Apple may be trailing Nokia and Samsung in global mobile phone market share, but when it comes to the all-important bottom line the company is crushing the competition. Analyst Horace Dediu of Asymco has put together a series of graphics that highlight Apple's meteoric rise to the top, showing that with only only around 9% of the global mobile phone market in Q4 2011, it raked in an astounding 75% of the industry's total profits.
Samsung came in a distant second with 16% of the profit pie, followed by RIM with 3.7%, HTC with 3% and nokia with 1.8%. All together that represents around $15 billion in profits last quarter.
Apple also topped the charts for mobile phone revenue with 'only' 39% market share, further highlighting the company's ample margins, made possible in part due to the tight grip it holds on every aspect of its business, from design to supply chain and manufacturing, and even retail distribution.
This affords them a tremendous advantage over competitors, which may sell more devices but at a comparatively little marginal gain. Not only Apple has more money left over for marketing and R&D, but it could even lower prices if needed as a competitive maneuver and still ensure a healthy profit. On the other hand, one could also argue that with those margins and no signs of the iPhone slowing down, the company could be doing more to improve the working conditions suffered by makers of Apple products overseas.
