Re: Apple?s market share slides in China as iPhone shipments decline, analyst Kuo says

Stone-aged Junk wrote:
Analyst Ming-Chi Kuo wrote in a post on Friday that Apple is losing market
share in China due to declining iPhone shipments.
 Despite the expected launch of the new iPhone SE 4, iPhone shipments are
expected to fall 6% year over year for the first half of 2025, he wrote.
 Apple shares slid 2.4% on Friday.
 Apple
is losing market share in China due to declining iPhone shipments, supply
chain analyst Ming-Chi Kuo wrote in a report on Friday. The stock slid
2.4%.
 "Apple has adopted a cautious stance when discussing 2025 iPhone
production plans with key suppliers," Kuo, an analyst at TF Securities,
wrote in the post. He added that despite the expected launch of the new
iPhone SE 4, shipments are expected to decline 6% year over year for the
first half of 2025.
 Kuo expects Apple's market share to continue to slide, as two of the
coming iPhones are so thin that they likely will only support eSIM, which
the Chinese market currently does not promote.
 "These two models could face shipping momentum challenges unless their
design is modified," he wrote.
 Kuo wrote that in December, overall smartphone shipments in China were
flat from a year earlier, but iPhone shipments dropped 10% to 12%.
 There is also "no evidence" that Apple Intelligence, the company's on-
device artificial intelligence offering, is driving hardware upgrades or
services revenue, according to Kuo. He wrote that the feature "has not
boosted iPhone replacement demand," according to a supply chain survey he
conducted, and added that in his view, the feature's appeal "has
significantly declined compared to cloud-based AI services, which have
advanced rapidly in subsequent months."
 Apple's estimated iPhone shipments total about 220 million units for 2024
and between about 220 million and 225 million for this year, Kuo wrote.
That is "below the market consensus of 240 million or more," he wrote.
 Apple did not immediately respond to CNBC's request for comment.
 https://www.cnbc.com/2025/01/10/apples-market-share-slides-in-china-
iphone-shipments-decline-kuo.html