from the sales-volume-best-indicator-of-quality dept.
Xiaomi has overtaken Apple to become the second-biggest smartphone seller in the world.
For the first time, the Chinese electronics giant took second place in Canalys' quarterly smartphone sales report, with a 17% share of the market.
Samsung remained in the number one spot, accounting for 19% of global smartphone shipments in the second quarter of 2021, the closely-watched report showed. Apple had 14% of the market.
If I read that right:
Samsung - 19 %
Xiaomi - 17%
Apple - 14%
Ben Stanton, research manager at Canalys, said: "All vendors are fighting hard to secure component supply amid global shortages, but Xiaomi already has its sights set on the next prize: displacing Samsung to become the world's largest vendor."
[...] Although Canalys said it was the first time Xiaomi had ranked above Apple on its list, in October, International Data Corporation said that Xiaomi sold nearly 5 million more smartphones than Apple in the third quarter of 2020.
In the end, there can be only one.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 17 2021, @09:46AM (3 children)
19% of smartphones by volume, or by revenue?
The thing about iOS devices, is despite being more restrictive, locked down, and the ultimate in OEM control over the user, the users in question pay more, spend more money, and pay more over to Apple in 30% i-Taxation revenues than any other smartphone segment. Apple has grown fat on the conspicuous over consumption of their compliant herd of iSnobs, every racing their wallets after the next advertised 'trend'.
Android manufacturers on the other hand, count pennies on the dollar. The average app 'attachement' rate on Android probably never surpasses the cost of the phone.
(Score: 2) by helel on Saturday July 17 2021, @05:17PM (1 child)
I don't think the profit difference between a $500+ iPhone and a $500+ Android phone is as great as you think. Both devices have similar production costs and while the 30% App Store tax goes to Google in the case of the Android phone the flip side is that the OEM doesn't need to foot the bill for developing the OS.
If you're only talking about the low end phone market... Well the profit there is probably slimmer but on the other hand Apple simply doesn't compete for that segment at all so there's no comparison to be made. If it didn't make money the Android venders would stick to their premium phones and leave the low end market - they're businesses, not charities.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by fakefuck39 on Saturday July 17 2021, @11:51PM
It's not - in fact, the $500 android phone likely makes less money because it's using off the shelf parts, where fapple designs and customizes theirs by lasesrcutting and things. But we're not talking about your comparison. We're talking about $1200 iphones, and $300 android phones. Those chinesium phone markets are getting numbers by selling millions of cheap phones to the chinese and people in India. Yes, they make a couple of flagships, that a couple of people buy, but you know what the chinese in china buy when they want a flagship? They buy an iphone. Source: spent a month in China. The margin on those $300 phones is five bucks, and the margin on the iphone is $500.
This comparison here is between the low end phone market that you admit apple is not in, and the high end market. This is like saying Kia beat Porche.
You know what the operating system on your microwave and TV remote is? Tron. The most widely used OS. Next up from the author: Tron vs Windows - Microsoft lost the OS wars.
>here's no comparison to be made
and yet here's the article, literally comparing the two.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 17 2021, @10:23PM
So Apple is still #1 in profits, which is how most people keep score. Samsung simply doesn't enjoy Apple's margins either.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 17 2021, @01:22PM (4 children)
they should stop calling it a "smart phone and refer to it as "triple-Ps" that is "portable pay phone". remmember those, on every street corner where you put in coins to make a call?
now, new, with even less ownership, less anonymity and location statistics for network operators to know where to build and expand access for more penny pinching and more share holder value.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 17 2021, @03:11PM
I imagine the AI overlord in control wants the drones out scouring the terrain. The meatbag vehicles that carry them are slow and sit still too much. Need to make 10000 steps target more effective.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 17 2021, @03:25PM (2 children)
Use Wi-Fi calling.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 17 2021, @08:39PM
use atox, i think it's called on the "other" repo -aka- app store.
*ducks
(Score: 2) by fakefuck39 on Sunday July 18 2021, @02:33AM
Wifi calling connects to their voip server and they have your location by IP, more precisely than tower triangulation. Normal calls don't turn on GPS, and you can also keep that off manually. In addition, wifi calling for all providers I am aware off does not support MMS. If you send MMS, it still goes over the data connection to the tower.
Now, I use wifi calling because the signal is better, and somehow the voice quality is Much better.
When I'm overseas, I don't want to roam, so I put my phone in airplane mode and turn on wifi. You'd think "all set" - no. They look up your IP, determine you're connecting to them via the internet from a different country, and add the roaming charges for wifi calls and SMS. Of course I get around that by just using a VPN to the states, makes the calls not connect about 10% of the time due to the increased voip packet latency. Point is, wifi calling gives you less privacy, not more.
What does give me some privacy (which I don't care about), and more importantly a lot more battery life, is flashing a custom android with no trace of google shit on it. No, I can't use a single banking or credit card app, or uber/lyft apps, because there's no google play services. what's been weird the last couple of years is now the phone no longer connects to control chromecast w/o google play - not even in VLC. But I do see my neighbor's roku for some reason. So when the chromecast breaks, it's going to be replaced by something else not purposely designed to fuck the customer.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by shrewdsheep on Saturday July 17 2021, @03:31PM (2 children)
I am wondering whether the factual ban of Huawai has led the Chinese government to just use a different brand for similar purposes. Alternatively, it could really be just market forces shifting sales from Huawei to Xiaomi. Any insights into the Chinese situation apprecieated.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 17 2021, @04:40PM (1 child)
Bid old but still relevant https://www.wired.com/story/behind-the-fall-and-rise-of-china-xiaomi/ [wired.com]
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Sunday July 18 2021, @07:42PM
wired.com seems to go out of its way to make the linked article unreadable.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 17 2021, @04:40PM
They're both Chinese-made shit made by China-loving companies.
(Score: 2) by MIRV888 on Saturday July 17 2021, @05:35PM
I have a Sonim XP3 and it's quite rugged.
Unfortunately its running a stripped down android OS.
I just want a phone.
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Sunday July 18 2021, @08:48PM
I haven't heard a single substantiated complaint about Huawei that isn't equally applicable to Xiaomi and every other Chinese manufacturer.