SAN FRANCISCO—Apple Inc. has cut orders for components for the iPhone 5 due to weaker than expected demand, according to
a report Monday (Jan. 14) by the Wall Street Journal. The report, which cites unnamed sources "familiar with the situation," said Apple cut orders for iPhone 5 screens to about half of what the company previously planned. Apple also cut orders for other iPhone 5 components, according to the report.
Apple, which has been a dominant player in the smartphone market since the original iPhone was introduced in 2007, has been losing ground in recent months to Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. and other vendors offering phones based on Google Inc.'s Android operating system. Android handsets are typically less expensive and by some measures more appealing than iPhones.
Apple's iPhone, which redefined the smartphone market upon introduction, remains a status symbol among many. But Android has cut significantly into the iPhone's mystique, and Samsung—which offers several different smartphone models—reportedly
shipped twice as many smartphones as Apple did in the third quarter of 2012. The
September introduction of the iPhone 5, the sixth generation of the iPhone family, disappointed many observers. The handset offers only incremental improvements over its predecessor, lacking the revolutionary improvements that many have come to expect of an Apple product introduction.
Apple's stock declined by more than 3 percent Monday after the
Journal report came out. The company's stock closed at $501.75. In after hours trading, Apple's stock rebounded to more than $503.
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