Apple, Huawei and Samsung released their financial results for the first half of 2019 today, giving us an idea of where the world of tech is headed.
i(Phone) Don’t Love You Anymore
Apple reported a revenue of $53.8 billion, a one percent increase from last year. What’s interesting to note here is that iPhones — which have traditionally been the company’s best selling product — accounted for $25.99 billion, compared to $29.47 billion last year.
This is actually the first time iPhones have made up less than half of Apple’s revenue since 2012, which might suggest a few things: (1) people aren’t changing their smartphones as often as they used to, (2) iPhones are losing their clout in an increasingly competitive smartphone arena, or (3) both.
Thankfully, iPhones aren’t the only thing in Apple’s catalogue, and products like the Apple Watch, AirPods, Macs and iPads are still big points of interest among consumers. Expect them to play a bigger role in the company’s earnings from here on out.
“This was our biggest June quarter ever,” Apple CEO Tim Cook said in a statement today. “The balance of calendar 2019 will be an exciting period, with major launches on all our platforms, new services and several new products.”
Ban? What Ban?
If iPhones aren’t selling, where exactly are smartphone sales going to? The most likely suspect is Huawei, who — despite being hit with a crippling trade ban back in May — reported a revenue of CNY401.3 billion (S$79.8 billions) , a 23.2% increase from last year.
While the Chinese tech giant’s Carrier and Enterprise businesses showed steady growth, the main source of revenue came from their Consumer arm, which accounted for CNY220.8 billion (S$49.3 billion). Huawei’s smartphone shipments (including their Honour sub-brand) reached 118 million units, up 24 percent from last year.
“We will stay the course. We are fully confident in what the future holds, and we will continue investing as planned – including a total of CNY120 billion in R&D this year.” Huawei Chairman Liang Hua said in a statement.
“We’ll get through these challenges, and we’re confident that Huawei will enter a new stage of growth after the worst of this is behind us.”
Sam-Sunk…?
One company’s growth is another company’s loss, and that burden unfortunately falls on Samsung this year. The Korean tech giant reported a net profit of 5.18 trillion won (S$6 billion), a 53 percent decrease from last year.
There are a few factors contributing to this, the biggest of which being an ongoing trade dispute between South Korea and Japan that has seen Tokyo imposing restrictions on the export of key materials used in Samsung’s displays and chips.
On the smartphone side of things, the company said in a statement that it achieved “stronger shipments on new mass-market models, but was overall weighed down by slower sales of flagship models and increased marketing expenses.” We’re guessing that the Galaxy Fold fiasco did not help with that.
It’s been an interesting year for tech so far, and with products like foldable phones and new services like Apple Arcade on the horizon, there’s still a lot more to look forward to in 2019.
Header Image Credit: Apple,Huawei
