Apple iPad Sales Fuel Mac, iPod and iPhone Sales Records

Apple iPad sales have blown away expectations. They have also aided Mac, iPod and iPhone sales records. This has also surprised analysts who expected iPad sales to cannibalize other Apple products. The opposite gas actually happened. What we have seen popular culture, not just the tech world has become engulfed by the iPad craze. We all know of the iPhone phenomenon, well the new iPad has seen one million iPads sell faster than the first one million iPhones. Apple Inc must be happy! Despite the global financial crisis one million iPads sold in only 28 days after the April 3 launch.

The iPhone was launched in 2007 and took 74 days to sell one million iPhones. Apple has struggled to meet demand and delayed the international rollout due to the iPad sales rush. International pre-orders began on May 10, iPads went on sale in nine new countries later in May and iPad sales were phenomenal. Apple iPad will be available in 19 countries by the end of 2010. Up from 10 countries during its third quarter. With iPads sales faster than iPhones and the success of Apple iOS 4 and iPhone 4 Apple continues to dominate Microsoft. The extent of iPad’s sales dominance and spectacular success is underscored by market researcher iSuppli‘s latest forecast. iSuppli has almost doubled its iPad’s sales target from 7.1 million to 12.9 million by the end of this year. One would expect Mac, iPhone and iPod sales to benefit from iPad sales going forward.

Back in June I wrote of Apple's iPad sales continuing to beat all expectations. Apple Chief Executive Steve Jobs repeated then, “Demand continues to exceed supply and we're working hard to get this magical product into the hands of even more customers'

Analysts had all expected lower sales, Hudson Square Research analyst Daniel Ernst had estimated iPad sales for the entire June quarter at 1.25 million units. However as we discussed the other day the question is how much of the iPad sales are to Mac fans or ‘early adopters’.

Another analyst Keith Bachman of BMO Capital markets said in a client note, 'In many respects, we are encouraged that the international roll-out will not begin until May, which will sustain strong sales in the September quarter and throughout 2010’ and that he expects Apple to sell 2 million iPads in the 2010 June quarter.

It appears the all-purpose media consumption marketing campaign for the iPad has worked a treat. The iPad seems to have captured electronic books, comics and magazines fans in particular. Apple said there have been over 1.5 million digital books downloaded from the iBooks store.

The Apple apps revolution continues with there being over 12 million software applications downloaded. There are now more than 5,000 iPad apps available from the iPad app store.

The stock market liked the news that one million iPads sell faster than one million iPhones with Apple shares up 2.1 percent to $266.63 on the NASDAQ at the time of writing. The iPad craze, iPads sell faster than iPhones means the Apple investors already besotted are after more.

Here we are in August and the records continue to tumble.

The market researcher iSuppli has almost doubled its iPad’s sales target from 7.1 million to 12.9 million by the end of 2010. They released the sales target after the Apple’s latest iPad sales report.  Apple reported revenue of US$15.7 billion for its fiscal third quarter ending June 26.  In this quarter Apple sold 3.27 million iPads. The iPad sales brought in US$2.17 billion. 

Rhoda Alexander the director of monitor research at iSuppli made the following observations in a research note on iPad sales.  “The iPad is shaping up to be the ‘Tickle Me Elmo’ of the 2010 holiday season, with product demand expected to vastly exceed available supply.”  The tickle me Elmo adds another trajectory to sales expectations. 

There is little doubt that demand has outstripped all expectations. Alexander added  “iSuppli believes that the only limitation on iPad sales now is production — and not demand,” She backs this up by the observation that “Our latest research indicates there is much higher production than previously expected for two key components, LCD panels and NAND flash.”