Business is a game of numbers and while Apple doesn’t have the lion’s share of the ridiculously lucrative mobile phone market in terms of market share, its iPhone lineup is still unbelievably dominant when it comes to dollars and cents. The shockingly rapid ascent of Google’s Android operating system on back of Samsung rocked the mobile industry as it rocketed to the top of market share charts. In fact, Samsung shipped more smartphones than all other major phone vendors combined last quarter. But despite how impressive Android’s market share dominance is, Apple’s iPhones still represent the most profitable phone business in the world by a huge margin.
Mobile analyst Horace Dediu posted one simple chart from his Twitter account on Monday morning that really does speak volumes.
In the chart, Dediu plotted three important groups of data. The first, in green, is Apple’s total share of the global cell phone market each quarter by shipment volume. While Apple’s share has grown pretty steadily over the years, it’s still barely 10%.
Next, in pink, is Apple’s share of total mobile phone revenue around the world. Here, we can see that Apple’s share of global cell phone sales sat at about 35% in the most recent quarter.
Finally, and most impressively, is Apple’s share of global mobile phone industry profit. Despite accounting for just 10% of phone sales, Apple pulls in between 60% and 70% of all phone industry profit thanks to its sky-high margins that rivals can’t even dream of approaching.
This trend is incredibly difficult to maintain, but if there’s anything that will help guarantee that those lines will continue to rise, it’s probably the simultaneous launch of an iPhone 6 and an iPhone phablet later this year.
