The business wires' new verbal tic: Apple is 'losing steam'

First Bloomberg, now Reuters, have boiled Apple down to a two-word editorial formula.

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FORTUNE -- How do you describe a company that grew like gangbusters but has entered a patch of slower growth?

Some desk editors at the business news services have hit on what they seem to think is the perfect phrase: Apple (AAPL) is "losing steam."

Last week it was Bloomberg News with this headline:

Harvard Liquidates Apple Stake After IPhone Sales Lose Steam

Which as we took pains to point out didn't do a particularly good job of describing either Harvard's investment strategy or the iPhone's sales growth. See: Bloomberg's lazy Apply bias.

Then, on Tuesday, Reuters weighed in with this headline:

Sharp to seek Samsung edge for survival as Apple sales lose steam

Several problems with that one:

• What's reportedly losing steam, when you read the story, are Sharp's orders from Apple, not Apple's overall sales.
• The writer claims -- without citation -- that "analysts project annual profit growth at Apple to average less than 5 percent over the next decade, compared with an average of 60 percent over the past five years." That may come as a surprise to the analysts polled by Thomson Financial. They're anticipating Apple's profits to grow 20.88% per annum over the next five years.
• Even those growth estimates are based on the assumption that Apple has nothing new up its sleeve. No new product categories. No new disruptions.
• And nobody but Asymco's Horace Dediu seems to be paying close attention to the iTunes Store, which as he notes is growing steadily -- without losing any steam at all -- at a compound rate of nearly 30% a year. For Dediu's latest on the subject, see The allure of iTunes or tune into last Sunday's Critical Path podcast: Blessed are the apps.

Posted in: Apple, Asymco, Bloomberg, Horace Dediu, iTunes, Reuters, Sharp

• Japanese manufacturers finally take on the iPad

  Japanese - yes, Japanese - electronics manufacturers have gotten the memo about what customers really want. And they're finally fighting back against the iPad.

  By Michael Fitzpatrick

  FORTUNE -- Stung badly by soaring sales of foreign-made smartphones and tablets, Japan's electronics makers are fighting back with a bevy of hi-tech tablets they hope will turn the tables on the dominant Apple iPad.

  Sony (SNE) is setting its hopes on the svelte, bantam-weight, MORE

  Mar 13, 2013 5:00 AM ET
  Posted in: Fujitsu, Galapagos, iPad, Japan, Panasonic, Sharp, Sony, Tablets, Toshiba, Xperia

• The agony of Japan Inc.

  Companies like Apple, IBM and Microsoft once stood in the shadow of much larger and more powerful Japanese electronics giants. Those days are long gone -- and, lately, it looks like they may never come back.

  By Kevin Kelleher, contributor

  "This country is in a war and some people understand it and some people are siding with the enemy."

  FORTUNE -- Believe it or not, someone once wrote those paranoid words about MORE

  May 25, 2012 10:40 AM ET
  Posted in: Apple, bubble, demise, electronics, giants, IBM, Japan, Microsoft, Nintendo, Olympus, Panasonic, Sega, Sharp, Silicon Valley, Sony, stocks

• Tell me again. Why do we think Apple will make a TV set?

  After four years of speculation there's still not a shred of hard evidence

  A lot of analysts talk about Apple's (AAPL) plans to make a television -- an actual TV set, not just a set-top box -- but last week, Jefferies' Peter Misek did something most have been careful not to do.

  Citing "increased confidence" that Apple's iTV is coming, he wrote into his published forecasts the revenue from its sales: 2 million MORE

  Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Apr 17, 2012 4:30 PM ET
  Posted in: Apple, Apple TV, Bloomberg Businessweek, Foxconn, Gene Munster, Hon Hai, iPad, iPanel, iPhone, iTV, Marco Arment, Peter Misek, Piper Jaffray, Sharp, Steve Jobs

• Sharp and Apple: What the Jefferies report really says

  There's a lot more to the relationship than the rumors of an Apple-branded TV suggest

  Credit AllThingsD's John Paczkowski for finding the most headline-worthy nugget in the report issued Tuesday by Jefferies analyst Peter Misek on his recent trip to Japan.

  The thrust of Paczkowski's story -- Apple Television Could Be Ready for Commercial Production by Feb. 2012 -- was echoed Wednesday by more than a dozen writers who had only his brief item to rely on.

  But MORE

  Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Nov 24, 2011 8:53 AM ET
  Posted in: Apple, Apple TV, iPad 3, iPhone 5, Jefferies, John Paczkowski, Mobile, OLED, Peter Misek, Sharp, Steve Jobs, Tablets, television