Apple Watch Sales Growth Far Behind Competitors

By Douglas A. McIntyre Published Sep 16, 7:01AM EDT

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Apple Watch Sales Growth Far Behind Competitors — © Apple Inc.

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL | AAPL Price Prediction) has released the new generation of its smartwatch product, which it calls Series 6. It has several features that may get people to upgrade from their current versions, or buy the first Apple Watch they have ever owned. The products need to sell extremely well to lift the growth in sales of the product, which is expected to be far below the global increase in smartwatch sales this year.
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Carefully followed figures from TrendForce, which tracks consumer electronic sales, show that of the 79.9 million smartwatches that will be shipped this year, Apple will sell 27.7 million. Apple’s figure for 2020 will be up only 3.7% from the 2019 level. The global total will be up 31.9%.

In raw numbers, Apple Watch shipments will rise by a million this year compared to last, according to the estimate. Total smartwatch shipments will be up 19.3 million.

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While Apple is the industry leader base on units, it has a formidable competitor in Samsung, the world’s largest consumer electronics company. Several smaller companies have modest market share. Most, like FitBit, also have modest financial prospects, but they take market share nevertheless.

Available research gives no reasons for the Apple growth slowdown. The launch of a new model often accelerates sales. Among the causes may be the Apple Watch carries a price at the high end of the industry. Another may be that the smartwatch market is already saturated. Whatever the reason, Apple has started to fall behind in an industry it hopes to dominate.

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About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.