If Foxconn Sneezes, Does That Mean Apple Caught a Cold? ⇥ tech.fortune.cnn.com

Lorraine Luk, the Wall Street Journal:

As Apple Feels Bite, Hon Hai Looks to Diversify

Hon Hai Precision Industry Co. has made a fortune over the years assembling iPhones and iPads for Apple Inc. But now that competition is biting into Apple’s market share, the Taiwanese contract manufacturer is feeling the pain too.

Unoriginal pun in the headline? Check. Burying the context later in the sixth paragraph?

Hon Hai also assembles PCs for Hewlett-Packard Co., PlayStations for Sony Corp. and mobile phones for Nokia Corp.

Check.

Debunking by Philip Elmer-Dewitt? Check:

To be sure, one can legitimately write that Apple has had an unusually long stretch without a product launch. Or that its profit margins have pulled back quite a bit from their historic highs. Or that its earnings fell year over year last quarter for the first time since 2003, and are likely to do it again this quarter.

But Apple’s all-important iOS shipments, as the chart above shows, are still growing nicely.