iPhone shipments in China are significantly down on an annual basis.
The latest data collected by Credit Suisse analyst Matt Cabral suggests that Apple recorded a significant 10.3% year-on-year decline in iPhone shipments throughout China in October. This was followed by an even bigger and worrying 35.4% year-on-year decline in November.
To confirm the news there is a previous report by Rosenblatt analyst Jun Zhang who says that Apple is cutting the production of iPhone 11 Pro and iPhone 11 Pro Max by 25% for the current quarter.
Apple has recorded one of its worst results over the years during the 2018 holiday season in China, so any further declines could be very significant for the company that has been hoping for recent growth.
Credit Suisse warns that monthly data on shipments can be ” volatile “, but the results paint an even more negative picture when compared with the rest of the market which, overall, recorded a slight annual growth of 0.2% .
Another noteworthy factor is the different release cycle adopted by Apple this year. In 2018, the Cupertino giant released iPhone XS and iPhone XS Max in late September, while it released the iPhone XR only at the end of October. This has created a push towards the ” premium ” models that clearly has not been repeated this time because Apple has decided to release all its iPhone 11 models in September.
With a population of around 1.4 billion, China and its smartphone market remain a huge goal, but so far elusive for Apple and international smartphone vendors. The Cupertino giant is behind local competitors such as Huawei, Xiaomi, Vivo and Oppo, which control over 80% of the market .
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