Apple Sets Record With First-Weekend iPhone 6 Sales

Apple said Monday that it sold more than 10 million iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus models over the first three-day weekend, a new company record. Apple previously said first-day orders topped 4 million.

The new models, unveiled earlier this month, are available in the U.S., Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Japan, Puerto Rico, Singapore and the U.K. and will be available in more than 20 additional countries on Sept. 26. The new iPhones will be available in 115 countries by the end of the year.

Watch more: Features of the New iPhone 6 Models

“Sales for iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus exceeded our expectations for the launch weekend, and we couldn’t be happier,” said Apple CEO Tim Cook, who had presented the new devices earlier this month along with others. “We would like to thank all of our customers for making this our best launch ever, shattering all previous sell-through records by a large margin. While our team managed the manufacturing ramp better than ever before, we could have sold many more iPhones with greater supply, and we are working hard to fill orders as quickly as possible.”

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Some Wall Street observers had projected sales of around 10 million for the first weekend, compared with about 9 million for the iPhone 5S/5C launch in September, which included China. The new models have been delayed in China.

See more: The Apple Watch

Cowen & Co. analyst Timothy Arcuri said the strong first-weekend trends “are further confirmation of our thesis this product cycle and its overall set-up are different from previous sell-the-news launches.” He added: “We continue to expect unprecedented upgrade sales over the next several quarters as 6/6+ allow Apple to both upsell its core high-end customers and to target high-end Android switchers.”

He added: “We continue to believe our above-Street iPhone 6/6+ units [estimates of] 118 million near-term are potentially very conservative.”

Email: Georg.Szalai@THR.com
Twitter: @georgszalai