Apple sales enjoy a boost from iPhone 8
LOS ANGELES — This year, Apple’s new iPhone sales bump had to wait a quarter.
Apple’s fourth fiscal quarter, the one that ends just before holiday shopping begins, historically has one great week of sales to report — the new iPhone released in late September.
But this year, Apple shifted its sales strategy to introduce two new slightly improved models, the 8 and 8 Plus, and a third phone, the X. iPhone 8s went on sale Sept. 22, but Apple held back the big guns for Nov. 3, when the state-of-the art, $999 X hits store shelves.
Apple still was able to blast through forecasts, reporting revenue of $52.6 billion, up 12% from the year-ago quarter, and easily beating analyst expectations of $50.7 billion for the September-ending quarter collected by S&P Global Market Intelligence.
Net income rose 19% to $10.7 billion and earnings per share climbed to $2.07, topping forecasts for $1.87.
It sold 46.6 million iPhones, in line with forecasts of 46 million and up from 45.5 million a year ago.
Of the iPhone figures cited, “we believe less than 10% of that is the 8,” says Daniel Ives, an analyst with GBH Tech Research. The rest would be other iPhones like the 6S, 7 and 7 Plus, as well as the entry-level SE edition.
Apple didn’t break out sales of the various iPhones, and declined the invitation to do so, despite many requests from analysts on a conference call. CEO Tim Cook did say that once the 8 and 8 Plus went on sale, they “became our two most popular iPhone models and have been ever since.”
The iPhone 8 and 8 Plus phones were well received by critics but were so similar to the previous 7 and 7 Plus models that carriers reported less interest in the new phones than years past.
The new X phone, which goes on sale Friday, got rave reviews this week, sold out of initial orders quickly and has a backlog of 5-6 weeks for delivery.
“The jury is still out whether the iPhone 8 was a mistake,” says Ives. “We won’t know for several quarters. It was soft out of gate, but we’ll have to see how it does in the next quarters.” Apple shares rallied 3% after hours. Now all eyes are on the next quarterly result, which will have two months of sales of the X, and 3 months of the 8 and 8 Plus.