US market share dispute: Apple deliberately let Android?

Computer Store News In the past few days, data from market research firm comScore and market analyst NPD have shown that Android still has a considerable market share in the US smartphone market. comScore's data shows that Android's market share is 51%, while NPD's data shows that Android's market share is as high as 61%. In contrast, Apple's market share is relatively small, and comScore and NPD data are only 30.7 & and 29%, respectively. On the surface, these data have big problems. Because the actual sales data of the three major US carriers is very different from the data provided by comScore and NPD. In the last quarter, the iPhone market share accounted for 78% of all smartphones sold by AT&T. And 51% of the smartphones sold by Verizon are iPhones. Although Sprint only announced the iPhone sales figures and did not announce the total smartphone sales, it is estimated that the iPhone's share is around 60%. Business Insider's Jay Yarow made a mathematical analysis: adding up the sales figures of the three major operators, the iPhone accounted for 63% of the previous quarter, which is equivalent to 59% estimated by Raymond James analyst Tavis McCourt. Close. Assuming that the data reported by Yankee Group is true, then the three major operators account for 80% of the total smartphone market in the United States. It is equivalent to Apple's mobile phone occupying nearly 50% of the entire smartphone market. According to the above calculation, Android can't reach 61% market share anyway. And in addition to the iPhone and Android, there are other brands of smart phones, such as RIM, Microsoft, Nokia, etc., even if the market share of these phones is 0, the remaining 50% are all under the name of Android, can not reach 61% of the market share, not to mention this is impossible. The data provided by ComScore still has some credibility, because they do not calculate the sales volume of mobile phones every quarter. After several years of sales, it is highly probable that Android phones will gradually occupy most of the US market. However, looking back, Android's market share has more than quadrupled in the last quarter, and it is still incredible in the case of the iPhone occupying 63% of the market share of the three major operators. When I questioned it a few days ago, comScore quickly responded: Looking at the sales figures of the three major operators, the iPhone 13% growth rate actually exceeded 11% of Android. However, the growth rate of Android phones in other operators offset this gap. But their explanation is still not convincing. First, if the iPhone's share of the three major operators reaches 63%, the growth rate of the iPhone 13% is still somewhat wrong compared to 11% of Android. Second, if the three major operators do account for 80% of the overall smartphone market, 20% of the market share of other operators will not allow Android to grow four times faster than the iPhone. These data are very confusing. The iPhone’s market share has grown so fast in a short period of time that has exposed some serious questions: How do these market analysts get their data? Take the example of comScore, they conducted an online survey of nationally representative mobile phone users over the age of 13 but did not disclose the number of people who eventually participated in the survey, but it is certain that the number will not be large. Another market analyst, NPD, only surveyed 12,811 people. Which group of data do you prefer to believe? Is it the millions of actual sales data reported by listed companies, or is it only the data from thousands of people? In addition, Ethan Kaplan pointed out: “The market analysis organization such as NPD uses the investigation of incentive mechanism, so the data obtained will naturally be biased. In the past few days, for various reasons, the accuracy of the comScore and NPD small-scale survey data has been questioned, and the actual sales data we have obtained fully confirm this. In addition, a debate in September 2010 concluded that Android was able to win in the US market because the iPhone was only able to use the AT&T network. If, as the survey says, Android still accounts for half to two-thirds of the US market. What is the explanation for the iPhone's market share of more than 60%, as measured by last quarter's data? Moreover, iPhone data is based on actual sales figures. Among the phones sold by Verizon and Sprint, Android was once the best-selling operating system. But that's just because the iPhone was not able to use the Verizon and Sprint networks last year. This year, the iPhone will be able to reach the top with Verizon and Sprint's network. It’s unbelievable that a mobile phone is better than other mobile phones. It seems that Android can only hope that they can have a mobile phone that is more attractive to consumers than the iPhone, but this has not been a reality in the past four years. So what is the reason for us to believe that they can do this year? Or can it be done next year? As long as Apple orders, they can easily win the battle of the US market share. If you only consider the numbers mentioned above. In fact, Apple has won this "Battle".