Apple sold 17.1 million iPhones during its fiscal 2011 fourth quarter that ended Sept. 24. That compares to 14.1 million in the previous September quarter for 21% year-over-year growth. What’s more, Apple smartphone sales more than doubled in the Asia-Pacific region.
“We expressed iPhone sales to decrease after iPhone rumors began,” CEO Tim Cook said in a conference call with analysts. “And sales did decline as we predicted, especially in the second half of the quarter. We ended the quarter with about 5.75 million iPhones in inventory, which was within our target range of 4-6 weeks of inventory.”
Revenue from iPhone accessories was $11 billion in the fourth fiscal quarter, compared to $8.8 billion in the year-ago quarter. Cook says that the iPhone continues to be adopted as a standard across the enterprise. Approximately 93% of Fortune 500 companies are deploying or testing the device.
“The iPhone 4S is off to a great start, and we sold over four million in three days,” Cook added. “We’re confident that we will have a large supply, but I don’t want to predict when supply and demand might balance, since the demand is obviously extremely high.”
Regarding price reductions on previous iPhone models, the CEO said Apple wanted to make the iPhone more accessible to a broader market. Not only did the company make the 3GS free post-paid in the US, and many other markets, but we also lowered the iPhone 4 price to $99, he noted.
— Dennis Sellers
