Nobody’s expecting big things from Apple’s quarterly earnings call this Tuesday, but it is possible that we’ll hear one incredibly significant metric announced at the event: Apple’s sale of its billionth iPhone.
While it is likely that iPhone sales will continue to decline this quarter — with 40 million likely to be reported as the number for the past three months — the billionth sales mark would serve to underline once again just what an enormous success the iPhone has been for Apple.
To put that number into context, when Apple stopped reporting iPod sales in 2014 (more than a decade after they first launched), Apple had sold in the region of 397 million units. The billion units number would look even more impressive next to the total number of PC sales since 1981, which is set to pass 5 billion units this year for every company combined.
Incredibly, half of all Apple’s iPhone sales have taken place in the past two years alone.
Apple’s no stranger to numbers in the billions, of course. Back in November 2014, it sold its 1 billionth iOS device, including iPhones, iPads and the iPod touch. The App Store, meanwhile, saw its 50 billionth download back in 2013, while the 10 billionth iTunes song was downloaded in 2010.
The question I have in all of this, however, is how Apple should celebrate its billionth iPhone sale? Given Apple’s history for rewarding customers who help it break sales thresholds, how great would it be if Apple produced a special one-of-a-kind handset for whoever purchased the billionth iPhone?
In the meantime, make sure you check back in on Cult of Mac tomorrow when we’ll have a special live blog breaking down the earnings call in all its math-heavy detail.
Source: FT
Luke Dormehl is a U.K.-based journalist and author, with a background working in documentary film for Channel 4 and the BBC. He is the author of The Apple Revolution and The Formula: How Algorithms Solve All Our Problems … and Create More, both published by Penguin/Random House. His tech writing has also appeared in Wired, Fast Company, Techmeme and other publications.
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