“A fresh report from Ming-Chi Kuo gives KGI’s take on the recent stories of poor market reception for HomePod,” Benjamin Mayo reports for 9to5Mac. “The report suggests that Apple could sell 2-2.5 million HomePods across all of 2018, with a million of those from first month pent-up demand.”
“He says the high price has cut off a lot of the potential market (in the face of tough, cheaper, competition) and that Apple is ‘mulling’ a lower-cost model,” Mayo reports. “Earlier this week, Bloomberg claimed that some Apple Stores were selling only ten HomePods a day.”
“A 2.5 million estimate for HomePod yearly sales from KGI works out to about 6,800 units per day, obviously split between retail and online sales,” Mayo reports. “KGI is non-committal about the lower-cost HomePod idea. This suggests that the analyst has seen evidence of lower-cost prototypes but not enough to indicate that Apple has signed off production on a cheaper model.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Again, you simply cannot miss the Christmas shopping season and not pay a steep price. For Apple, the price is a lost year and millions of potential customers lost to other ecosystems – perhaps temporarily, perhaps permanently; regardless they will be much harder to land had Apple had product on the shelves for Christmas.
A finally finished HomePod (with flawless multi-room audio and stereo pairing out of the box) and, potentially others in the HomePod family, are products for Christmas 2018 and beyond.
SEE ALSO:
China Times echoes poor HomePod sales, says Apple has reduced orders to 200,000 per month – April 12, 2018
Apple HomePod disappoints with weak sales after tardy debut that missed Christmas shopping season – April 12, 2018
Apple tumbles 24 spots – from 5th to 29th – in Harris Reputation Poll – March 13, 2018
Apple shakes up software development strategy to focus on quality – February 12, 2018
Apple on Mac flaw: ‘We apologize to all Mac users. Our customers deserve better. We are auditing our development processes.’ – November 29, 2017
Tim Cook’s sloppy, unfocused Apple rushes to fix a major Mac security bug – November 29, 2017
What to do about Apple’s shameful Mac security flaw in macOS High Sierra – November 29, 2017
Under ‘operations genius’ Tim Cook, product delays and other problems are no longer unusual for Apple – November 20, 2017
Apple’s desperate Mac Pro damage control message hints at a confused, divided company – April 6, 2017
On the future of Apple’s Macintosh – February 6, 2017
Apple is misplaying the hand Steve Jobs left them – November 30, 2016
Open letter to Tim Cook: Apple needs to do better – January 5, 2015
