“Verizon on Friday revealed that iPhone demand was actually up in spring despite a full push from Android. The carrier activated 2.3 million iPhone 4s in spring, up from 2.2 million in winter,” Electronista reports. “The company added 2.2 million total cellphone customers, including 1.3 million of the retail subscribers core to the iPhone and 3G iPads; Apple’s support meant Verizon had the best subscriber growth in 2.5 years.”
“Data from the company suggested that, in spite of multiple device launches and high publicity, 4G Android phones hadn’t caught on in a significant way at the network,” Electronista reports. “Verizon sold a total of 1.2 million LTE-capable devices in the spring but had to split that across not just three separate Android phones, the HTC Thunderbolt, LG Revolution, and Samsung Droid Charge, but also include modems and routers. The data supports analyst claims that the iPhone was more popular at most stores as well as talk of high return rates due to poor 4G battery life.”
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Electronista reports, “The figures, combined with AT&T’s 3.6 million activations, show the iPhone relatively steady in the US in a quarter that can often see sales drop. They also come in spite of the iPhone 4 having reached its one-year anniversary and competing against much newer devices.”
Read more in the full article here.
Verizon’s earnings report press release is here.
MacDailyNews Take: As our own SteveJack explained two and a half years ago on December 23, 2009:
Google Android offers the same messy, inconsistent Windows PC “experience,” but without any cost savings, real or perceived… I’d call any Android device the “Poor Man’s iPhone,” but you have to spend just as much, if not more, to partake in an increasingly fragmented and inferior platform. There’s no real reason to choose Android, people settle for Android. “I’d have bought an iPhone if Verizon offered them.” Just look what’s happening in any country where iPhone is offered on multiple carriers. It’s a bloodbath.
Apple offers consistency to developers of both software and hardware. Just look at the vibrant third-party accessories market for iPhone vs. the Zune-like handful of oddball items for Android. If you make a case or a vehicle mount, does it pay to make 44 different Android accessories whose total addressable audience numbers under 1 million each, or to make one or two for what’s [now over 200] million iPhone/iPod touch devices? As Apple’s iPhone expands onto more and more carriers, Android’s only real selling point (“I’m stuck on Verizon or some other carrier that doesn’t offer the iPhone”) evaporates.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Fred Mertz” for the heads up.]
Related articles:
Changewave: Apple iPhone demand outgrows Android phones in 2011 – July 18, 2011
Verizon iPhone and iPad 2 cause Google’s Android to lose developer support to Apple’s iOS – July 14, 2011
Nielsen: Apple iPhone drives U.S. smartphone growth as Android stagnates – June 30, 2011
IDC: Apple becomes Australia’s number one mobile brand as Nokia plummets – June 27, 2011
40% of European smartphone buyers plan to next buy an Apple iPhone – June 24, 2011
Apple iPhone the top-selling smartphone at both Verizon and AT&T – June 22, 2011
Analyst: Android to continue to lose smartphone share – June 20, 2011
Multiple Android tablet peddlers give up, focus on 4- to 5 -inch smartphones – June 17, 2011
Analyst: Apple iPhone 4 still bestseller ‘by far’ at AT&T and Verizon; still outsells Android in U.S. – June 13, 2011
Nielsen finds decline in Android’s U.S. smartphone share – May 31, 2011
NPD: Apple iPhone 4 for Verizon best-selling mobile phone in U.S.; causes Android to lose share for first time since Q209 – April 28, 2011
I’ve played with a lot of Android devices. It’s so messy and fragmented. I felt bad for my buddy who bought a Thunderbolt and waited for months to get an update to stop it’s TB from resetting all the time.
I also played games on Android devices and compared them to iOS games, and it’s just better quality on an iOS device.
I’m not really sure how you update an Android device but I do know it can be a pain since there’s so many phones running Android. You don’t get the same experience, and more often than not they will drop support of the hardware anywhere from 6months to a year.
Software updates on Android are cake, its the OTA OS updates that have been a joke. In most cases you are exactly right, you buy an android phone and then you never get an OTA update because when the next version of Android is released the manufacturer of your phone is 2 versions ahead of your hardware!
One of the big initiatives that Google is pushing is basically getting manufacturers to agree to provide OS updates for a minimum of 18 months after a phone launches.
If that helps against fragmentation of the platform only time will tell.
I’d like to see how Google enforces it. Promises are empty until they are fulfilled.
The fact is that Google sacrificed user experience because they wanted to go for marketshare. OEMs have little incentive to keep the software up to date.
You and me both, I’m not sure how they are going to enforce it.
Yea, good luck with that, Google!
Dude, give it up- we don’t care…
As an Android phone user (iPhone plans are too rich for my blood, unfortunately, so I’m doing Virgin Mobile for $40 per month, unlimited text & data, 1200 minutes voice), I can say that I have no clue how carriers actually execute updates.
I have had my Android phone (LG Optimus V) since this winter (almost six months now). Virgin Mobile has yet to deliver their first OTA system update. The phone came with OS v 2.2 (a.k.a Frozen Yogurt, or FroYo). At the time the phone was released, 2.3 (a.k.a Gingerbread) was already available and shipping on some devices. Since then, even that Gingerbread went through a few dot-releases, but my carrier (and their parent, Sprint) haven’t really bothered customising a ROM for our 2.2 phones.
This is your typical Android experience. It really doesn’t matter how often Google issues OS updates; carriers will continue to operate the same way they did with the dumbphones, updating the OS of their phones once, at most twice during the phone’s expected lifetime.
All I can say about the Android experience is that it is very much like the Windows experience: you simply can’t know what you’re getting with your phone. Everything kind of works, but nothing is consistent or predictable. If you are techno-geek, you’ll have the knowledge (and the will) to overcome any and all issues that appear. If not, you’ll be frustrated, and that clearly shows in customer satisfaction data.
Look it’s very simple really. This dictum should be printed in letter 10′ high in the Googleplex.
NO ONE WANTS TO BUY SHIT.
I remember back when Apple introduced the Verizon iPhone and the jackasses were saying that since no one was lined up for the Verizon iPhone that Apple wasn’t getting any sales. They said that nobody wanted an eight-month old iPhone when consumers could buy the latest and greatest Android smartphones for half the price of an aging iPhone 4. The problem is with these so-called knowledgeable pundits is that they like to speculate too much.
Verizon had said that iPhone 4 sales were doing well if not spectacular, yet the pundits insisted that Verizon was lying and iPhone 4 sales were poor. Obviously, Verizon was telling the truth so the no lines, no sales statement is basically some urban myth.
iPhones sold 2.3 million. Java phones 1.2 million. A 2 to 1 thrashing. Guess what happens with release of iPhone 5? Guess what happens at sprint and tmobile?
2.3 million is nothing to write home about. The so-called massive Android push is a red herring.
Of course it was up, during the winter quarter it was available for only one month and a half.
Alltel was bought by Verizon, not AT&T. It was a shame, they had good customer service until then. The iPod Touch 1 was great, however using it to compare to new Android devices is stupid. So would be comparing the first Androids to a iPhone 4.
For people who don’t mind a daily rectal exam by Google, it doesn’t really matter if that crap gets updated.
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