Apple posted a soft quarter and iPhone shipment declined annually in Q1 2017. While the healthy demand of bigger screen iPhone 7 Plus drove up iPhone wholesale APS, the vendor’s profitability hurt by foreign exchange fluctuations, higher cost of key components, as well as higher operating costs. China remained weak mainly due to intensified competition from local OEMs.

The iPhone has now declined in 4 of the past 5 quarters, Apple was unable to capitalize on Samsung’s Note 7 missteps, and it is clear that Apple has to do something radical with its upcoming iPhone 8 portfolio in the second half of this year to arrest the ongoing slide. Apple needs refreshed new models with major hard innovations to reignite growth. If the widely-rumoured iPhone 8 will be launched in the second half this year, we expect Apple will see a strong rebound by iPhone volumes during 2H 2017.

Q1’17: Apple: Soft iPhone Shipments, China Remain Weak was published and WSS clients please click here to access the full report.