This wouldn't happen to have been that time period when they weren't selling iMacs for a few weeks?

Well, I hope it was. I like clear cause-effect relationships.

Things are rarely so simple, however...

EDIT : Go me! Posting after reading the short article...just finished reading the whole article...ok, yeah, that WAS part of it.

Also, I noticed THIS:

What makes the numbers most interesting is the fact that despite a 34% increase in Mac unit sales Q3 to Q2 at Apple's retail stores, the company's market share continued to decline in both the worldwide and U.S. figures.

So this just means EVERYONE'S selling lots more computers, right? I wonder if this represents the trend of everyone having 3 or 4 computers at home instead of just 1.

Televisions were the same way...going from one to many per household. I think people are finally starting to buy several computers for their homes now too.

It's unfortunate that Apple's market share is still declining. I think their product line is the strongest it's been in years. I hope they can turn it around and start to gain some ground with the momentum that they have going.

It would be interesting if the numbers could be displayed separately between consumer, business and school sales.

If Apple reduces their computer price, more people will jump for a mac; otherwise, we will only see market share declines.

with the same price of a powermac G5, with a 20 inches monitor, you can buy 2 or even 3 dell computers with monitors.

Quote

Small White Car wrote:
So this just means EVERYONE'S selling lots more computers, right? I wonder if this represents the trend of everyone having 3 or 4 computers at home instead of just 1.

It does seem likely that this is what is happening. But that represents an opportunity for Apple: If you're buying a second or third computer, why not make it a Mac? It's a painless way for an individual or family to introduce a Mac to the household without completely abandoning what they've grown accustomed to.

And I'd be willing to be that those who do give the Mac a try in this way will continue to buy Macs in the future, in time phasing Windows out of their house.

Quote

jimothy wrote:

But that represents an opportunity for Apple: If you're buying a second or third computer, why not make it a Mac?

I have ALWAYS believed that the biggest market for iMacs is children. You know, families have a PC or two and want to get something for the kids to play on...maybe do some homework...hey, why NOT an iMac, they say?

And then of course, they get used to it.

I DO see a day when the Mac share is 25%, but only because everyone in America will have 3 PCs and 1 Mac in the house.

As computers get better people end up keeping them longer because they don't have any reason to upgrade. They wait until the thing dies or won't support the newest OS or something.

Pretty soon people will be keeping their computers for 10 years...yeah, buying a new one every 3 years, but keeping the old ones around too...THAT's when my two ideas combine...when people are buying iMacs for their kids and keeping old computers for 10 years...then you'll see a nice percentage of Macs in EVERYONE's home...not just some people who only use Macs.

Low quality combined with high prices continue to kill Mac sales. It's time for Bryan Chaffin to finally pay up on The Bet with John Kheit that Mac market share would rise during the last year.

Why won't Bryan admit he was wrong and pay up? You know if Bryan had been right he'd be crowing and demanding for John to pay up. If Bryan continues to stonewall on The Bet, he'll be the poster child for the Mac zealot fanboys.

http://www.macobserver.com/columns/devilsadvocate/2003/20030620.shtml

Seem that Apple is taking share from their dealers.

Also, to look at halo effect, we should look at sales of iBook/powerbook as compared with previous year and not powermac and x-serve.

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Mace wrote:

Also, to look at halo effect, we should look at sales of iBook/powerbook as compared with previous year and not powermac and x-serve.

LOL

X-Serve - From the makers of the iPod Mini

"Oh dude, I gotta get me one of those X-Serves now!"

Macs last longer too. I'm going on almost four years with mine. My step dad just bought his 3rd emachine in 3.5 years because it crapped out. I guess that's a way for apple to do it...just making crappy hardware that fails every year so people will buy a new one! Brilliant!!

RealityCheck is half right (gasp!), in that relatively high prices do contribute to Mac's declining market share. He's wrong (you already knew he was!) when he says it's "killing" Mac sales; as the latest numbers show, Mac sales have increased. I'd call that alive and kicking, wouldn't you? It's just the market as a whole is increasing at a faster clip. (He's also wrong when he blames Apple quality for the decline.)

And "Guest" is also right that Apple could increase market share by reducing the price of their computers. But Apple has stated, and demonstrated, that this is not their goal: They'll leave the profit eroding market share wars to Dell, HP, and company, while they'll content themselves and shareholders with juicy profits, thank you very much.

Apple clearly needs to keep increasing Mac sales, and driving down costs to make Macs more affordable, to one day increase market share. But they will do so slowly. Slashing prices to grab market share will leave them with little cash to fund the R&D that makes the companies so great, and would eventually ruin and bankrupt the company.

Once the Mac's market share reaches a critical mass--it may be 5%, it may be 10%--look out, as the share will only continue to rise. Economies of scale will kick in--for Apple, suppliers (especially, IBM), and third party vendors--so prices will continue to come down and software availability continue to climb, enabling further market share gains. It'll also remove a psychological barrier: the "Nobody uses a Mac!" perception.

A lot of pieces need to fall into place, but I see tremendous opportunity for Apple over the next several years. And remember, even moving to 4% or 5% market share represents a tremendous jump in unit volume and revenue for Apple.

Question:

Do we know HOW these numbers are obtained? Polls? Surveys? Or are they just based on sales?

I ask because I usually buy my Macs used...something that's a year old. Is my mac still counted as the original owner's Mac...and they assume that guy got rid of it?

I know these things work using very large numbers of people and one example doesn't mean anything, but my question still stands:

Does the fact that Macs last many years and enjoy a lively re-sale market factor into these numbers?

Quote

Small White Car wrote:
Does the fact that Macs last many years and enjoy a lively re-sale market factor into these numbers?

No. Marker share figures are based on sales (retail, wholesale, or a combination of both). These are not installed base figures (i.e., the number of computers in use), which I suspect would be much higher for the Mac, because of reasons pointed out here, such as longer lifespan and resales.

What I would like to see is the market share of the market over the 1000$ mark.

As Apple CFO as said they don't whant to compete in that market so we shouldn't look into it.

TO make the old analogy do you compare Jeep market share as a whole or only in the market they really compete (4WD).

As usual the market share figures do not seem to breakdown sales to consumer and business. There has been very strong growth in PC sales to business at just the time that Apple is struggling to get G5 chips. So this will be reflected in the share analysis.

Clearly consumer sales have been impacted by the delay in getting the iMac G5 out of manufacturing.

I'd be interested to see what the comparable analysis is for laptops. Bet that Apple is in a much healthier position.

I'd wait to see what the Q4/Q1 share figures look like before assessing whether Apple has failed to turn the corner or not.

The numbers include servers, where Apple really doesn't play. There is dramatic growth in the server market as the Internet continues to grow. Google buys servers by the thousands.

The numbers also include "cash" registers, kiosk-type systems, and the like. I was at SeaWorld Orlando and in the dolphin area, they have six Windows PCs for selecting the photos to buy and two PCs where you pay for the photos. This is replicated at other locations in the park. Same for the airport.

Will someone just publish real numbers regarding computers going into people's houses (incl. home businesses), computers going into K-12 schools, and computers going into businesses (desks, registers, kiosks, servers, etc)? I think Apple's share would be much higher than 3.2% in the US for the first two, and way lower for the last.

Isn't this article misleading?

Apple's market share is claimed to be declining, while PC unit sales are up.

This could happen, even with more Macs being sold!!! Keeping Apple more than healthy.

Market share is just a ratio. It would just mean proportionally more PCs are being sold.

Before talking about dropping the price to sell more remember that Apple is pumping out computers as fast as they can.

Order a BTO 2.5 PM and see how fast it will be delivered.

Order a BTO 20" iMac with a big HD and BT and see how fast you get it.

Computers are moving out the door as fast as IBM delivers the G5 chips and moving to a lower price point is not going to increase unit sales.

Apple can increase unit sales with older technology. Maybe a revised G3 and cheaper parts. Then what? More demands (costs) on customer & tech support without the gross margin dollars to support it - unless you move support to India? Far less money to support hardware and software development? Basically moving to the same position as most of the other top 10 companies who are not making a profit. Doubt that Apple is going to take that road.

You think USA prices are high for Apple hardware!

Market Share just keeps dropping; I hope it makes you guys happy. Apple ends up scraping the bottom of the barrel for old surplus video cards, and IBM Fishkill how can they continue to fund developement of their proccessors, well the thing is they can't. That is why they are having so much trouble....well be sure to correct me if I have got it wrong.

Hey the iPod is doing great...ending this on a positive note.

Yes but geting these PC users next or near a Mac, let alone acepting one as an extra option in the home, is the big hurdle. A friend of ours who has a desktop PC was telling me about a Targa 15.4 laptop that they may purchase as a replacment. The unit costs €1500 and includes these specs

A64 Notebook

Processor of the future generation, A64 3000+
Graphics Card 128MB
15.4" WXGA Wide Screen TFT-Display
Toshiba DVD-Multinorm and CD Burner
Memory Card Reader
Hard Drive Samsung 60GB
Working Memory Siemens 512MB
Modem and Network connection
Music and Audio Functions
Cordless Network and Internet access
Ports
Accessories included
Price per item


So, I argue in favour of a basic iBook at €1099 even though it's not wide-screen, has less RAM, half the HD space and quater the graphics memory. I argue that adding 512 MB of memory from Crucial will bump up the iBook to €1229; that 30GB is possibly more than sufficient for their needs and that unless you are a gamer you will not notice the difference in horse power between the graphics cards.

The choice of a laptop is also down to the practicalities of a more compact unit where space is a premium, so I also suggest looking at the new G5 iMac as an alternative, if portability isn't the aim of the exercise.

Now our friend is a practicle and pragmatic person. She is not particularly tech savy but has had a trouble free PC experience witout bein effected by any virusus. I can't argue with her decision to stick with a Windows machine. She would have to fork out extra cash to move to alternative applications on the Mac and would have to spend time getting used to the new OS.

So how do you sway people to the side of Mac?

Gene Steinberg has mentioned the headless iMac, perhaps a G4 or G5 basic box, sans monitor, as a replacement to the eMac. Not only should this be a more budget orientated unit, it would also be more flexible, friendly and attractive offering for PC users whereby the monitor of choice can be hooked up to it. It doesn't have to be dirt cheap. It should retain the standard Apple quality. It can be pitched marginally more expensive than bargain basement PCs, in the manner that the iPod is percieved to cost more than other portable music players but still retains that magnetism that makes people want it. Perhaps some exposure of the magnetism of OS X would help as well.

One that just keeps on losing year after year, ya might as well keep it up. Good job Apple and SJobs whatever it takes to keep on losing, well please don't change anything.

And please concentrate you efforts on the iPod.

BMW is also a company that sees its yearly market share decline, while it sells more of its cars every year.

They are in good shape too, but not as in as good a shape as Apple. Apple has billions in the bank, and they spend a good part of their profit on R&D, which is why they continue to grow every year.

Its just that the computer market world-wide is growing faster than anyone can cover, and a few companies are making a lot of computers and profits too.

Too bad they're all running Win-duh-ows. Imagine the world wide pain and suffering that people are feeling, all because Micro$oft peddles such a sucky product.

Roger Born
writing.borngraphics.com

Eventually the mac market will keep on declining. Big reason PRICE. I'm a big proponent of Mac, and in the past couple of years, have convenienced many friends to buy mac's. But almost everyone have bought pc's as their new computer's because anyone working from home needs to access sites that can't be accessed by the mac.

Take my example, I've to use windows to acces the MLS website, unfortunately I can't access it through safari, or even VPC... very slow. And, guess what I bought a pc. Apple has some great products that are free or cost very little, eg iLife. And I can gurantee almost 80% of people who use mac's have a pc at home to be compatible. Bottom line Apple has to conveniece, big corporations to start using macs or make software parity... available on both mac and pc. Only time will tell if this will work...

I don't agree with these findings. As Mark Twain once said, "There are lies, damned lies and statistics."

Case in point: I've been building my own PCs for the past 10 years and have installed every version of Windows since (and including) Windows 3.11. I built my last cutting edge machine about 6 months ago and installed XP Pro on it (with the usual assortment of security patches, upgrades and pro apps like Photoshop and MX Studio). I sat there with my head in my hands as I was forced to chase down yet another strange problem that surfaced on my machine (it was either the PocketPC not synchronizing or the printer getting hung up... something like that). I remember thinking, "This is a clean machine, kept up to date and constantly checked for spy/adware with up to date antivirus software running behind a firewall, running the current best OS Microsoft can offer... and it's letting me down time after time."

I sold that computer and bought my first Mac - the new 17" iMac... and I couldn't be happier. For the first time in my life I am recommending to my friends and family (and anyone else who asks) that they make their next machine a Mac. The only time I need to reboot is after applying a security update. I know you've heard this before but, coming from a new Mac-ex-Windows user, being able to say "everything just works" is a really big deal. My wife (who holds the purse in the family) surprised me a couple of nights ago by agreeing that buying the Mac was a good idea.

With people like me switching over (and seriously pushing the idea onto friends and family), I can't imagine Apple's market share doing anything other than increasing as the months progress.

Thanks for letting me rave : )

Jeff

Im amazed at these figures (if accurate) considering Apples just announced figures for the quarter which looked more positive. You can blame IBM, Apple, whatever. Its clear though the ongoing issues with product availability are hitting Apple hard no matter how you look at it.

I have just cancelled my 2.5 G5 and reordered a 2ghtz instead because frankly, after 3 months, I'm tired of waiting for it. I know of others interested in new Macs, both for business and consumers, who have simply bought or reordered new PCs for the same reasons. No product and either dont, or cant afford to wait.

Developers need to be healthy too. Its not that Apple cant run a viable and profitable business on their exisiting market share, but I'd hate to see some developers reassess the platforms viability if this drop becomes more regular.

Its one thing to be growing at a smaller rate than the wintel market, but to be declining when spending is on the upturn is a concern. It takes the shine off a really good product line up. Maybe the iPods 'halo' has caused people to forget about the Mac altogether?

These numbers are simply a joke and are almost meaningless. How can a site that claims being even a little bit of a Mac site use numbers from Gartner or IDC? They base numbers on unit sales, not on market share. Market share is the share of a particular product being used. This is dramatically different that the number of units sold. For example, if Mac users buy a new machine every six years and Wintel users buy a new machine every 3 years, then: If the same number of users bought on each platform, it would seem from 'sales' numbers that there were half as many Mac users as Wintel users even though they were exactly equal. In actuality, Mac users represent somewhere between 5-10% of the market. In addition, users of Macs at home represent as high as 15% of the home use market. Neither of these numbers are reflected in Gartner nor IDC figures. Thus, at best the numbers they use are misleading, at worst, they are false.

Macs best sales are in the over $2000 PC market. Even the cheapest headless Mac, the 1.8 GHz PowerMac, is over $2000 with the cheapest 256MB graphics card and AppleCare. Yikes, and that's still with only the base 256MB SDRAM which is barely usable.

Depending on which web stats you believe, the worldwide Mac installed base is 2.5 to 3.5%

If you can find a good graph ( I have seen some linked to from the ars technica forum "battlefront" ) of apple and pc marketshare, you will note that the pc market is cyclical on an annual basis. Apple sales do not show this pattern, at least not as strongly. In Q3 pc sales are generally up, and apple MS goes down. For this reason trends in pc sales are generally measured by year-over-year numbers. The relevant numbers here therefore are the year over year marketshare difference - no change globally, and up .1% in the united states. If you look at these numbers over the last few ( post iMac 1 craze) years apple has been slowly losing small amounts of marketshare, and at a declining rate which in the present quarter appears to have declined to zero. Since this is happenning after a quarter with no iMac and during which many PowerMac orders will be posted to the next quarter due to G5 supply issues, this is actually fairly strong good news.

...but then again, it should appear indirectly as when the owner buys a new computer to replace the older one he sold you used or entered into the aftermarket system...

...but then again, it should appear indirectly as when the owner buys a new computer to replace the older one he sold you used or entered into the aftermarket system...


...this was a reply to this message...
"Market share figures are based on sales (retail, wholesale, or a combination of both). These are not installed base figures (i.e., the number of computers in use), which I suspect would be much higher for the Mac, because of reasons pointed out here, such as longer lifespan and resales."

You cultists are forgetting that a lot of companies make a LOT of money off Apple's products.

Hmmm...market share falling, but stock price is higher than its been in years...

Buy more iPods, or Steve's going to lose his fight to keep Adobe from taking his company from him.

Think this will never happen? In between playing with your bloated UNIX derivative and your music player, you might want to pick up a business history book.

The war is between Windows and Linux...Apple's only hope is to slowly leave the desktop market, port OS X to handheld devices and media centers, and focus on multimedia distribution.

Print, Web ... most production is slowly moving toward XML based automation in a big way. Microsoft gets 30 XML derivative patents PER WEEK. Apple's reign as 'king of graphic design' is ending and you are missing it...

Stop reading news from just the Apple prejudiced sources...You're being kept in the dark by your favorite company as to what's really going on.

BTW, I use OS X five days a week. It's a gorgeous OS that's incredibly designed...it just came way too late in the game.

This report really means that Apple didn't gain as many customers as Dell sold machines. That's a really big difference, and I'll tell you why.

The "Market Share" statistic is based on sales, not the Installed Base of the computers. Apple sold more than 830,000 Macintosh computers that will last a long time for those lucky people who bought them.

Dell, on the other hand, sells crappy computers that break down very quickly. I'm on my 2nd desktop and I'm on my 3rd laptop at work in 3 years. The whole time, my PowerMac G4 has been busy being a great computer at home. I've donated it to my wife, who uses it for web/email/excel/word, etc, and have replaced it with a Dual 2Ghz G5 PowerMac that I've had for a year. (knocking on wood here) I've had no problems with it the whole time. I consider it a terrible tragedy when the GUI locks up because I'm doing something stupid (like opening 2 or 3 newsgroups with 1+ million articles each... bad idea!). My Dell at work routinely has problems with its motherboard or video card or whatever. My laptop currently thinks that it's docked all the time. The acronym P.O.S. was invented for the computers that Dell sells.

I'll take an Apple with a declining market share over an Apple that sells computers that break down every 9-12 months any day.

Who ya gonna call...Mr. Boogers...

What matters is that Apple continues to make money from Macs and that developers keep supporting the platform. As long as that is happening, we'll still have our beloved Macs.

Of course an increasing market share would be even better, but it's not absolutely necessary for Apple to survive.

I too would like to see the figures broken down by price, as Apple doesn't even compete at the low end, which is where most sales are moving to.

Quote

Anonymous wrote:
Eventually the mac market will keep on declining. Big reason PRICE. I'm a big proponent of Mac, and in the past couple of years, have convenienced many friends to buy mac's. But almost everyone have bought pc's as their new computer's because anyone working from home needs to access sites that can't be accessed by the mac.

Take my example, I've to use windows to acces the MLS website, unfortunately I can't access it through safari, or even VPC... very slow. And, guess what I bought a pc. Apple has some great products that are free or cost very little, eg iLife. And I can gurantee almost 80% of people who use mac's have a pc at home to be compatible. Bottom line Apple has to conveniece, big corporations to start using macs or make software parity... available on both mac and pc. Only time will tell if this will work...

This is not Apple's fault, and I wish people would stop blaming it on Apple.

The fault lies with the people/person who has built the website. They are not building standards compliant sites which is why Safari and other browsers that are non-Windows IE cannot visit/navigate them. If the sites were W3C compliant, then the web would be as it was intended: accessible to everyone.

Market share is an excuse used by lazy webmasters to not make their sites work correctly across not only OS, but browsers.

There are some browsers that are not up to rendering as much as they should (iCab, Opera, Netscape) but the main browsers (Safari, Mozilla/Firefox/Camino/OmniWeb) are than mature enough to render these pages, if they were built correctly.

Don't blame Apple for the shortcomings of ignorant designers.

with the rise of AMD a windows computer, and speed tests with premier, photoshop and other programs MACs use to dominate, looks like apple is just overpriced and users would rather use a cheaper, but just as fast counterpart that supports way more programs. I mean why spend 3500 dollars on a computer than 1500 on an AMD system that does just as well?

I bet most of these PC shipments were to enterprise customers. Apple doesn't compete in the enterprise or sub $800 market. as long as thye installed base increases is all that really matters.