With smartphones slowly but surely reaching the 7-inch mark, there has been a vociferous call for smaller and compact phones. Apple assessed the market sentiment and brought the second generation of iPhone SE (2020) and it sold in huge numbers. Inspired by its success, the Cupertino based company added the smaller variant to its main lineup and introduced the iPhone 12 mini.
However, according to a note to investors from William Yang, a JP Morgan supply chain analyst, the iPhone 12 mini has seen extremely weak demand which may result in the brand discontinuing its production by the second quarter of 2021.
As per the report, Yang believes that Apple may increase the production of iPhone 12 Pro and Pro Max apart from iPhone 11 and cuts down the expectations of iPhone 12 and 12 mini. He revised the iPhone 12 Pro Max build numbers up by 11 million units; iPhone 12 Pro build numbers up by 2 million units; and iPhone 11 build numbers up by 8 million units.
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This hints that the company may already have surplus units of the phone and hence may stop marketing or selling the iPhone 12 mini altogether and retrain its focus on the devices that are already doing good as well as the next-generation iPhones.
Additionally, he also predicts that the company may introduce four new smartphones in the second half of 2021 and suggests that while the supply chain is already working on the 3rd generation iPhone SE. Though the iPhone SE 3 is expected to only launch next year, not in 2021.
Coming back to the basic iPhones, he expected that these phones could come with improvements all over - improved battery life, better camera, and a smaller notch. According to the analyst, inspired by the good show by the iPhone 11, the company may come up with a low-cost variant based on the iPhone 11.
That said since Apple introduced the iPhone 12 mini, a lot of other brands are looking to come up with a compact version of their primary device equipped with premium specifications. Just today we came across a news that even Asus is looking to make a premium Zenfone mini.
However, with Apple looking to make drastic changes to the plans, will other brands be in a position to do course correction?
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