Marketshare
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Hitachi looks overseas to boost plasma market share
Just in case you had any doubts regarding Hitachi's vision to move up a few spots in the plasma market share ranks, here's a tad more proof. Apparently, the firm has been "lowering procurement costs and increasing the product lineup of bigger TVs," and it's looking to satisfy the growing overseas desire for larger sets in the PDP arena. Currently sitting in the five spot amongst worldwide plasma producers, the company is looking to raise its global market share from 9-percent to 13-percent over the next year by moving some 1.4-million PDP sets. Of course, Hitachi didn't fail to mention just how critical North American sales would remain, but we still maintain that it'll have a tough time fighting off the brutal competition brought on by the increasingly inexpensive LCD.[Via About-Electronics]
Does Microsoft need Japan to succeed?
It's been generally known for a while that Microsoft has had trouble selling game systems in Japan, first with the Xbox and now with even slower sales of the Xbox 360. Analyst Robert Ehrenberg harps on this fact in a repetitive analysis claiming that the Xbox brand in a "bomb" that is dragging down the company.We don't buy it. While it's true that Japan still holds the spiritual center of the industry for many gamers, we don't necessarily agree with Ehrenberg's conclusion that "success in the Japanese market is a key determinant of success in the worldwide market." The Japanese market for home systems has actually been sizably smaller than the European and American markets for at least the past two generations. And while the best-selling systems in Japan tend to also do well elsewhere, success in Japan does not necessarily lead to success in the rest of the world -- see the tepid worldwide reaction to the hot-in-Japan Saturn and Dreamcast as evidence. But Ehrenberg's logic really fails when he claims that a weak Japanese start means that key developers will be unwilling to support the system. Healthy 360 support from the likes of Capcom, Namco, Sega and Sakaguchi's MistWalker studio shows that Japanese companies are considering the 360's global footprint in their worldwide distribution plans. Maybe Japanese game buyers aren't important as long as Japanese companies and the rest of the world are on board.Ehrenberg also asserts that Microsoft should dump the Xbox because it has so far failed to make them money. This neglects the long term value of the branding and cachet that Microsoft is slowly but surely building as a major part of the gaming universe. That kind of branding is invaluable. Just look at Star Wars -- three crappy prequels weren't enough to truly dilute the value of the hot property.
Safari's market share rises to 4.03 percent
In a post cleverly titled The same thing we do every night, Pinky (an Animaniacs/Pinky and the Brain reference), the WebKit blog Surfing Safari links a Switch to a Mac article which notes that Safari's market share has risen once again. Continuing its upward stride from October's 3.53 percent, Market Share now finds Safari at 4.03 percent, though data suggests that Safari's growth, while still on the up and up, has actually slowed in the past month.Since the overall Mac OS market share is still progressing quite nicely - up to 5.39 percent now - this slow in Safari's growth could be attributed to any number of factors, one of which I'm willing to bet could be all those switchers coming over and bringing Firefox with them (note: that's just my theory; I can't find numbers right now to back it up). Still, this is good news for the spread of Apple either way, as it can probably be safe to bet that the company won't be stopping the development of Safari anytime soon.
New Yorker: Wii doesn't have to win to be a winner
We know, The New Yorker isn't the first name in video game writing, but staff writer James Surowiecki is a well respected business writer whose most recent column, titled "In Praise of Third Place," is valuable reading for every fanboy whose metric for success is a simple market share ratio. Much of this stuff is old hat for anyone familiar with Nintendo's core strategy, or who have spent more than a few minutes in a flamewar with Nintendo loyalists, but Surowiecki's mainstream pitch is fascinating, full of references to business icons like GE's Jack Welch and Glengarry Glen Ross' Alec Baldwin character (what was his name again?). In short, the Wii ceded the video game arms race to big spenders like Microsoft and Sony and, lo and behold, it may be better off having done so! What would the big guy from downtown, from Mitch and Murray, say to that? It turns out third place isn't "you're fired!"[Thanks, Andrew]
Apple inches ahead of Dell in UK education market
I've been seeing a lot of people using Macs at the university I work at lately and that made me wonder whether this is a more widespread phenomenon. It seems that it is. According to an article at Macworld, Apple is now ranked second in the UK education market, well behind leader Research Machines but ahead of Dell and HP.And it gets better for Apple. The company's last quarter put it in the No. 1 position in the UK, with nearly 12 percent of the market. MacBooks in particular are hot, though that's not really news if you've walked into a coffee shop in London in the last six months.How are things at your school/college?
Apple's US market share still falling and rising with the tides
Yesterday's prelim 4th quarter report was great news for Apple's health as a manufacturer of personal computers - they shipped over 1.6 million Macs, the most ever in a quarter and 30% more than the previous quarter. Today's news of a rise to 6.1 percent market share in the U.S. from Gartner, however, has the Mac web doing the market share dance all over again, as just a year ago this month it was the NPD Group reporting that Apple's U.S. market share - excluding online sales - had risen to 6.6 percent. The confusion ensues when considering MacNN's conflicting report from Gartner claiming Apple's U.S. share just rose to 6.1 percent. Of course where and how these different groups are getting their numbers is unbeknownst to this blogger, but methinks something might have been lost in translation between all these analysts.Still, while market share numbers might be getting a little fuzzy as of late, we can at least trust Apple's announcement of selling the most.Macs.evar in a quarter, and that's alright with me.
Detailed analysis of Apple's market share
These days it seems like any analyst with an axe to grind or a website to build pageviews with is taking a dig at Apple, making any claims that zing well in a headline, deliberately misinterpreting any data they can to make it look like the Mac is receding into unappreciated obscurity. Fortunately, Switch to a Mac has done their research and laid the smack down, calling out the falsifying data and proving that Apple's market share in the computer market (hooray! Finally talk of 'market share' without 'iPod' in the same sentence!) has been expanding. The article analyzes data from various market share studies, Wall Street announcements (for what those are worth), Apple's own releases and more to see through the fog and find that Apple is really doing quite well. If you need some cold hard numbers to convince family/friends/your boss that a Mac is a good purchase, head over and soak up more statistics than you can probably remember.
On iPod pricing, competition and the value of a full package
I've noticed a couple reports from analyst firm Gartner Research that claim Apple's pricing on the new iPods betrays an increased interest in profit margins at the expense of market share. These reports focus on the iPod nano's pricing of $199/4GB and $249/8GB as being a bit high, given their estimated materials cost of $90 and $130, respectively. Admittedly, similar players from competitors such as Creative do beat out Apple in pricing; the ZEN V 4GB player is only $159.99 - but what rulebook dictates that a higher price on one particular member of a product family (by and far the most popular member) definitively means the company doesn't care about market share?These reports don't seem to mention anything about the nano's big brother (unless MacNN and Playlist used some sneaky cut and pasting techniques), where Apple is competing quite well: they dropped their 30GB iPod price to match that of Creative's 30GB ZEN Vision:M ($249), and the 60GB ZEN Vision:M (if you can find it on their site), is reportedly $399 - a full $50 more expensive for 20GB of less storage.Gartner's claim that competitors like Creative and Microsoft's new Zune could start chomping at the iPod's market share, based solely on the profit margins of one member of the family, also doesn't seem to take into account the value of the full package that Apple's iPod offers, such as seamless, 'it just works' integration with a leading digital media store (maybe Gatner simply forgot that the existence of Apple's margin-thin digital store leans fairly heavily on the popularity of the iPod). While there are plenty of consumers out there to whom a $40 difference between an iPod nano and a ZEN V can (understandably) make or break a purchase, the are still other important factors consumers can evaluate for a DAP purchase. Unfortunately, some of these elements aren't capable of being factored into an analyst's equations, but Apple is clearly still banking on their weight with a consumer's dollar.
Safari's market share up 46% from last year
TUAW has long agreed that Safari support is not optional, and MacDailyNews is reporting that Apple's baby browser is continuing its market share march and has snagged 3.21% - up 46% from its 2.20 share in August of '05. However, MDN also notes that, from analyzing the data from NetApplications, it appears most of Safari's growth happened during 2005's holiday season, from about September to December of '05. In fact, Safari actually peaked this year in April with 3.30%, which could be attributed to anything - dropping Safari for Firefox being the most likely, since a lot of switchers probably use Windows/Firefox-heavy sites that might not play well with Safari - yet.Either way, (as a reminder) this represents a strong upward trend of Safari use, which is also a strong indication of Mac use, since the browser is Mac OS X-only (well, mostly). March on Safari, march on.
Dell CEO jabs at Apple, forgets how to count
Michael Dell, amidst lackluster growth reports and a dismal earnings warning, has fired a couple more potshots across Apple's bow. During a recent Q&A, Dell's CEO cited MTV's new URGE music service as one reason why he is skeptical of the iTMS market dominance over the next ten to twenty years. I guess we'll have to see how well Microsoft irons out their Plays for Sure, er URGE, er Zune project (indecisive, anyone?), and how upset users get when the Zune crashes with a BSOD right in the middle of a wireless purchase, accidentally charging their credit cards for 5 additional albums that weren't even in their shopping cart.Going further, Mr. Dell also bragged about Dell's market share statistics, stating that Apple isn't a threat because they haven't broken into the list of top five market share holders. All debates as to whether Apple is trying to, or even should, dominate the world with their shiny computers aside, Michael is only half right: Apple's market share in the U.S. has actually jumped high enough to rank them 4th in PC manufacturers (again, in the U.S.).How many times do we have to tell you this, Mr. Dell? Insulting Apple won't make them open up OS X for you.[via MacNN]
Gimme a break: iPod marketshare "14%"?
Paul Thurrott, in his constant quest to belittle Apple and its followers, links to an article by a group called "Communities Dominate Brands" regarding iPod and its marketshare in the MP3 Player World. I won't get too deep into it, but the gist of the article can be summed up in a few sentences: "The whole MP3 player market worldwide for the second quarter of 2006 is not 10 million units, from which Apple could claim four out of five units. In reality the MP3 player market is about 56 million units (48 million MP3 playing musicphones, 8 million iPods, and 2 million non-Apple brand stand-alone MP3 players)," they write. "So Apple's quarterly market share is not 77% like it was back in 2004 before musicphones. In this quarter Apple's market share is 14%"While I'm not going to "react to this article as if it were the insane ramblings of a 9/11 conspiracy theorist," as Thurrott predicts, I will ask some very valid questions: How many of those 48 million actually use the MP3 player functionality of their phone aside from ringtones? Maybe 1%? And how many of those 48 million own and use an iPod as their main MP3 player? Do you see anyone walking around listening to their phone instead of their iPod? Nnno.I have friends who own phones that can act as MP3 players, but none of them use it as such. They all use iPods instead -- and I think that trend is pretty global.What say you, ye members of the Mac Elite: is the iPod being marginalized by the insurgence of MP3-playin' cells, or will the one-purpose device live on, putting to shame the limited and tedious functionality of the swiss-army port-o-phones? Is Apple's only salvation the future iPhone?
Apple's market share falls/rises, depending on who you ask
AppleInsider writes about a new Gartner report that states overall Mac market share has decreased in the first quarter of this year compared to the same quarter last year. However these findings conflict with an earlier news article by ZDNet based on earlier research by Gartner which suggested that worldwide Mac market share had actually increased slightly. MacRumors.com puts the numbers together:U.S. Mac Market Share 1Q 2005: 3.8% 1Q 2006 (ZDNet): 3.5% 1Q 2006 (AI): 3.6% Worldwide Mac Market Share 1Q 2005: 2.2% 1Q 2006 (ZDNet): 2.3% 1Q 2006 (AI): 2.0%So depending on which report you believe, Apple could have gained or lost overall marketshare across the world. Both articles state that Apple has lost market share in the U.S. The only thing that's really clear is that Mac sales have obviously been lackluster in the first quarter when compared to the rest of the industry.That's not entirely surprising considering that only Intel Mac that was available throughout the first quarter was the Intel iMac. The MacBook Pro didn't ship until mid-February, the Intel Mac mini wasn't released until late February and the MacBook was released just under three weeks ago. It's remarkable that the Mac market share has managed to stay as high as it is considering that half the Apple line-up hadn't made the transisition to Intel CPUs for much of the quarter. We've got to ask though, where did that 6.6% U.S. Mac marketshare that was reported last year go?
MMO statistics show WoW wins
We've pointed to MMOGChart before, but the site's latest update is worth commenting on. With subscriber numbers for all major MMOs through to May 2006, there's one game that stands head and shoulders above the rest -- no prizes for guessing which.In fact, the pie chart above shows that over half (50.6%) of all MMO subscriptions are for World of Warcraft. The growth of WoW has been phenomenal, and it's great to be part of its popularity. However, we all know that WoW isn't without its problems, and it's going to be hard for a challenger to come along and threaten WoW's dominance.[Via Joystiq]
WoW dominates MMO market share
If you were in doubt about World of Warcraft's popularity amongst MMOs, the updated subscriber numbers over at MMOGChart will set you straight. The pie chart above shows the market share, as of May 2006, of subscription-based MMOs; the huge blue slice taking up 50.6% of the market is none other than Blizzard's behemoth.While a number of smaller games have some slice of the pie, the MMO world is dominated by Lineage, World of Warcraft and Runescape -- the latter has been racking up subscribers recently.
Safari use up 76 percent
That's up 76 percent from last year. And we're still talking about a 3.19% browser market share, according to Net Applications. Of course, as stated on the Surfin' Safari blog, the hope (for Apple) is to see more WebKit-based browsers out there too. You may recall Nokia's S60 web browser is just such a beast. Whether or not a cell phone browser will make a dent in WebKit's market share? I'll let you decide that one. In the end, I can really only hope all this great market share business is going to make some developers out there (you know who you are) work a little harder to make their websites Safari-compatible. List the worst Safari offenders in the comments, and just ignore Google, where everything is beta. Besides, it could be worse: you could be using Opera.
The Real Reason Behind Apple's Boot Camp
I think I've realized the real reason why Apple has released Boot Camp, and why it'll be part of Leopard when it's released. As C.K. suggests, it's a move to be more competitive in the desktop PC market, but it's more than that. Apple's marketshare in some of their traditional strongholds (like Education) has been slipping for some time, and Boot Camp is nothing short of an all-out frontal assault to reverse that trend. Here's how it works in most schools and large organizations:- most universities still have both PC's and Macs. Of course, some have moved entirely to Dells, but the majority still have both.- the computers in schools and large organizations tend to be refreshed every 3-4 years as part of a refresh program. This is hardwired to the IT budget; it's scheduled to happen.- computer labs and classrooms are designated either a Mac classroom or a Windows classroom, by necessity.Imagine a school budget that simply replaces all the computers campus-wide with new Intel Macs that can run anything we throw at them. Need to run Windows? Image the iMac with the WinXP image. Need to run Mac OS X? Image the iMac with the Tiger (or Leopard) image. Need to run either (because it's a dual-purpose classroom)? Install both and teach the lab assistants and instructors how switch between the environments. It might even be scheduled to reboot the classroom between classes so it's transparent to the end-user.Now imagine that you're a sysadmin and you could tell your boss that you could outfit a classroom or a lab with one model computer that could run either your Mac image or your Windows image, or even both of the images? Suddenly your rooms are dual-use rooms. The AutoCAD kids can simple boot the computer to Windows to turn their software and two hours later, the Graphic Design students can boot the computers to Mac OS X to run their design applications!Boot Camp is a bombshell change in the PC desktop marketplace. Suddenly, there will be options available to us sysadmins that we've never had before. This development is going to allow an organization to achieve the holy grail in computer workstation management--complete standardization on one model computer (e.g. the new Intel iMac). I'm so excited about this possibility that my workchair is spinning. Certainly, I'm not alone.
Sony to increase European LCD marketshare by 20%
What's that old saying? If you fail once, try, try again. Sony must have that in mind after failing to sell as many LCDs in Europe as they said they would. So what do they do? They say they are going to increase their market share by a whopping 20% over there. Sony recently shot their worldwide LCD market share past Samsung, LG.Philips and Sharp to claim the number one spot, so this might not be out of the question after all. Hey, more competition for them means a better price for us.
