Apple will hold its autumn press conference on the early morning of September 10th Beijing time, launching a new iPhone 16 and updating its system. Apple has previously announced that the iOS 18 system will be released this fall, and the iOS 18, iPadOS 18, and macOS Sequoia systems will provide the Apple Intelligence intelligent system.
Due to the upcoming release of Apple's new phone, iPhone 16, and the fact that some iPhone models, including iPhone 16, will be equipped with Apple Intelligence in the future, this press conference has attracted a lot of attention, and the market is also looking forward to the iPhone 16 triggering Apple's "super sales cycle". According to the reporter's analysis, there have been speculations about the price and form of Apple's new products, and multiple market research institutions are concerned about whether the iPhone 16 can drive sales growth of Apple phones. Some market research institutions predict that the price of the Apple iPhone 16 may increase due to the installation of Apple Intelligence.
Will the price of iPhone 16 increase?
There are various speculations on the content of Apple's press conference in the market. Renowned Apple whistleblower Mark Gurman predicts that Apple will release the iPhone 16 series, new AirPods Max earphones, and low-end AirPods 4 at this press conference. Apple will not release the Apple Watch. He predicts that the iPhone 16 model will be equipped with a touch sensitive camera button, and the focus of the press conference will be on AI and A18 chips.
Jibang Consulting predicts that the new iPhone 16 series will adopt the all-new A18 and A18 Pro processors respectively. In order to support Apple Intelligence functionality, the iPhone 16 will be fully upgraded with DRAM (Dynamic Random Access Memory). In addition, Jibang Consulting expects that the A18 and A18 Pro used in the iPhone 16 will be manufactured using TSMC's 3nm process, and the panel size of the two iPhone 16 Pro series phones will slightly increase compared to the previous generation.
Whether the iPhone 16 will increase in price is a key concern for various analysis agencies and analysts. From the perspective of components, memory prices have increased this year, and Apple has invested a certain amount of cost in developing Apple Intelligence.
Jibang Consulting predicts that the cost of new phones will be affected by the rise in storage prices, resulting in a slight increase in the total cost of the iPhone 16. However, considering the downward trend in the mobile phone market, it is expected that Apple will continue to adopt a cautious pricing strategy. The US dollar pricing of the four new iPhone 16 models is expected to remain at the same level as the iPhone 15 series, or be slightly raised due to cost increases. Apple may dilute the impression of a price increase by raising the base capacity starting point to 256GB, following the strategy of last year's Pro Max.
When the iPhone 15 series was released last year, the starting prices for iPhone 15, iPhone 15 Plus, iPhone 15 Pro, and iPhone 15 Pro Max were $799, $899, $999, and $1199, respectively. Jibang Consulting predicts that the starting prices for iPhone 16, iPhone 16 Plus, iPhone 16 Pro, and iPhone 16 Pro Max will be $799, $899, $1099, and $1199, respectively. Mark Gurman expects that the entry-level price of the iPhone 16 Pro will not increase from $999.
Market research firm Counterpoint Research analysts predict that Apple may offset the cost of running Apple Intelligence by slightly raising prices. Previously, Neil Shah, Partner and Vice President of Research at Counterpoint Research, also told reporters that integrating Apple Intelligence into Apple devices is an expensive investment that requires a significant amount of research and development resources to develop and train models with billions of parameters, ensure that data can be securely stored in Apple's "private cloud," and ensure that it can interact with a large number of Apple applications centered on Apple Intelligence in the future. At some point, Apple will have to make profits through Apple Intelligence or related services, and the ideal price may start at $9.99 or higher.
Will Apple's' Super Sales Cycle 'Start?
Regarding whether the iPhone 16 will initiate Apple's "super sales cycle", the judgments of various institutions are not consistent.
Investment bank Wedbush previously released a report stating that the iPhone 16 series will begin the largest upgrade cycle in Apple's history, with an expected initial shipment of over 90 million units, exceeding market expectations of 80 million to 84 million units. Approximately 300 million iPhones worldwide have not been upgraded in over four years, laying the foundation for a significant surge in demand. With the formation of an AI driven upgrade cycle, Apple's iPhone sales in the 2025 fiscal year may exceed 240 million units.
Counterpoint Research analysts also mentioned that for Apple phones, the positive factor is that the last iPhone revenue super cycle was in 2021, so there will be a considerable number of consumers using iPhone 12 and iPhone 13, who may decide to upgrade and drive iPhone revenue growth.
Jibang Consulting predicts that the market's expectations for Apple Intelligence have increased, and with a lower base period in 2023, it is estimated that the total output of the four new iPhone 16 series will reach 86.7 million units in the second half of 2024. It is not ruled out that Apple may have the opportunity to surpass Samsung for the first time by the end of the year and become the market share leader in smartphone production for the whole year.
However, some market research institutions and analysts believe that the iPhone sales growth brought by Apple Intelligence to Apple will not be reflected so quickly, so iPhone revenue will remain stable rather than rapidly growing this year.
Counterpoint Research analysts predict that the launch of the iPhone 16 series is expected to increase the base of iPhones equipped with Apple Intelligence to over 125 million units by the end of 2024. The impact of Apple Intelligence on Apple's shipment volume and revenue growth will become more apparent in 2025 and beyond, as the launch of AI is phased in terms of features and regions, while iPhone revenue is expected to remain stable this year.
Mark Gurman predicts that although there have been rumors about the iPhone 16 initiating Apple's "super sales cycle," this will not happen, and the iPhone 17 will have the opportunity to initiate a "super sales cycle.
Nabila Popal, research director at market research firm IDC, also believes that although Apple's new phone has many highlights, including being equipped with Apple Intelligence, it is difficult to bring too much growth to the new product due to the lack of complete language support for Apple Intelligence, and its impact is more to prevent Apple's decline.
IDC analyst Ryan Reith believes that consumers will pay attention to Apple Intelligence, but they also have other options such as GPT to use AI features, so it is difficult for Apple Intelligence to directly drive new consumer purchases. Without promotions and significant discounts, the development of the AI smartphone market remains challenging.
In addition, Apple also faces competition. Huawei's press conference almost collided with Apple's, and Huawei will launch the three fold mobile phone MateXT Extraordinary Master at the press conference on September 10th. The phone has already started pre ordering, and the Huawei Mall shows that the number of pre orders for this product has exceeded 2 million.
Nabila Popal believes that Apple faces competition, especially from the Chinese market, such as its competitor Huawei. China has always been Apple's largest market, and in recent years, Huawei has begun to recover, leading to a stagnation or even slight decline in Apple's rapid growth trend in the past few years.
Market analysis firm TechInsight recently stated that if the release time interval between Huawei and Apple is long, it may lead to a large number of consumers choosing the iPhone 16 series, and Huawei is determined to maintain its leading position in the third quarter, attracting some Apple users. According to TechInsight data, Huawei's market share in China exceeded Apple's in the first and second quarters of this year.