- Apple will replace Samsung as the global smartphone market leader.
- Even if Apple is in the lead, it can't let iPhone development stagnate.
- Over the past decade, innovation in smartphones has fueled some crazy advances in computing.
Global smartphone sales have plummeted, but Apple has so far avoided the worst and delivered surprising results.
Phone sales from Samsung and other smartphone makers are suffering from the economic slowdown, while iPhone is expected to post modest growth. The result is that Apple is on the verge of surpassing Samsung as the world's leading smartphone maker. This may be bad news for iPhone users.
"While competition between smartphone types has undoubtedly contributed to the maturation of each platform, they have taken very different routes to their current feature sets. Apple releases iOS features in a very methodical manner, waiting until the technology and user interface mature for mobile apps Alexis Talarico, a team leader at the company Swenson He, told Lifewire via email: “Unless one platform or the other completely disappears, which is unlikely to happen in the short to medium term, there will continue to be a push-pull relationship between the two ecosystems. "
The pace of smartphone innovation has been rapid over the past 15 years. It’s hard to think of another product category that has grown so quickly. This is partly because multi-touch, full-screen smartphones have become an entirely new category, partly because smartphones have become the way most people in the world use computers and surf the Internet, and partly because of the huge competition that brings for sales. potential.
That said, Apple and Samsung have been pulling out all the stops over the past decade, and the result is a crazy array of features packed into phones. Cell phone users have enjoyed faster and more impressive cameras in their pockets, wireless headphones that seemed like science fiction just a few years ago, incredible high dynamic range screens that can stay on all day long, and more.
For Apple users, the impact is even more significant. The chip in iPhone is so powerful that it surpasses even the chips available in laptops and desktop computers while bringing all the benefits of mobile computing, such as incredibly low power consumption and the ability to run fast and cool without a fan. ability. It's no exaggeration to say that without iPhone, M-series MacBooks wouldn't have all-day battery life and workstation-class performance.
If the iPhone becomes the market leader and dominates global smartphone sales, will Apple let down its guard?
For one thing, Apple has recently let its entire product line shrink. Before the M1 MacBook came along, the entire Mac laptop line had been in decline, and even getting worse. From the constant removal of useful ports to the debacle of the butterfly keyboard to the way so-called "pro" computers get hot and noisy whenever you do anything more strenuous than checking email, Macs look like Apple has forgotten Got this.
That all changed with the switch to Apple Silicon and the rebirth of the MacBook Pro with an SD card slot and HDMI port, but it shows that even modern Apple can get lazy or negligent.
The iPhone, on the other hand, is Apple's cash cow, and even if it's ahead of Samsung, there's no reason to slow down.
Communications expert Ray Fernandez told Lifewire: "Samsung and Apple have very different strategies and are both strong companies in the market. If Apple surpasses them now, it doesn't mean Samsung will stand still, forever. Tumble and they’ll fight back” email. "Samsung's business strategy is to release a large number of mobile phone models every year, and Apple is far from achieving this goal. Apple focuses on carefully selected high-quality models and pursues quality over quantity."
Of course, it's not just Samsung.
"Another important thing to consider is that Samsung is not Apple's only competitor. Xiaomi, Oppo, Vivo, Huawei, Motorola and other brands are all committed to competing globally. Although individually, none of these brands can demonstrate and Show the ability to beat Apple or Samsung, they are dangerous for companies from Cupertino," Fernandez said.
But becoming the global smartphone leader could create another problem for Apple: increased government scrutiny. It's one thing to act fast and loose with monopolistic behavior when you're not the market leader, but it's quite another when you're clearly selling more phones than anyone else.
