Nov 1, 2017

People are keeping their cell phones a lot longer

Ina Fried

The average number of months U.S. consumers hold onto their cellphones. Graphic: Chetan Sharma Consulting

The average American is now hanging on to their cell phone nearly three years, according to new data from Chetan Sharma Consulting. That's up from about a two-year upgrade cycle in 2014.

The big culprits: The end of two-year contracts and a maturing cell phone market have been the key factors.

"Consumers are treating phone purchase akin to a computer buy and given that there are only minor hardware changes from model to model [with exceptions], there is less incentive for consumers to upgrade," CEO Chetan Sharma told Axios.

The X factor: Sharma says the arrival of the iPhone X could lead upgrade cycle times to shorten in the coming quarters.

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Sara Fischer, Jonathan Swan

Scoop: Inside the Trump campaign's big hedge on Facebook

Illustration: Eniola Odetunde/Axios

The Trump campaign has invested most of its advertising budget to date on Facebook, testing thousands of versions of ads per day to maximize its spending.

But behind the scenes, a source familiar with the campaign tells Axios, the thinking has shifted: "As everyone can see, we still have strong spending on Facebook, but the percentage of our total media budget [on Facebook] is shrinking."

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Alayna Treene

Trump's revenge tour has the House in its sights

Illustration: Aïda Amer/Axios. Photo: Saul Loeb/Getty Contributor

In the lead-up to the 2018 midterm elections — buoyed by Republican control of both chambers — President Trump viewed campaigning for the House as a lower-tier priority and instead poured his energy into rallying for the Senate.

But after the GOP reckoning in 2018, and experiencing firsthand how damaging a Democratic-led House has been to him, Trump is now personally invested in helping Republicans regain the majority in November, several people familiar with his thinking tell Axios.

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Jacob Knutson

Pelosi warns U.S. allies against working with China's Huawei

Nancy Pelosi, Feb. 16. Photo: Sven Hoppe/picture alliance via Getty Images

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Sunday cautioned U.S. allies against allowing Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei to develop their 5G networks, arguing at the Munich Security Conference that doing so is akin to “choosing autocracy over democracy," CNBC reports.

Why it matters: Pelosi's hawkish stance marks a rare area of agreement with the Trump administration, which believes Huawei is a national security threat because the Chinese government may be capable of accessing its equipment for espionage.

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