Yet another confirmation that sales of new iPhones are weak

Dec 6, 2018 09:26 GMT  ·  By

While Apple no longer provides data on iPhone sales, there are quite a lot of hints coming from its own suppliers and which indicate that the 2018 generation is selling substantially below expectations.

The latest to do this is iPhone touch solutions provider General Interface Solutions, also referred to as GIS, who recently announced that its revenues are going down for the month of November.

As per Digitimes, GIS revenues reached $516 million in November, which is a decline of no less than 12.1% month-over-month, with estimates indicating that the drop may continue in the coming months, especially as sales after the holiday season are likely to go down.

Unsurprisingly, GIS was one of the suppliers that expected the arrival of Apple’s new iPhone generation to generate a substantial increase in terms of revenues, but as it learned the hard way, 2018 models do not match expectations.

The iPhone XR fiasco

GIS was particularly convinced that fourth-quarter revenues would benefit from growing demand for new iPhones, especially the iPhone XR which arrived later than the iPhone XS and iPhone XS Max.

iPhone XR was launched as the most affordable iPhone this year, and it is available starting at $749 in the United States. Despite the lower price, however, iPhone XR is still considered an expensive product, and this is one of the reasons it isn’t selling as good as Apple anticipated.

Previously, it’s been rumored the iPhone XR accounted for more than half of the orders made by Apple at its suppliers. In the last few weeks, however, people with knowledge of the matter said Apple reduced orders at least twice in an attempt to align production with demand.

Apple has also reportedly considered restarting production of the iPhone X, which was retired after the 2018 generation was announced, but a confirmation in this regard isn’t yet available.