China are restricting the export of key technologies (by US) or critical materials for electric cars (by China). Apple's responses to this have been slow preferring to keep its supply chain the way it is in a strategy based on the short run, with some minor shift to India and Vietnam.

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The marketing of the iPhone 6 in the U.S., China and global markets helps Apple widen its lead over competitors in 2015. Apple sales were 47.5 million iPhones in the 2nd quarter 2015, increasing by 35% over the prior year quarter. Apple is also gaining sales from buyers switching from Android phones. Apple's iPhone sales now make up 63% of its sales, compared with 53% in the same quarter in 2014. Sales of iPhones increased 59% to $31.37 billion as the average selling price went up by $100 to $662.42. Apple remained above the fray, and actually increased average selling price to $662, as Xiaomi sold quality Android phones at near cost in China hitting Samsung sales and margins hard, and leaving unsold inventory for Samsung in China. Rarely has a company dominated its business in this manner from the standpoint of profits with only about 20% of the market in smartphones. Apple profits in the 2nd quarter were $10.7 billion, increasing from $7.74 billion in the prior year quarter. The iPad unit sales declined by 18% for the 2nd quarter 2015, the sixth quarter of such declines and fewer customers upgrading. The iPad has also not taken off in the workplace. Mac unit sales were up 9%, even though the PC market declined in units by 9.5% globally for the quarter. Apple shares up 39% in 2015, fell by 6.7% over concerns about slowing China sales....

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Apple did its first product launch in China with the launch of the iPhone 5C in China. The phone is priced at $99 in the U.S. and targets buyers at the low end. In China where subsidies kick in later in lower monthly phone bills the price is much higher at about 4500 yuan or $733. Buyers in smaller cities in China pay about 1000 to 2000 yuan for a smartphone. Apple's market share is about 5% in China, behind Samsung at 18% and Chinese manufacturers Huawei, Lenovo and HTC.

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Apple provides about 40% of Taiwanese company Pegatron revenues. Starting with older iPhone models, the company now supplies the new model iPhone 5C. Revenue in the 4th quarter 2013 for iPhones and tablets increased 20%, as sales from televisions and PC's declined. Operating margins increased slightly to 1.9% in the 4th quarter 2014 from the prior year quarter 1.6%.

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With the decline of its hardware business making iPhones Apple is looking at other fields. It is launching cheap online TV subscriptions in streaming wars in competition with Netflix and others. Apple is launching a new TV streaming service Apple TV+ in 100 countries for 4.99 British pounds a month undercutting Netflix's price of 5.99 pounds. The new service will be started November 1, 2019. Disney plans a streaming service for 7 pounds a month starting November 12. This service is alongside iPhone 11 launch and anew iPad, a new iWatch. Buy any new Apple device and you get a 1 year streaming service free.  Sales of iPhones fell 14% in the April to June 2019 quarter to 39 million units. Samsung's business is growing by 4% to 75 million units and Huawei by 16% to 58 million units. Apple sees the need to increases its services business with a target of $50 billion in 2020. Apple sees itself more as a media and cloud services company as it makes this change. In markets such as India Apple's growth is limited by its failure to lower prices on new iPhones. In China it faces strong competition from Huawei. The trade tensions are increasing the strength of Chinese brands in the Chinese market. The market in U.S. and Europe is saturated after years of expansion. New iPhone models are costly and bring peripheral advantages such as more and better cameras and features such as screens that are not breakable- for the iPhone 11- not dimensions that are critical for making a costly purchase. After years of growth tech companies such as Apple, Google, Alibaba, Amazon are reaching a point where incremental growth is not what it used to be and most of the rapid growth behind them. Trade tensions are also limiting the outlook in the Chinese market, and pricing remains a major factor in the Indian market. Western markets are saturated. There are fewer and fewer substantial new ideas from these tech companies. ...

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Tim Cook talks to developers at a world wide virtual and in person event. 

Apple will introduce a new 13.5 inch Macbook Air with a inhouse M2 chip for $1195 on sale in July 2022. A new 13 inch Macbook Pro will also be made.

The new iPhone with 5G capability had sales of $191 billion in fiscal year ending in September 2021. iPhone sales up 6.2% in 2022 vs 39% in 2021 when the pandemic led to remote work on Apple and other PC's.

App store and ad sales up by 17% to $80 billion, larger than Mac and iPad sales. 

Apple Pay will break payments into 4 installments as an option. Messages will have an unsend or edit option for 15 minutes.

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Google's operating profit margin on the Moto G smartphone is about 5%, according to analyst Newman at Sanford Bernstein & Co. By comparison Samsung gets a 28% operating profit margin on the Galaxy S4, and Apple gets a 30-35% margin on the iPhone 5S and 5C. Apple and Samsung have a little over $200 in parts and components in the iPhone 5S and the the Galaxy S4, and price their smartphones at about $640, according to TechInsights. Moto X premium smartphone from Google sells for $350 without a contract. Moto G for price sensitive customers has $123 in parts and components and is priced starting at $199. For about $90 in additional circuitry Apple and Samsung are able to command an additional $440 in price level, say experts. Google's Motorola Mobility head, Dennis Woodside, says Apple and Samsung premium smartphone and lower end smartphone prices are too high, without starting a price war Google is lowering prices gradually.

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In the third fiscal quarter ending June 28, 2014, Apple sold 35.2 million iPhones, up 13% from the year ago quarter. Profit reported was $7.75 billion for the quarter, up from $6.9 billion in the prior year quarter. Revenue increased to $37.43 billion from $35.32 billion the prior year quarter. Apple is not experiencing the weakness in smartphone sales that Samsung is seeing. The strong sales comes with increasing sales in China following the distribution deal with China Mobile. iPad sales slowed with sales declining to 13.3 million iPads in the quarter, down 9% from the prior year quarter. While Samsung has difficulty in preventing lower cost competitors such as Xiaomi and Huawei from eroding sales in China Apple sales are increasing. Apple's revenue in China increased by 28% for the quarter. China is a western brand conscious market as seen in sales of U.S. and German made automobiles. Another trend Apple is capitalizing on is the sale of larger screen iPhones. Screens larger than 5 inches make up 20% of iPhones shipped in China, according to IDC, which are estimated to go up to 50% by 2017....

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The iphone 16e 2025 for $599 more battery, more camera and larger screen offers more features at the lower end of the price range. One can see this as a phone that helps tackle the cost of living crisis that could hurt Apple sales from buyers with moderate incomes who are cutting back. It could also target a growing middle class buyer segment in India. The e in 16e could stand for economy buyers who want basics in the Apple and could attract upper income buyers of Xiaomi , Huawei and Samsung. Apple iphones have strengths in: seamless ecosytem navigation interface reliable and secure ios software higher resale value Apple discontinues support for older iphones after about 7 years. iPhone 13's can still be used in 2025 4 years old, a good time to change would be by 2026. iPhone 15 was introduced in 2023 which means a good time for changing it is 2028 using a 5 year change which balances the need to update and  update to have access to newer iphones. ...

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IHS reports show the cost of making the Galaxy S 4 smartphone with 16 gigabytes of flash memory is about $244. This is 15% more than the cost for the Galaxy III and 17% more than Apple iPhone 5 with 16 gigabyte memory. Higher cost is due to better sensors, a better processor, and larger full high-definition display for upgrades. Samsung plans to launch the new phone in April 2013 in 155 countries. Unlike Apple Samsung does its own manufacturing providing it an edge in hardware capabilities.

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Since 2007 Applle has sold 50 million units of the Apple iPhone, making it Apple's largest business. With the New iPhone 4 analysts expect Apple to sell about 37 million phones in the fiscal year to September 2010. This would be a 79% increase over the 20.7 million sets sold in the prior year. And of global sales analysts say about 55% of sales for the iPhone are from outside the US, compared to 25% 2 years ago. There is a lot of excitement among iPhone fans waiting in line at Apple stores in Europe and Japan, long before the stores opened.

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In India 70% of smartphones sold in 2015 cost less than $150. Apple's market share in India is really small at about 2%. Apple iPhone sales were up 56% in the 1st quarter of 2016 over the same quarter in 2015, according to CEO Tim Cook. iPhones cost about $300-$1000 without a data plan in India reducing the size of the market. In May 2016 Apple applied for approval from the Indian government to sell refurbished or certified iPhones at lower cost. In India the best selling iPhone is the older 5S which costs about $300. It makes up 50% of iPhone sales in India for 1st quarter in 2016, according to Counterpoint. Apple has no model at the low end, as the SE model will cost even more at $500. The Indian market is growing at 26% in 2016 over prior year, making it the next largest market after China. Another approach Apple is taking is seeking approval to open its own retail stores and sell online. A waiver has been given by the government for using locally made parts. Apple's high prices and margins remain a significant barrier in opening up the Indian market, when lower priced Korean and Chinese smartphone models offer attractive options to price conscious Indian buyers....

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Joanna Stern of the WSJ uses the original iPhone that came out in 2007 for one day in June 2017 and sees how it felt to use the introductory version. The original one worked on a 2G cellular network. It took about a minute for the president's Twitter feed to fully load in the old phone's Safari browser, it now takes 5 seconds. A lot has changed with the smartphone revolution in ten years. Lunch spot search results, Stern points out, might take longer than the time to eat lunch in the Maps App with that old phone. No emojis, predictive text, no Siri, and no third party apps, no Apple Music or Spotify, all that came later. The 2 megapixel camera took decent shots but not without good light. What is useful in Joanna Stern's little experiment is that it makes one reflect on how quickly people forget, how so much is now taken for granted as smartphones change the way people live their lives and interact with technology on a daily basis. Not mentioned here is how common smartphones have become with the Android versions made in China offering so much more for the budgets of ordinary people. And how it has changed the lives of billions of people in China, India, other parts of Asia and Latin America, bringing them into contact with the outside world. What is also interesting in this sense is that what took a huge effort over many years and many disappointments- the idea of a touchscreen that works- shows what an idea and the courage to persist in the face of innumerable hurdles can accomplish. See the link to how  Steve Jobs accomplished this. Daisuke Wakabayashi talked with Apple engineer Greg Christie in his article-"Apple Engineer on iPhone's Birth," Wall Street Journal, March 26, 2014. Christie had worked on a digital personal assistant at Apple in 1996, one that had tried the first touch screen Apple made. The device failed in the market. In 2004, eight years later the touch screen is the idea Jobs had Christie work on again. Many frustrations and obstacles later the first smartphone was developed by 2007. It took 10 years and undaunted effort which is the Apple story under Jobs. ...

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Apple to ship 25 million iphones made in India to the US for the June quarter 2025, meeting 50% of US demand. This will reduce iphone tariff from 20% for China to 10% for India. Apple will take $900 million in added costs for the tariffs for the June quarter and higher costs for future quarters. Apple made 24.8 billion on $95 billion in sales for the 1st quarter of 2025.  Apple will not get the $20 billion payment it gets from Google for making Google search the default search engine on Safari web browser. This is 25% of Apple profit. A federal judge declared this payment illegal on antitrust grounds. Another federal judge has referred Apple's App policies for criminal contempt investigation. Apple has been late to recognize the dangers of concentrating production in one country. Eight years after the 2016 election won by DJT Apple has not corrected this concentration in one country. Apple has focused on proift alone ignoring the potential for education for it's products such as the iPad. The public perception of Tech companies is that Tech is all about profit alone without regard for the Nation, education, investment in American communities and jobs, and other needs. ...

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How the little known Hong Kong startup KAiOS Technologies with its low cost operating system is bringing low cost access to basic smart phone features, making them affordable for the 3 billion people lacking smartphones because of the cost. Jio phones of Reliance Technologies started this affordability change by working with KAiOS to bring out its $20 Jio phone and building a high speed 4G network in India to provide low cost data to these users. Reliance turned things upside down by bringing to India the cheapest data on wireless phone use of any country in the world. KAiOS is now the third most important operating system for wireless phones after Android and Apple. This is now spreading to Brazil, Indonesia, and Africa. 

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2013 will be a crucial year for Windows mobile software, according to IDC. IDC analysts say developer support is critical and mobile platforms that fall below 50% in support from developers 'very interested' in developing apps for them are likely to see a gradual demise. IDC's quarterly surveys of more than 4800 mobile apps developers shows Windows 8 tablets having such support from 33% of developers and Windows phone 7 software having 21% support. Research in Motion (RIM) has a mere 9% support for Blackberry phones and 8% for the PlayBook tablet. The figures for Apple iPhone are 85% and iPad are 83%, followed by Android phone 76%, Android tablet 66%.

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Global smartphone shipment sales are dropping with sticker shock over new smartphone prices, dropping 7% worldwide, and 15% in China in third quarter 2018, according to Canalys. Apple sales have stagnated in China at 8% market share, and shipments volumes have declined by 11% in 2018. Apple gets 20% of its sales revenue from China. Apple is now in fifth place behind Huawei, Oppo, Vivo, Xiaomi in China. Each of the Chinese brands gained from 2 to 5% increase in market share while Apple with its high pricing has stagnated. Apple had high hopes for the Apple XR priced at $945 and ordered large volume of the phone for sale in China. It now has excess unsold inventory of that phone as Chinese competitors with prices at little over half the Apple price the Huawei Mate 20 are proving to be strong competitors. The fact that the Chinese market has declined by 15% in smartphone shipments hurts Apple, even though trade tensions have not created anti-Apple sentiment.   ...

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Apple App Store sales are estimated at $15 billion for 2014, increasing by 50% from 2013. Apple says it has directly or indirectly created one million jobs in the U.S., with two thirds of this in software development by developers to run programs on iPhone, iPad and iPod. The App Store opened in 2008 after the introduction of the iPhone in 2007. Other jobs created by Apple are the 300,000 working at parts and materials suppliers, or construction workers at Apple facilities. Apple employs directly 66,000 workers in the U.S., with 30,000 of this in retail stores.

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Apple shares are down 25% says this WSJ article and asks the question whether Apple's best days are past. In the fastest growing markets in Asia and Africa, Apple iPhones are beyond the reach of about 95% of the population. The number of Apple iPhones sold in India have dropped 40% in 2018 compared to 2017. Apple's market share in India has fallen from 2% to 1%, according to Canalys research firm. The $1.8 billion in Indian sales is about half of what Apple executives had hoped for when Tim Cook visited India in 2016. Some call it a rout. Tim Cook seldom mentions India now. At the center of this is Apple's reluctance to change its business model of getting the highest margins, making not a range of handsets, but a few models selling at high prices. This is the strategy that Apple has used to revive the company from near bankruptcy in 1997. Competitors including Xiaomi, the Apple for China and India, tweak their phones constantly to address local concerns for battery life, and lower prices to get market penetration. Only 24% of Indians have a smartphone and India is fastest growing market. Friction with the Modi government which cannot be favorable to Apple's plans to push a high  margin product when competitors have similar but better value packages.   In price sensitive markets of Africa and Asia most people buy phones outright and use pay as you go plans, Apple is not popular. Even in China Apple's market share is down from 12.5% in 2015 to 8% in 2017, according to Canalys. Apple is reluctant to make many models offering lower prices and to address concerns such as battery life in India. In India 39 million people will add smartphones in 2018 with 75% costing less than $250, 95% costing less than $500. In Apple's lineup the iPhone 7 costs around $550. Competitors such as Xiaomi, OnePlus, Oppo, and Vivo flooded India with smartphones costing less than $200. Unlike Apple which spurns market research these companies do extensive research work on local situation. OnePlus has focussed on battery life and gained 30% share of the premium segment to Apple's 25%. By making the devices in India these companies avoid having to pay the 20% tariff. Apple has so far not put up a new plant with the restriction that India places of single brand retailers over 51% foreign owned to buy locally 30% of manufacturing materials. The Modi government felt Apple was not focussed enough on bringing high tech jobs to India and helping local manufacturing, a perception not conducive to expansion in India where "Made in India" is the government plan. This means opening Apple stores in India is less likely now.  The turnover of Apple India executives is also increasing with 3 new CEO's 2017- 2019. Apple's strategy of targeting wealthier Indians makes it not even a fringe player in the Indian market down to 1% of the market. Just as it shrinks in the Chinese market where most customers are price sensitive and the economy is slowing.   ...

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Apple appears to have peaked and it marks the end of an era. Americans have more to be concerned about than the latest incremental iPhone design with decline in reading skills among children, dropping mens college enrollments, cost of living crisis, and retiree poverty.  For the most part US prices are kept at last year's level as Apple is facing new competition and restrictions in China, with a new Huawei phone which matches the new iPhone. Apple has increased iPhone revenues by 44%, even though shipments have increased by 15%, with aggressive pricing, making iPhones generate $40 billion, 50% of total revenue. This aggressive pricing phase may now be ending as Huawei plans to increase global shipments by 20% even as the total smartphone market declined by 6% to 1.15 billion shipments. Apple has 55% of the US smartphone market and worldwide at 27%. This may be the peak and the end of an era in which Apple and other Tech companies not paying a fair share of taxes led to the defunding of infrastructure and public services. ...

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Apple faces large hurdles in China with models made locally by Huawei and other Chinese companies that offer similar features at a price about one third less. Chinese buyers are also looking for products that are made locally by Chinese companies. As a result Apple's market share in China has declined from 9% in 2015 to 7% in 2016. The future for Apple does not look bright apart from a core group of Apple fans that look for new product launches every year. Social media comments cited here show the comments about the iPhone 7 that say buyers should not pay $159 for Air Pods, the cordless earbuds. With the economic situation changing buyers are careful to pay so much for the iPhone 7, when it looks so much like the iPhone 6. In India Apple iPhone price are much higher and remain a significant hurdle for price conscious buyers.

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Estimates are for a 9% increase for Apple laptops and iphones Made in China if Apple passes through the price increase following DJT's 54% tariff on Chinese imports. Instead Apple may decide to be patriotic and reduce the huge margins it has charged American customers for three decades now as part of its $500 billion plan to invest in Made in the USA, after waffling and delay for so so long. Even after the first term of DJT in 2016 Apple has waited 8 years to not move some of the production home to avoid an overconcentration in China. This is a sign of its management not having listened to the mood of America preferring huge profit margins to doing the right thing, literally waiting till the last minute.

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Apple shares which made a steep rise of over 50% with the introduction of the iPad in 2011, reaching over $600 by March 2012, fell by about 9% between April 9 and April 16, 2012. Apple faces questions about the extent of new innovations it can bring compared to the pace of innovation under CEO Jobs. How long it can maintain the high profit margins on the iPad and the iPhone before they are gradually eroded. And whether a lot of the growth in future years has already been priced into the price of the stock already, with the steep ascent in price in 2011-2012.