Are Smartphones Doomed to the Same Fate as Personal Computers? [View all]

[marmar]

(Bloomberg) The smartphone market has stopped defying gravity.

After almost a decade of turbocharged sales, the $423 billion industry can no longer count on consumers to robotically upgrade their handsets, putting at risk the fat margins and steady revenue growth long envied by the rest of the hardware sector.

Signs of a sputtering market have been brewing for months, but spilled into the open last week when Apple Inc. reported its first quarterly sales decline in 13 years. Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook acknowledged on April 26 that -- nine years after the iPhone’s game-changing debut -- the market had “stopped growing.” The next day, research firm Strategy Analytics reported a 3 percent drop in first-quarter smartphone shipments, the first decline ever.

“You couldn’t help but wonder how long the party could go,” said David Hsu, a management professor at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School who tracks the market. .................(more)

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-05-04/are-smartphones-doomed-to-the-same-fate-as-personal-computers