The problem was the client, a smartphone OEM, who had not been providing accurate information of the sales of the model. Production, sell in shipments and sell through sales are all different numbers. We tracked down the actual sell through of each model where the component was used and calculated the inventory level of the model and smartphone brand.

Sell through of the main smartphone model was reaching only 30% of the level of production and 50% of the sell in even after two months of sales. This was the sign of a major flop. We warned of a possible cancel in component orders and sure enough the second batch of components were cancelled in the following month.

We helped our component client to understand and accurately forecast the sales of a key flagship smartphone model. This was through our understanding of 5,000+ models sold in more than 50+ countries in the world, tracked on a monthly basis.