[slivym]

I don't think that it's fair to say that Apple's release schedule has been similar between now and the previous year. Last year the iPhone X was announced in September and released in November/December (by region) and it was arguably the biggest upgrade Apple made since the iPhone 4. So it's fairly obvious that Q3 2017 was an almost uniquely low year. Compare that to Q3 2018 where Apple announced AND shipped the iPhone Xs in September.

I don't disagree that there's a larger trend going on, I'm just saying that this isn't a particularly good data point because there are other underlying factors.

[GeekyBear]

Apple is one of those companies whose fiscal year doesn't match the calendar year.

The numbers that were just released are for their fiscal fourth quarter which covers sales through the end of September, so we are talking about a couple of days worth of sales in 2017 with only the (then) new iPhone 8 variants for sale but not the iPhone X and a couple of days worth of sales in 2018 with only the iPhone XS variants for sale but not the iPhone XR.

I don't really see any calendar related difference for Samsung's flagships between 2017 and 2018.

I don't see any of that being greatly material when you look to explain the difference between a tiny year on year smartphone sales increase for Apple and a massive year on year smartphone sales drop for Samsung.