How many new iPhones did AT&T sell?
AT&T's (T) widely leaked "best-ever sales day" memo ticking off the records set on June 19, 2009 — the day it began selling the iPhone 3GS — is packed with superlatives but notably lacking in numbers. (See memo below.)
Unlike Apple (AAPL), which reports on a quarterly basis how many iPhones it has shipped, AT&T keeps its unit sales figures close to its chest.
The new memo trumpets the fact that iPhone sales on June 19 "exceeded sales recorded on 2008's iPhone launch day," without saying how many phones it sold on either day.
But by extrapolating from previous quarters and reading between the lines, we can make some rough estimates. Here are the data points as we understand them:
- June 29 and 30: Apple launches first iPhone, and AT&T and Apple together sell 270,000 units in two days. In its Q2 earnings call the next month, AT&T CFO Rick Lindner says his company activated 146,000 iPhones in the last day and a half of the quarter.
- Oct. 2007: Apple announces that it has sold a total 1.39 million iPhones; AT&T says it has activated 1.1 million of them.
- Jan. 2008: Apple says it has sold 4 million iPhones; AT&T says it has activated about 2 million (sparking much hand-wringing about the "missing" 2 million iPhones)
- July 11, 2008: Apple sells more than 1 million iPhone 3Gs in 21 countries over the space of three days. AT&T later says its stores sold nearly twice as many iPhones that weekend as they did the weekend of the first iPhone launch. Even if AT&T's sales equaled Apple's, that can't be more than 270,000.
- Oct. 2008: Apple announces that it sold 6.9 million iPhones in its September quarter. AT&T says it activated 2.4 million of them, about 35%. (Overseas sales and unlocked iPhones presumably making up most of the difference.)
- Jan. 2009: AT&T says it activated more than 4 million iPhone 3Gs in the previous six months. In that period, Apple had sold 11.25 million iPhones. Again, AT&T's activations represent about 35% of the total.
- June 2009: Apple launches the 3GS and again sells more than 1 million iPhones in the space of three days, but this time in only 8 countries, not 21.
- July 2: AT&T's memo says it sold more iPhones over the June 19 weekend than it did over the July 11, 2008 weekend. That makes sense, given that the U.S. (and thus AT&T) share of Apple's sales was larger this year.
Assuming the 35% ratio holds up, it's not unlikely that AT&T will eventually activate about 350,000 of the new iPhones sold the weekend of June 19 — many of them Apple Stores — and that actually unit sales at AT&T outlets that weekend could easily exceed 300,000.
AT&T's public relations department announced that it sold "hundreds of thousands" through its pre-order process prior to launch, and would say no more.
Photo courtesy of AppleInsider.
Below the fold: The iPhone portion of the AT&T memo, as leaked to MacDailyNews.
"iLaunch day 2009 was one for the record books, as AT∓T customers scrambled to get their hands on the fastest, most powerful iPhone yet.
Here's a look at some of the milestones we achieved:
- Best-ever sales day in our retail stores
- Second-largest traffic day in our retail stores
- Most transactions processed via our IT systems in a single day
- Most upgrade eligibility checks in a single day
- Largest order day in att.com history
- Largest features sales day in att.com history
On this year's launch day, iPhone sales exceeded sales recorded on 2008's iPhone launch day, Black Friday 2008 and Dec. 26, 2008 — all heavy-volume sales days. In fact, this year we surpassed 2008's launch day sales at about noon Central time, and sustained our previous peak hour record, also set in 2008, for 11 straight hours." (link)
Personally, I love the iPhone, but I don't own one. Why? The AT&T folks were rude and not really willing to work here on Water St., NYC. We dropped our account with AT&T and went back to T-Mobile. I got myself a G1. Though it's not as pretty and sleek as an iPhone, it does everything that I need it to do. That's the point no? I'm sure the Pre does the same shit. I'm a huge Apple guy, have several computers and don't even touch Windows…I used to build pc's. I know Windows. But I have drawn the line with Apple at points. Mobile Me…I have to spend a $100 a year for syncing my crap, and it failed at one point. I did get my $100 back. And the whole contract crap with AT&T…though T-Mobile's got their crap too…with contracts. Apple should just sell the damn phone and you should be able to pick your carrier, since they all suck with something.
To the comment about "other countries" in Asia having better and cheaper choices than the iPhone, the #1 and #2 selling smart phones in Japan are the 8 gig and 16 gig iphone.
To the guy pumping the Nokia N97; the reviews of the N97 say its interface feels unresponsive due to the "resistive" touchscreen which requires you to apply pressure to the screen. Reviewers often had to press 2 or 3 times to get it to register their touch. On the other hand, modern smartphones (T-Mobile G1, Blackberry Storm, Palm Pre, Apple iPhone) have "capactive" touchscreens which respond to the slightest touch.
Also, people like to pick up and play with the devices before deciding whether to buy it (especially one as rare and obscure as the $700 N97). Unless you live near a Nokia flagship store in Chicago or New York City, you'll have to buy it online. This ensures that the N97 will NEVER become popular in America.
Those that think Nokia is even in the same class of the iphone are in denial. Nokia is going down fast and furious. Their designs are fugly and stupid.
The Nokia N97 is far better than any iphone out there. Just compare the specs and features and you'll quickly find that the iphone is nothing com pared to the Nokia N97. The Nokia is for people who can afford it.(It is a "world" phone after all).
There is simply nothing on the market more compelling than the iPhone, now in it's 3rd
generation. Apple set the smart phone World on fire, and the resulting competition is win for the consumer whether you iPhone or not.
Just surprise to see all the comments whenever iphone topics appear on CNN.
In other countries like Japan, Korea, China and other countries in Asia, people can choose phone from many brands which is OK and a lot cheaper than iPhone. The price, interface and features is also good. Just open your eyes and see how other choices.
To Joe from Hoboken,
Android is going to do just about as well as Linux and open source, which is to say it will have its loyal fan-base amongst the pure geeks and it will survive due to the low cost of its business plans. But it will NEVER take a large market share, because it takes real $$$ and vertical integration skills to drive the kind of innovation that has already taken place, and is about to accelerate, in the iPhone world. Google has the dollars, but they won't invest enough of them in integration to send Android mainstream. They are going to count on hardware vendors to try to make do with their API. Apple has the advantage of making both hardware and software work together in harmony.
Astonishingly, because Google doesn't need Android to be a hit in order to survive, I predict that Android will emerge as the number two mobile computing platform, far behind iPhone OS. Microsoft can survive with crap too, so they will likely persist. Palm and RIM are going to be in trouble in this space within a few years.
Thompson
Hows that 3G AT&T service? From what I hear the coverage is spotty at best and non-existant for many. Anyone wanna post some figures on the ACTUAL speeds achieved? (how long to download files, loading a basic webpage, loading a webpage with many 'features').
Let's see some stats instead of just supporting whichever side of the argument you want to support without using any real data to compare.
ex ped: Wired did a pair of AT&T 3G surveys. Here's a link to the most recent:
http://gizmodo.com/5239323/take-wireds-3g-smartphone-speed-survey
The iphone paved the way for new phones. Why do you think everyone is trying to make their phones to be like the iphone?
Well one million devices is a great opening week (or weeks if it includes all pre-sales)
I want to understand how many of that figure is actual NEW subcribers vs. older iPhone users upgrading (majority I saw in lines).
Also no word on how the 3G pricing is doing. I'm thinking until Apple moves to Verizon or at&t lowers data prices iPhone market share will be static as it's just the Apple faithful rushing out to upgrade. A month from now the sales will trend like all previous sales and trend downward.
ex ped: From a Piper Jaffray survey of 256 iPhone 3GS buyers opening day in NYC and Minneapolis:
–28% were switching carriers to AT&T, down from 38% last year
–56% were upgrading from an iPhone 3G, up from 38% last year
For all of those people boosting the Pre over the iPhone – why does it matter? The Pre is a well-designed phone from a company that used to be very good (in fact a lot of their people came from Apple). They've been struggling recently, so the Pre was a do-or-die product for Palm.
Just like the first generation iPhone, there will almost certainly be problems with it, and it sounds like the hardware build quality is not fantastic. All of these things can be improved over time, but saying that the Pre 1.0 is better than the iPhone 3.0 is pretty silly.
I hope Palm can make a good profit off of the Pre and stay in business, since it would be good for Apple to have a serious competitor and Palm is capable of it. For now, Apple has a serious advantage and Palm will have to work very hard to catch up…
iPhone is great and iPhone Touch which my kids love it alot. I hope backyard zoo games come out soon my kids haunting me.
Last i heard the pre has sold about 100,000 units after 2 weeks. Also some(quite a few)have been returned for both hardware and software issues.
Iphone is just a money making machine. For using 50% of the things that come with the iphone you need to have a 75 monthly signature with your carrier (at least). So for using a iphone you need to pay at least 900 per year… plus the iphone price. And many people doesn´t use 50% of all the thingys that apple send with the iphone.
"Once people find out that the iPhone is just a glass screen and one button, they will stampede to Sprint stores to buy a Pre. It has a keyboard which comes in handy if you are far sighted."
Sergio, you are an IDIOT. iPhone has been out more than 2 YEARS, & you don't think people know what it looks like & how it works? In addition, iPhone 3 GS sold 1,000,000 unit in THREE DAYS AFTER THE PRE CAME OUT, while Palm won't give sales figures—I wonder why that is?
"Pre is going to topple the iPhone once Verizon sells it."
Michael meet fellow moron Sergio. Fortunately for the gene pool you can't have kids.
Ayuh
What's the big deal with the Pre?
I've had a phone for years (Cingular 8525, before that 8125) that has:
- MS PocketPC (very stable)
- Keyboard (better one than Pre)
- Touch screen
- Internet access – email, web, chat, text msg
- Digital camera
- SD Card (currently own 8Gb)
- Tens of thousands of applications, for 3rd party apps I mostly use, Avantgo, HanDbase, MS voice dial, Chess, Texas Hold'em, Backgammon AND Excel, Word, Powerpoint
- Plays WMV, MP3
- and it's AT&T not Sprint.
Pre Good: running several apps at once.
Pre Bad: does so drastically reduces battery time.
"Pre is going to topple the iPhone once Verizon sells it."
Any bets?
There are already 5 major phone OS's that developers have to cover, the Pre is another one, so which one will they write for… same argument that developers write for Windows and not Mac because of the Windows monopoly.
OS's – iPhone, Windows CE, Windows Mobile, Symbian, Google Android, and now Pre OS.
Once people find out that the iPhone is just a glass screen and one button, they will stampede to Sprint stores to buy a Pre. It has a keyboard which comes in handy if you are far sighted.
You can't compare the iPhone with any other device in the market. Remember how Steve Balmer laughs about the iPhone? and who's laughing now? Remember what Ed Zandler said about "how the iphone is going to compete with us?" and now Motorola is nearly out of the market? remember how palm executives say that apple has no experience in phones and can't do any damage to long lasting phone makers like them, and palm is in big trouble even with the new PRE. So you can't think of iphone like you think about normal phones because you will look ridicule like the so called "experts". Let's wait for the facts, and the facts we have right now is that apple came from no where with the iPhone and now it is driven the all industry.
By the time Apple finally opens up to other carriers, the other carriers will already have had numerous Android and other smart phones as alternatives to the iPhone. The majority of consumers who do opt for the iPhone on Verizon, etc., will be the ones switching from AT&T.
iPhone is going to topple everything once Verizon and AT&T switch to the new 4G protocol in the next two years and iPhones can use either telco.
in 2007 there was no preordering, also in 2008 the preordering (if i remember it right) was not so much used. So if it was "Best-ever sales day in our retail stores" + “hundreds of thousands” through its pre-order process, that means they had to sell more then 500 thousands, i would guess around 700, because the other countries are far smaller with far less iPhone boom, then US
20 reasons to buy an iPhone 3GS:
1. 3GS has a 600 MHz CPU vs. the 3G's 412 MHz CPU.
2. 3GS processor has been optimized from 90nm to 65nm.
3. 3GS has double the quantity of L1 cache: 32KB up from 16KB.
4. 3GS has 256MB RAM vs. the 3G's 128MB RAM.
5. 3GS has OpenGL ES 2.0 vs. the 3G's OpenGL 1.1.
6. 3GS pipeline depth has been boosted to 13-stage from 8-stage.
7. 3GS has a PowerVR SGX graphics core which is far superior to the MBX in 3G.
8. 3GS has an average data speed of 1568Kbps vs. 3G's 1165Kbps data speed.
9. 3GS has a 19 sec. system bootup vs. the 3G's 48 sec. system bootup.
10. 3GS has a fingerprint resistant oleophobic coating.
11. 3GS has a warmer display tint for easier reading.
12. 3GS applications and games load and run 14% to 72% faster.
13. 3GS now supports up to DirectX 10.1.
14. An average web page load is 5-6 seconds faster than the 3G (yes, with same OS 3).
15. SunSpider Javascript speed benchmarks shows the 3GS at 16.7 ms vs. the 3G at 41.4 ms.
16. The 3GS performs page renders 21% faster than Palm Pre, and 122% faster than the 3G – bench by Anandtech.
17. 3GS shutdown time is shorter.
18. iPhone OS 3.0 is more optimized for the 3GS over the 3G.
19. 3GS now has video ability and a better camera. If you want pro pics, then go buy a Nikon D300 at 1600 bucks (and that doesn't include the lens). No one is expecting to take studio level pics with a phone.
20. The 3GS overall performance increase is has been clearly tested by Anandtech, ArsTechnica, and CNET. If you want better performance, then the 3GS is worth the upgrade.