50 Million iPhone 5 Sales By December?

Following in the steps of its staggering pre-order and launch sales, the iPhone 5 is said to be poised to sell 50,000,000 units by the end of December. Yes, that’s the right number of zeros. 50 million. Blogs like the iPhone 5 News Blog still have a b it of work left to do in terms of reporting on the iPhone 5: discuss whether the iPhone 5 turns out to live up to its hype, and to track its sales and success. While there is still plenty of conjecture as to whether the iPhone 5 will live up to its hype, early reports confirm that it will indeed go on to be the most successfully marketed smartphone ever. There are a myriad of recent reports that show the iPhone 5 breaking all previous iPhone sales records. Take, for example, this report from CNET, which claims ”A new report from ComScore, which finds that the first three days of iPhone 5 preorders equaled the earlier Apple record set by the iPhone 4S over the course of a month.” Pretty astounding. But considering all of the pent-up excitement and anticipation surrounding the iPhone 5, it remains to be seen if this current excitement will continue to sustain itself over the months ahead, into 2013. What are the financial analysts saying? Well, they expect nothing less than 50 million iPhone 5 sales by the end of December. According to USAToday: “FBR Capital forecasts that more than 50 million iPhone 5s could move in the fourth quarter of 2012, and that 250 million could be sold over the phone’s lifespan.” Even more astounding. Given the fact that many tech enthusiasts and journalists have had little nice things to say about the iPhone 5, it’s hard to reconcile the new iPhone’s middling press with such astronomical sales volume. Perhaps, however, the answer is simple: that Apple has much more control over the buzz and excitement surrounding its products than the online tech community does, and that the average iPhone user has less-lofty expectations for new iPhone iterations than those who follow iPhone rumors avidly. In the areas that some feel the iPhone 5 has failed to deliver on, such as next-generation features and a more proportionally-expanded display, the new screen and form factor are proving to be major selling points for the iPhone 5 among mobile users. It remains to be seen if early hiccups like the lackluster launch of Apple Maps will stall iPhone 5 sales, but since the new hardware and look for the 5 appear to be what is propelling its incredible sales, it would take a seismic disaster to slow down sales and excitement anytime soon.