After many critics dismissed, what they deemed minor upgrades to the newly launched iphone 5, Apple's announcement earlier today that it sold over two million iPhone 5's during pre-orders in the first 24 hours of availability shows this giant shows no sign of slowing down. The iPhone 5 will be available in 100 countries, including China, by the end of the year.
Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster has published a report estimating that Apple should have sales of 6-10 million units for the opening weekend:
Given the 2 million pre-orders, we remain confident that Apple can deliver 8 million (range of 6-10 million) iPhones in the launch weekend. The reason we are confident in the 8 million is two-fold. First, initial 24 hour pre-orders for the iPhone 5 were up 100% y/y from the iPhone 4S. Last year, pre-orders accounted for 25% of total weekend launch unit sales. Assuming the same initial pre-order/retail distribution, the pre-order total would suggest 8 million launch units.
“iPhone 5 pre-orders have shattered the previous record held by iPhone 4S and the customer response to iPhone 5 has been phenomenal,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing. “iPhone 5 is the best iPhone yet, the most beautiful product we’ve ever made, and we hope customers love it as much as we do.”
Shipping times for the new iPhone 5 has slipped to 2-3 weeks wait. With all three U.S. carriers, Verizon, AT&T and Sprint reporting high demand, especially with price drops on the newly replaced iPhone 4S, now selling for $99 (16GB) & free for the 8GB with a two year contract.
