Internal Apple Docs Reveal Concern Over Dropping iPhone Sales

Iphone models

Apple’s sales force is concerned about the growth of the iPhone as the company faces rising competition from Android devices, which has bigger screens and lower prices, an internal document reveals (via Re/code).

As the document reveals, the market segment that included the iPhone declined, while the segments including larger-screen smartphones for $300 or above and other handsets for less than $300 were both on the rise.

“Competitors have drastically improved their hardware and in some cases their ecosystems,” a member of Apple’s sales team wrote in a document that was prepared as part of a fiscal 2014 offsite meeting. Portions of the document were shown Friday to the jury in the Apple-Samsung case.

The document was presented today in court as part of Samsung’s cross-examination of Phil Schiller, Apple’s worldwide head of marketing, who rejected the idea, saying it didn’t represent Apple’s policy.

In addition to the aforementioned concerns, the sales team was worried about the high subsidies carriers pay on the device, as the telcos have allegedly had an interest in limiting iPhone sales due to those subsidy costs.

Among other things, the cross-examination covered the recently unveiled internal email from Steve Jobs suggesting that Apple’s top-100 executive meeting should focus on starting a “holy war” with Google.

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