In the last few days, the price of Apple’s stock has dropped below $400 on the Nasdaq stock exchange, placing its value at where it was in 2011 with a drop of almost $300. This is a 45% decrease since the iPhone 5 was introduced in September of 2012. On the other hand, Google has remained relatively stable at more than $700 per share, while more than 1.5 million Android smartphones are activated every day.
The drop can be attributed to several factors relating to the different fields in which Apple works. In the latest study about the music industry by the NDP Group, iTunes sales have dropped by 5%. On the other hand, the associated hardware manufacturers, such as Cirrus Logic who is in charge of creating the audio chips for iOS devices, have confirmed a decline in sales of almost $30 million below its latest estimates.
Google’s situation is more favorable than ever in regards to its most direct competitor. According to Eric Schmidt, an executive chairman at Google, in addition to almost 1.5 million daily device activations every day, there are more than 700,000 apps in Google Play, whose overall quality is hoped to improve following the purge of low-quality content that was carried out earlier this year.
And Android is increasingly supported by companies, just as we have seen with the recent launch of Facebook Home exclusively on Google systems. In the end, and as was expected, Apple’s lack of transparency and limitations on the publication of applications by third parties is taking its toll.
And if all this weren’t enough, high-end smartphone sales, dominated by Apple up until now, has seen a boom in Samsung devices recently, in addition to Google’s first attempt at undergirding its Nexus product line. Ultimately, Apple needs a media push, but we don’t know exactly based on what. Tim Cook should be worried.
