Nonostante l'idea originale, la buona scheda tecnica e il prezzo inferiore agli altri modelli l'iPhone 12 mini non si vende e Apple ne ha preso atto.
Apple taglia la produzione di iPhone 12 mini prevista per il primo semestre 2021: il piccolo smartphone 5G della mela morsicata, nonostante costi assai meno dei fratelli maggiori della gamma iPhone 12, non si vende abbastanza. Di conseguenza Apple ha chiesto ai suoi fornitori di accantonare scorte di componenti sufficienti per 75 milioni di telefoni (compresi anche gli iPhone 11, iPhone SE e iPhone Xr ancora in gamma), mentre prima ne chiedeva per 100 milioni.
Valuta l’acquisto di un iPhone a rate o altro smartphone qui:
A snocciolare i numeri è l’agenzia di stampa giapponese Nikkei Asia, che precisa però che Apple prevede comunque di vendere 230 milioni di smartphone in tutto il 2021. That is, 11% more than it produced and sold in 2020. While iPhone mini production will be cut by about 70%, therefore, according to Nikkei, production capacity will be shifted to other models that sell much better. iPhone 12, iPhone 12 Pro and Pro Max are in fact selling quite well and "Some of the components and parts for the mini are being reallocated to iPhone 12 Pro and iPhone 12 Pro Max," a person familiar with the facts told Nikkei.
Why iPhone 12 mini is a flop
While iPhone 12 mini are selling very few, iPhone 12, iPhone 12 Pro and Pro Max are selling well. But not great, due to the global economic situation still heavily influenced by the Covid-19 pandemic.
It's clear, then, that it's not a matter of price, but of model: iPhone 12 mini is a wrong smartphone for the Apple audience, maybe it would have been great for the Android one but, perhaps because of the economic situation already described, the average Android user doesn't feel like jumping to Apple by paying $699 in America or €839 in Italy.
Moved the production of the new MacBooks
Also according to Nikkei, moreover, Apple would have decided to move forward the date of the beginning of the production of the two new MacBook models: from May-June to the second half of the year. These are two highly anticipated models, because they will be equipped with the new Apple Silicon M1 processors already seen on the new MacBook Pro, MacBook Air and Mac mini.
Behind this decision there is probably, more than the now announced global "chip crisis", the need not to overlap too many very similar models. Already today, many users have discovered that for most of their needs the basic 8 GB MackBook Air is more than sufficient thanks to the high efficiency of the new M1 architecture, which offers a real leap in performance over the previous Intel architecture.