iPhone 6 Demand Unbroken says Analyst

The iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus will be outdated in four month time. Consumers though are still buying them like hot cakes says new analyst report.

Apple launched the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus in September of last year. It is widely expected that the new iPhone 6S will go on sale in September. Apple analyst Kuo predicts even an earlier iPhone launch this year. We are only 5 month away from the iPhone refresh, but demand for the iPhone 6 is still unbroken says a new analyst report. 

Morgan Stanley analyst Katy Huberty says that iPhone demand is ahead of expectations with 53 million units this quarter. Apple has sold 61.2 million iPhones in the Q2 2015 quarter. The data is based on Morgan Stanley’s AlphaWise Smartphone Tracker. Huberty raised her estimate of iPhone sales for the quarter from 46 million to 50 million. For the fiscal year 2015 she estimates overall iPhone sales of 240 million. For 2016 Huberty predicts 249 million iPhone units to be sold.

“We expect slight iPhone unit growth of 4% in FY16 (next iPhone cycle) as our survey earlier in the year indicates strong demand from existing iPhone users, with nearly half of the installed base planning to upgrade in FY16,” Huberty wrote in a note according to The Street.

Apple CEO Tim Cook said on the last earnings call that only 20% of the iPhone users have upgraded yet to the iPhone 6. There is still a lot of sales potential there. Additionally we seen recently several analyst reports that say that Android is losing ground. The iPhone also continues to grow in China where Apple sells now more iPhones than in the United States.

Huberty also had a thing to say about the Apple Watch sales. The analyst estimates that the Apple Watch will sell in the first 12 months 36 million units, up from 30 million previously. In contrast KGI Research analyst Ming-Chi Kuo lowered his Apple Watch sales prediction to only 15 million for the first year. There is a huge gap here. Apple is maybe revealing the Apple Watch sales numbers at the WWDC 2015 keynote or in the next quarterly earnings call.

Tim Cook said this week that the Apple Watch will finally be sold in Apple Stores starting in June.