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Apple HomePod Sales Said to be Disappointing

Maura

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According to a new report from Bloomberg Technology today, Apple’s HomePod has not sold anything like as well as Apple would have hoped.

HomePod arrived in stores in January 2018, but by late March, Bloomberg’s sources say, Apple had already lowered sales forecasts and cut its orders with Inventec, one of the companies that makes HomePod.

HomePod started well, with impressive pre-orders, but according to Slice Intelligence analyst Ken Cassar, when HomePod actually arrived in stores, sales started falling. “Even when people had the ability to hear these things, it still didn’t give Apple another spike,” he said.

Slice Intelligence’s figures show that in the first 10 weeks that HomePod was on sale it had 10% of the smart speaker market, while Amazon’s Echo had 73% and Google Home had 14%. Three weeks following launch, Slice says that weekly HomePod sales had fallen to approximately 4% of the smart speaker market.

Furthermore, Apple Store employees have reported that some stores are selling less than 10 HomePods a day.

As to why HomePod might have failed to capture the public’s imagination, Bloomberg says that despite its exceptional, market-leading sound quality, consumers were disappointed that it wasn’t as versatile as rivals such as Amazon’s Echo.

Analyst Shannon Cross told Bloomberg that unlike Echo or Google Home, HomePod is not able to perform such tasks as answer questions, order takeout food, and so on. Instead, it is mainly an Apple Music player, a control station for some smart home devices, and also sends messages via iPhone, but all with an asking price that is $200 more than the competition, Cross points out.

Apple has made no official comment on HomePod sales in the light of Bloomberg’s story.

Source: Apple’s Stumbling HomePod Isn’t the Hot Seller It Wanted
 
They failed to release it in more than 3 countries. Canada still has no love.
 
We plan to buy one, but not quite yet. We need to finish the last stage of a bathroom remodel first lol.

The HomePod is perfect for us. We no longer have a traditional stereo setup at home. When we hangout at home and just listen to music, we use the TV. Before hearing about the HomePod, we were planning on a whole-house ceiling mount sound system. With the way this is supposed to sound, I’m really excited about getting one. I hope this news doesn’t impact its future.
 
I don't own any type of home assistant speaker so I'm ready and waiting for this to come to Canada.

Now, I know features-wise it's limited compared tot he competition, but I'm also huge when it comes to sound quality. If this thing sounds rich and fills the room with sound, I'm already 90% impressed. I've heard the echo and google speakers, and while they're great assistants (I guess) they sound tin canny and terrible. Crank up the volume and it's distorted.

I'd prefer to dish out the extra cheddar to get a well rounded music speaker that has some assistant functionality. But first and foremost I want a nice sounding speaker.

I own a Bose Revolve+ Bluetooth speaker currently, and while it doesn't have any assistant setup on it, the sound is great for the form factor and it ws the main reason I got this over the Beats Pill + or the UE Megaboom. It came down to sound quality. If the Bose Revolve+ had an assistant and was branded Apple it would make up for being a sweet Home Pod. So if the early reviews are right and the Home Pod is about sound quality first, and assistant features secondary, I've got a blank cheque signed, ready to get my hands on one.

I'm also feeling confident that with future software updates, this thing will be able to do some of the essentials. It does have airplay so that could be the value-add for the time being.
 
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