“In four months, Apple will reveal new iPhones,” Buster Hein writes for Cult of Mac. “It’s as certain as the changing of summer to fall: Leaves die, kids go back to school, and the world gets a shiny new iPhone, delivered with love from Cupertino. But when Tim Cook takes the wraps off this year’s version, what’s to become of the poor, sad, unloved iPhone 5c, still begging the world to caress its unapologetically plastic frame? Will there be a sequel?
“The iPhone 5c has been one of the most perplexing Apple products since the quick life and death of the iPod Hi-Fi stereo system. At $549 off-contract, the iPhone 5c is by no means inexpensive, while its guts are comprised of remnants of 2012’s top iPhone, the iPhone 5. It’s neither the cheap, mass-market phone analysts were craving to counter Android’s growing dominance of the mobile market, nor is it a compelling enough mid-tier device to make you wish you hadn’t just jumped up to the iPhone 5s,” Hein writes. “Instead of giving Apple a foothold in rapidly expanding Asian markets, the 5c is perceived as a candy-colored flop — a rare miss for Cupertino.”
“But is the iPhone 5c really a dud? Tim Cook admitted iPhone 5c demand turned out to be different than Apple thought, but also revealed both the 5s and 5c outsold Apple’s previous products, as well as every Windows, Blackberry and Android flagship its first sales quarter,” Hein writes. “‘One thing’s for sure,” says top Apple analyst Horace Dediu, “Apple does not care about sales volumes alone… ‘The question shouldn’t be about the 5C but about the slot it occupied,’ Dediu told Cult of Mac. ‘Does it remain defined as it currently is — a ‘mid’ slot with ‘low-end’ still occupied by older models? Or do the low and mid get fresh SKUs?'”
Much more in the full article here.
Related article:
Why would anyone buy an iPhone 5c instead of an iPhone 5s? – September 10, 2013