Apple boasts record Q1 as revenue tops $10bn
No love for netbooks, Palm
Apple announced its first-quarter financial results today, beating estimates from the Wall Street guessmen.
But these were almost secondary. During the Q&A session that ended their Q1 earnings call, Apple spokesfolks skirted questions about Steve Jobs's health, dissed netbooks, reaffirmed their support for Apple TV, and fired a shot across the bulbous bow of the Palm Pre.
First the numbers, which set new records for the Cupertino computer consumer-electronics manufacturer.
Revenue for the company's first quarter - which runs from September 1 through December 31 - surpassed $10bn "for the first time in Apple's history," according to the effusive Peter Oppenheimer, Apple's senior vice president and chief financial officer. The exact figure, $10.17bn, led to another record for the quarter: $1.61bn in profits.
Compared to the same quarter last year, revenues were up 5.94 per cent and profits 1.90 per cent - not exactly earthshaking growth, but not too shabby during a quarter in which PC sales plummeted worldwide.
Before you say "but Apple's no longer just a PC manufacturer - that growth must be coming from the iPhone and other Apple gadgetry," know that Apple's Mac sales were up nine per cent over the same quarter in 2007 to over 2.5 million.
Of those Mac sales, the solid majority - 72 per cent - were laptops, reflecting the release of customer's pent-up demand when the new MacBook line was introduced in October, according to Oppenheimer.
Desktop sales were another story. They declined 21 per cent year-on-year - although Oppenheimer sought to soften the news by explaining that the new iMacs released in 2007 spiked the desktop market just as the new MacBooks did in 2008.
Adding to the relative weakness of Apple's desktop offerings, sales of the Mac Pro have slipped from 2007 to 2008.
The iPod had a year-on-year increase as well, but of only three percent. Still, a boatload minus three per cent is still quite a load: Apple sold 22,727,000 iPods during the quarter.
The increase in iPhone sales was an astronomical 88 per cent year-on-year, with just under 4.4 million being sold. The Jesus Phone now has 13.7 million apostles.
Apple's cash position remains strong, increasing from $25bn in the previous quarter to $28.1bn. If only our personal cash positions had such a comfortable year-end quarter.
COMMENTS
@Jared
>Leave netbooks to those who make netbooks.
Since its Asus that actually design and manufacture the better mobile Mac kit anyway [apart from the pretty enclosures and dodgy periphs] Apple couldn't possibly compete in this market.
Amazes me how many commenters still think Apple design and manufacture computers.....those days are long gone.
Coo!
Palm registered their lawyers.
Palm, it may be time to mobilize your lawyer corps. ®
Is this kinda like registering a dog? I mean my dog gets registered each year after he gets his rabies shot. It would seen good to do the same with lawyers.
I have the collar tag in my pocket...
"We think the products there are inferior."
Doesn't mean they're not getting into the netbook market, it means that nothing out there right now is what they think a netbook should be like. Just like the way Apple considered phones before the iPhone to be "inferior".
@ David Simpson
If you are so informed how come you aren't aware that Konfabulator was a 'direct' rip of something that shipped in 1984 as part of the first Mac OS? All that Knofabulator did was amalgamate the "widget" concept with the concept of Sherlock or Copernicus. That is it. They couldn't have patented it even if they had wanted to as there were lots of examples of prior art, many of which belonged to and were invented at Apple.
Mis-reporting rather than mis-direction
It would help if El Reg wouldn't spin so much. Cook wasn't as dismssive of the netbook category as this article implies (go read the full transcript of what he said to help get a clue). What he was saying was that the quality of the hardware wasn't there for *Apple* yet, and that they also didn't think much of the software available (a dig at both Linux and XP). However, he clearly states that it is a category that Apple has its eye on and could enter once the time is right. Apple obviously have the software in place (OS X), especially so because of the iPhone, but want to get their timing right so that they don't enter the space as "me-too" types and instead have something unique to offer it.
