From "Apple's iPhone growth predicated on its ability to get users to upgrade, says Bernstein's Sacconaghi" which aired Tuesday on CNBC:
Toni Sacconaghi, Bernstein analyst, joins 'TechCheck' to discuss his thoughts on Apple's lost supply, if smartphones are getting longer life cycles and whether Elon Musk's attack on Apple's app store business model has any legs.
My take: Elon Musk makes Toni Sacconaghi sound pretty reasonable.
Musk said he might make his own phone to replace iPhones. That is as laughable as everything else he has said.
As far as Tesla cars go, I wouldn’t own one if it was given to me. FSD, or AutoPilot, is an out-and-out fraud.
“Musk has to be “managed” by the adults…”
Thanks! Perfect metaphor for the hubris-laden powerful who are jacking whole countries around. And for what? More power!
The insinuation that Apple smartphones are “bloated” and thus due for a reduction in sales “much like…PC’s” is such a softball lobbed at a known Apple doubter it’s just laughable in its obviousness. To which Mr. Sacconaghi immediately responds by saying that the last two years of massive iPhone sales is just based on “upgrades” and not on actual growth in installed base. And his evidence? Smartphone growth has stalled overall. Ergo, iPhone growth has stalled as well.
Let it never be said that Mr. Sacconaghi was loathe to use a false analogy in his negative attacks on Apple!
Turning to the Musk attacks on Apple, he – of course – defends Musk, lumping him in with others who suck off the Apple teat and demand “fairness” in the price Apple charges for same. His conclusion: Apple’s charging 30% for the first year is a “fairly high level”, even though the rate is halved to 15% in the following years and he thinks that at a 15% rate “everyone would be happy”.
Again, the epitome of mealy-mouthism.
I’m not sure if he overthinks his poor conclusions or if his analysis is straight-forward weak. For example, his argument that iPhone sales are stagnating and doesn’t reflect share gains because the installed base hasn’t grown doesn’t square with Apple’s representations about the installed base. Notwithstanding demand that was pulled forward in 2020 and 2021, the unit sales reflect share gains insofar as unit sales aren’t down as they were after 2014 when the introduction of the larger form factor iPhone resulted in robust growth from pulled forward demand followed by moderately declining unit sales for the next 12-18 months.
Apple logically can grow iPhone and Mac unit share despite mature TAMs. It isn’t rocket science to recognize that.
Yeah, maybe because Elon made it up for the attention whore that he is – how this guy isn’t put in the same box as PT Barnum is beyond me.
https://jabberwocking (dot) com/surprise-apple-never-planned-to-kick-twitter-out-of-the-app-store/
Basic idea is that Tim Cook is an experienced adult who has had to deal with the Chinese among other world leaders. Musk is a petulant child by comparison.