It goes without saying that we live in challenging economic times, although you wouldn’t know it to look at companies like Apple Inc., who have been lifted ever higher with each passing financial report. A new report claims that smartphone makers have started cutting back on fourth quarter chipset orders over economic concerns -- and that includes the mighty Apple as well.
DigiTimes is reporting that “changing economic conditions” may be responsible for smartphone vendors scaling back on chipset orders for the fourth quarter of this year, with Taiwanese sources claiming that both HTC and Apple are being cautious going into the end of 2011 when compared to third quarter buys.
“While most smartphone vendors are likely to reach their shipment targets for the third quarter, they have begun to reduce orders for parts and components for the fourth quarter in preparation for a possible impact from changing economic conditions,” DigiTimes sources reveal.
For their part, Android and Windows Phone maker HTC raised their internal shipment target for this year to 70 million units in the first quarter after initially projecting 50 million units in late 2010. That number was recently revised backward to 50 to 60 million units, according to sources with knowledge of the company’s roadmap.
“Sources in the supply chain of iPhone have revealed that Apple has also scaled down its orders for handset parts and components to be shipped at the end of third quarter,” DigiTimes concludes.
While we all know that what goes up must eventually come back down, Apple would appear to be immune from that syndrome, at least for now. But maybe they know something we don’t in the months ahead? Only time will tell...
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(Image courtesy of 9to5Mac)
