“I had been concerned for several quarters that the battery replacement program would lead to a dent in iPhone sales in 2018. It turns out that I was right, with a recent report stating that as many as 11 million batteries were replaced, roughly 10 times the normal amount,” Bill Maurer writes for Seeking Alpha. “That’s several billion in potential iPhone upgrade revenues pushed out of 2018 and into the future.”
“Perhaps the biggest question I have is what will Apple try to feature most in its iPhone lineup this year?” Maurer writes. “Outside of a triple lens camera for the highest priced model expected this year, there doesn’t seem like a lot of major upgrades Apple can offer in 2019 for its iPhone lineup outside of the usual better processor and perhaps incremental camera upgrades.”
“That gets me to the one area where Apple could make its biggest leap this year, and that is price,” Maurer writes. “Consumers are waiting longer to upgrade since smartphones are so good that many can last. With replacement cycles having gone from two to three years basically, perhaps Apple should rethink the iPhone.”
“What if Apple, with the help of its carrier partners, offered a three-year payment plan instead of the current two-year plan? Yes, I understand that there’s the potential for some lost sales from those who upgrade every two years, but if most consumers aren’t upgrading for three years or more, is there really a major difference?” Maurer writes. “With the high price of the iPhone being a stumbling block for consumers, shouldn’t Apple try to rethink how consumers look at things?”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: An interesting idea, and likely one Apple has already considered. CEO Cook has promised to be aggressive about the things Apple can control and price is one of those things.
Apple and iPhone carriers odd not have to offer a three-year payment plan instead of the current two-year plan, they should offer three-year payment plans in addition to two-year plans. Heck, offer a one-year plan, too. One size doesn’t fit all. Offer as many options as possible so that at least one offer will appeal to everyone!
What do you think about offering iPhones on three-year payment plans?
If Apple forces us to replace our phones every 2 or 3 years due to battery or other issues then I will buy something else.
Well, Howard, Android would be perfect for you, given that you’re a fscking moron.
Spot on 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Buy garbage 3 times a year
Apple doesn’t force users to upgrade. iPhones get major OS updates for 5-6 years after introduction. No other smartphone gets such ongoing support. iPhone battery and screen replacements have always been easy and cheap. I know people who are still rocking an iPhone 4 more than eight years after it was introduced.
Please troll elsewhere.
Sorry, my 4S is unusable. Thanks to AppleCare Plus, my 6Plus battery never needed replacement as the entire phone was replaced when it had issues, but I outgrew it and had to get a X. I don’t splurge on many things, but technology is a necessity, not a luxury.
Apple really as a company tries to do the right thing by customers. The battery discount was nice but maybe too much. They were trying to fight public perception. Which people like Howard apparently still have. And as you can see. The discount didn’t really help people understand the problem. That batteries. All batteries won’t hold a charge once they have been charged so many times.
They should have offered their website that explained all that stuff. Then they should have discounted the price by 20 bucks or something. That would have been a happy medium. Generous. In the customers interests. Even the uninformed ones. But it wouldn’t have been counter to Apples. Like this really really great deal they offered. I’m not sure it bought them enough good will to pay for the new iPhone sale shortfalls.
I totally concur, the class action suit was bogus and Tim Cook did not want the nightmare of whiners claiming planned obsolescence during a prolonged court battle with ambulance chasers.
It is unfortunate Apple was not forthcoming with the ‘feature’ of slowing down the phone to maintain the length of time between charges the user became accustomed to. The popularity of the battery replacement may have actually shown Apple that many users enjoy their older devices over the new offerings for one reason or another including desired features (or lack thereof) and the steep price to upgrade. I’m sure consumers are now more aware of how their devices could remain useful with just a battery replacement and future battery replacement sales will be higher than the past average.
Let’s not forget Apple caused the public perception
Why was this too much? Certainly not to customers- only greedy stockholders and clueless pundits. People are often blind to the big picture.
If Apple really did the right thing by customers …
… then I’d be typing this on my 2016 Mac Pro.
Here’s a novel idea: lower prices.
Here’s a novel idea: save more money and buy quality products rather than settling for cheap sh!t.
Don’t be a loser, gatorz.
Totally agree! For modest improvements the prices are too high. Consider the flagship phone cost $499 in 2007, and now way more than doubled? Inflation did not grow that high, only Cook greed…
Android users are fscking maroons. If you know an Android User, be careful, like with freedom of speech, they have spoke and we know they don’t care about privacy, don’t care about quality of apps, don’t care about hardware and software quality, we know they settle for second best and we know they are losers.
Simple.
Oh Man you couldn’t say it any better !!!!
Got in to it with a few on a forum with my new S Max , they’re still bragging about Fscking headphone jacks and SD card storage .
I said what year are you living in ??????
Talk to a wall man !!!!
SD cards are an invitation to end up lost, or end up being too slow because cheapskates buy slow models.
Headphone jacks – dust receptacles and just not needed in a world of much more convenient Bluetooth
So yes, these maroons begging for losable storage and loser jacks should just jack off onto their hopefully liquid proof androids.
Don’t neglect the 4″ size.. not everyone wants a large phone in their pocket. I hope they realize that.
Just buy an SE, tons of refurb models around at cheapest ever pricing. Stop whining, losers!
2019 will be an incremental iPhone update year with new cameras and maybe faster WiFi. 2020 will be the big update year with the introduction of 5G. USB-C may get introduced in 2019, as it’s already in the iPads, if Apple feels the need to offer a significant reason to update in 2019, but they will probably wait until 2020.
Apple is its own enemi. Creating products that last more than the average tech is a rarety nowaday.
They will think of something.