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The HTCship continues to sink as sales drop 55% in April
- HTC revenue dropped by over 55 percent in April 2018 as compared to April 2017.
- Revenue for Q1 2018 was over 43 percent lower than Q1 2017.
- If these drops continue, we could see HTCcease smartphone production altogether.
Taiwanese smartphone manufacturer HTC posted its first-quarter earnings for 2018. As one would expect, the news is not good: the company’s revenue for April 2018 is 55.4 percent lower than April 2017. The company only made 10.89 billion NT (~$365.3 million) in the first quarter of 2018, a 43.4 percent drop from Q1 2017.
Considering that 2017 was the worst fiscal year ever for the company, this is terrible news.
HTC has a new smartphone in the pipeline, the HTC U12 Plus, which will land sometime this month. The company also expects to see sales jump for its HTCVive Pro virtual reality headset. With that in mind, it seems like Q2 earnings will likely be better for the company than Q1, but judging from today’s numbers, it’s hard to believe that revenue will top Q2 of 2017.
The company stated that the HTCU12 Plus would be its only flagship smartphone of the year, which will allow it to consolidate its smartphone marketing and production to better match its revenue. With the drop in smartphone releases and the recent exodus of HTCengineers to Google, the day may soon come where we see HTCdrop out of smartphones altogether.
HTC’s fall from grace is incredible when you think that only seven years ago it was the fifth-largest smartphone manufacturer in the world. Now it doesn’t even crack the top ten.
We’ll have to see how well the HTCU12 Plus does in this saturated smartphone market. If the company can’t turn itself around, the HTCU12 Plus may be HTC’s swan song.