“Apple surprised the investor community in October with record breaking sales of the Macintosh computer line,” J. M. Manness writes for Seeking Alpha. “At 5.52 million units, and $6.6 billion in revenue, what had been a declining business, suddenly shot forward.”
“In spite of two years of decline in PC sales, the Mac line has outperformed the PC market in general for more than eight years, slowly picking up market share,” Manness writes. “It now ranks number three in sales in the U.S. and globally is just slightly behind fifth place Asus (5.8 million), according to Gartner.”
“The [all-time record] 5.52 million Macs sold last quarter was a 21% increase in the number of units (18% revenue growth) compared to the same quarter a year ago. I see no reason why this should not continue. It is in line with growth the previous year (19%),” Manness writes. “So, in the year ago FQ1 Apple sold 4.837 million Macs (revenue $6.395 billion). If we add 21% growth in units then we have 5.85 million units… I forecast about 5.9 million Macs will be sold this quarter (FQ1-2015) earning revenue of $7.6 billion. I believe this is a slightly conservative estimate.”
“With Microsoft dropping support for Windows XP, many businesses will need to buy replacement hardware. Inevitably, some will take the opportunity to switch to Macs,” Manness writes. “Looking forward, there is also the partnership with IBM. While focused on mobile apps and support, this will undoubtedly also be a huge boon for the Mac… The value of this should not be underestimated.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: 5.52 million Macs sold in 91 days. Manness predicts 5.9 million Macs this Christmas quarter (we’re expecting 6 Plus million).
As we wrote on January 10, 2005, after Apple had just reported 836,000 Macs sold in Q405:
As we have always said, even as many short-sightedly waved (and continue to wave) the white flag, the war is not over. And, yes, we shall prevail…
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “OldFatGuy” for the heads up.]
Related articles:
Walter Mossberg: Apple Mac’s amazing comeback – November 19, 2014
Apple Macintosh hits market share milestone in U.S. – November 7, 2014
Apple’s Mac surge: 2015 could be even bigger – October 22, 2014
NYT: Macs, iPhones and iPads seamlessly connect in Apple’s silky smooth ecosystem – October 22, 2014
The Mac is back: Why Apple just set an all-time Mac sales record – October 22, 2014
Apple’s Mac a surprise hit in Q414 results; market share now highest since 1995 – October 21, 2014
NPD: Apple Mac grabs 26.8% U.S. consumer market share – September 24, 2014
Apple Macintosh continues to dominate in personal computer customer satisfaction – September 23, 2014
Milestone: Apple computers outsold Windows PCs in Q4 2013 – February 12, 2014
Apple Macintosh continues to dominate in personal computer customer satisfaction – September 17, 2013
Indeed, the PC industry is dead. The other one.
If anything is dead, it is your blind Apple cheerleader comments.
Good grief.
afraid, just a realist!
If anything is dead, it is my trust in Microsoft to do anything really well in making a rock solid OS.
Call me in the morning after your enima and we’ll see what your asshole looks
And don’t forget to register your sorry annaymous coward raisns too
Make that 6 million and two.
I remember a conference call after a quarterly report where an Apple executive admitted that Apple could never expect to sell a million PowerMacs in a quarter. The numbers don’t tell me how many Mac Pros were sold this quarter, but I am sure that 1 million is no longer an impossibility. I remember it so clearly because I thought at the time that one day this will be true and I will be waiting for that day.
Apple has even outdone what it could not imagine itself doing.
I’m thoroughly convinced that Apple is going to have the MOTHER-OF-ALL MONSTER quarters this time around.
That’s the easiest of easy calls. 🙂
The question is how much? And how gobsmacked will The Whiztards of Wall St. be?
Some will be eating their hats; some will be wiping egg from their faces; and some will running for the loo.
And some will be snorting another line of coke in preparation for writing another year’s worth of worthless hyperbole. 😛
And some, like you, will be enjoying the awesome refinements of Windows 8.
Idiot.
One thing that holds Mac sales ‘down’ is their reliability.
I have bought around 25 Macs in the past 8 years.
Only 3 were new (all for me) while the rest were ‘used’ purchases for kids, friends, grandkids or as collectables (plus one incredible AppleCare replacement).
Almost ALL are still going….including three 1.25 GHz eMacs, 2 iMac G4s, 2 iMac G5s, a few CoreDuos and several 2007 Core2Duos.
I even have three G3 iMacs in storage that worked when I banished them.
If working computers were included in the total numbers, I think Apple would be a few points higher for it.
It’s not just “reliability” of the hardware. It’s long-term usability of hardware design, OS, and software, which are what makes a Mac “useful” for a really long time. I have an old PowerBook that sits near the TV, because it’s useful there. I have a Power Mac G5; in addition to being a “data dump” for my network, I can still rent movies from the iTunes Store and watch YouTube videos using TenFourFox, connected to my HDTV. It remains very useful.
My last two Macs were purchased as Apple-certified refurbs, at substantial discounts, more than two years after their respective model release dates, because I felt confident they would STILL be useful for a long time. They have not disappointed…
We used a G3 as a server along with FileMaker Pro Server 3.0 and FMP 4.0 from roughly 1998 thru 2009 and it was still running
I remember when there were a total of 4m Macs in the world; things are looking up a bit 😉
I can remember when there weren’t any.
Haha, indeed ;-). The first time ever I saw a computer was when I got my first job in 1984 as a physics amanuensis at a teacher training institute. There was a hodge-podge of computers with just one Apple-II and one BBC-B. TRS-80 clones we had several labs of. A few years later it would all be wiped out by DOS PC’s, not for educational reasons, but because of a deal struck by three dutch PC clone builders and the education ministry covering the entire country. It took many years before anything educational started happening with the PC’s and by then getting to grips with the problems of DOS PC’s had turned into “educational”.
Got me MacBook Pro last month. But am looking forward to ipad though in near future.
We’re not keeping track of market share, right? Except when the numbers are in our favor. Can’t have it both ways.
Yes we can. Market share is not the primary target but it’s nice when it picks up and even more people are brought the light…
Please stop to think about it for a second. Context is everything. We are not pretending that an increase in market share of an inferior phone with an inferior OS means the inferior product is somehow “wining the race” against true smart phones. This is basically how most of the Samsung Android market share numbers are presented.
The Mac market share context is different. The Mac is slowly increasing market share, while being a premium product sold at premium prices, at a time the overall market for PCs is shrinking fairly dramatically …and for quite some time. This says something, don’t you think ?
There is no need to begrudge the Apple Mac its growth in market share, they way many of us here begrudge inane and misleading market share growth comments about Samsung and Android.
Why not put your critical powers to better use?
i have been complaining about lack of mac ads for years….
(Thunderbolt, Mac manufacturing in USA for award winning Mac Pro, cheaper iMacs cheaper Mac Minis, great MacBooks, Retina iMacs, Yosemite best consumer OS , etc … NO MAC ADS)
then….
recently astonishingly I saw a Mac ad on TV!
Apple marketing is waking up!
GO! GO!…. 🙂
It is likely that apple hadn’t been advertising the Mac because they are managing their growth and have been revamping the entire product line for Yosemite, Bluetoith LE, 802.11ac and Retina displays. As the Sharp factory still is ramping up production of larger Retina screens. Once that’s under control, watch for Zmac ads to reappear.
Got the 2012 Mac minii. Give me a user expandable Mini with an i7, and i”ll upgrade.
Otherwise, it’s off to the store to buy Windows.