APPLES BATTERY OFFER

REPLACEMENT OVER UPGRADE

Battery offer may cost APPLE 16 million in new sales.

CALIFORNIA : Apple's Inc's offer to replace iPhone batteries cheaply may cut sales of new handsets by millions of units this year, according to Barclays analyst Mark Moskowitz.

''Even a small percentage of customers opting for battery replacement over upgrade could have meaningful impact on iPhone sales,'' he said.

Apple recently said it intentionally slowed iPhones with older batteries to prevent the handsets abruptly shutting down.

The company stressed that it hadn't intentionally slowed the devices to encourage users to purchase newer models.

In response to customer complaints, Apple apologized and cut the price of replacement batteries from US$ 79 to US$ 29 for many older iPhones

While analysts agree that this was a good public-relations move, some are concerned it will dent future sales of iPhones, a product that accounts for roughly two-thirds of Apple revenue.

The company's stock rose almost 50 per cent last year, largely on hopes of  ''super cycle''  with the new iPhone  X and 8, where a large number of users upgrade.

Moskowitz estmates around 519 million users are eligible for the battery offer, and that in the most likely scenario 10 per cent take the US$ 29 offer, and about 30 per cent of those people decide not to buy a new iPhone this year.

This means that the tech giant could miss out on 16 million  iPhone upgrades this year, said the analyst. Bloomberg.