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Apple Reports Record Results - 47.8 Million iPhones Sold; 22.9 Million iPads Sold
Use Your Mac as a Wi-Fi Hotspot and More
Why Apple's Earnings Fall Is Completely Unjustified
Sorry, Apple-Haters, But Cupertinian Doom Not On The Horizon
Why Laptop/Tablet Hybrids Will Never Work
Microsoft's ARM blunder: 7 reasons why Windows RT was DOA
Samsung Surpassed Apple as Top Global Semiconductor Customer, While Samsung and Apple Jointly Consumed 15 Percent of Total Semiconductor Demand in 2012
Microsoft May Back Dell Buyout
Apple Reports Record Results - 47.8 Million iPhones Sold; 22.9 Million iPads Sold
Apple on Wednesday announced financial results for its 13-week fiscal 2013 first quarter ended December 29, 2012. The Company posted record quarterly revenue of $54.5 billion and record quarterly net profit of $13.1 billion, or $13.81 per diluted share. These results compare to revenue of $46.3 billion and net profit of $13.1 billion, or $13.87 per diluted share, in the 14-week year-ago quarter. Gross margin was 38.6 percent compared to 44.7 percent in the year-ago quarter. International sales accounted for 61 percent of the quarters revenue.
Average weekly revenue was $4.2 billion in the quarter compared to $3.3 billion in the year-ago quarter.
The Company sold a record 47.8 million iPhones in the quarter, compared to 37 million in the year-ago quarter. Apple also sold a record 22.9 million iPads during the quarter, compared to 15.4 million in the year-ago quarter. The Company sold 4.1 million Macs, compared to 5.2 million in the year-ago quarter. Apple sold 12.7 million iPods in the quarter, compared to 15.4 million in the year-ago quarter.
Apple's Board of Directors has declared a cash dividend of $2.65 per share of the Companys common stock. The dividend is payable on February 14, 2013, to shareholders of record as of the close of business on February 11, 2013.
"We're thrilled with record revenue of over $54 billion and sales of over 75 million iOS devices in a single quarter," said Tim Cook, Apple's CEO. "We're very confident in our product pipeline as we continue to focus on innovation and making the best products in the world."
"We're pleased to have generated over $23 billion in cash flow from operations during the quarter," said Peter Oppenheimer, Apples CFO. "We established new all-time quarterly records for iPhone and iPad sales, significantly broadened our ecosystem, and generated Apples highest quarterly revenue ever."
Apple is providing the following guidance for its fiscal 2013 second quarter:
• revenue between $41 billion and $43 billion
• gross margin between 37.5 percent and 38.5 percent
• operating expenses between $3.8 billion and $3.9 billion
• other income/(expense) of $350 million
• tax rate of 26%
Apple will provide live streaming of its Q1 2013 financial results conference call beginning at 2:00 p.m. PST on January 23, 2013 at:
http://www.apple.com/quicktime/qtv/earningsq113
This webcast will also be available for replay for approximately two weeks.
Use Your Mac as a Wi-Fi Hotspot and More
MacTuts+'s Andrew Lee notes that while Wi-Fi hotspots and networks abound these days from coffee shops to airports, but there still may be occasions when you find yourself without a wireless connection and have five friends who need to get online. Lee shows us Mac users how to create a Wi-Fi hotspot from a wired Internet connection with our Macs usiing functionality built into OS X, and also covering how to set up computer-to-computer networks for sharing files, screens, and more, and no routers required. Lee says this system works great when you're traveling and only have a single cable to connect several gadgets. Everything gets to connect to the Internet from just one cord.
You can check it out at:
http://goo.gl/6fXrX
Why Apple's Earnings Fall Is Completely Unjustified
SeekingAlpha's Bill Maurer notes that for its 3013 fiscal 1st quarterquarter, Apple missed slightly on revenues, but earnings per share came in above expectations, as did margins. Nevertheless Apple shares declined in after hours trading, which Maurer thinks might provide an opportunity for investors.
Analyzing the figures Apple reported, Maurer deduces that while iPhone and iPad sales were very healthy, Mac sales were extremely disappointing, which he attributes to both weakness in the overall PC market and well as some apparent supply constraints, with Apple apparently not able to entirely fulfil demand over the holiday season, and which he points to as the primary reason why Apple missed revenue expectations, and Apple Mac average selling price ticked up a bit.
iPhone and iPad unit sales came in fine, although there may have been some iPhone supply issues as well.
As for the iPad, Maurer calculates that it returned about 59.5% growth over last year's Apple Q1when you factor in that there was an extra week in this year's quarteralthough thanks to introduction of the iPad mini, average selling price dropped a bit, which was expected.
Then there's Apple's "other revenues", which were extremely strong at more than $5.5 billion.
Consequently, Maurer thinks Apple's latest share price fall is unjustified, backs his contention with several important facts, and says the stock stays where it it or goes lower in the next few days, he might even buy some himself.
For the full commentary visit here:
http://goo.gl/FK6bD
Sorry, Apple-Haters, But Cupertinian Doom Not On The Horizon
The Register's Rik Myslewski takes a closer look at Apple's 'disappointing' fiscal Q1/13 numbers, in the context of Apple's stock is taking a beating-down of around 10 percent from its $514.01 Wednesday close,, noting that quarterly revenue of $54.5bn, up 17.7 per cent from the $46.3bn earned in the same quarter last year; iPhone unit sales of 47.8 million, up 29.0 per cent from the 37.04 million sold during same quarter last year; iPad unit sales of 22.9 million, up 48.4 per cent from 15.43 million year-on-year; and cash reserves of $137.1bn, up 40.4 per cent from the $97.6bn it held in cash, short-term, and long-term securities at the same time last year, oblige even the most rock-ribbed Apple-hater to grudgingly agree with Apple CEO Tim Cook that those metrics are impressive, especially in light of this year's Apple Q1 having only 13 weeks while last year's Q1 had 14 weeks, and adjusted for which Apple managed a per-week revenue increase of 27.2 percentMay
For the full commentary visit here:
http://goo.gl/pVOvk
Why Laptop/Tablet Hybrids Will Never Work
CNNMoney's Adrian Covert maintains that while Microsoft's Surface tablet PC aims to meld laptop with hybrid, it proves that the quest may be futile, and that one single device promising both laptop and tablet experiences with no compromises will never work, and that goes for the Surface Pro that's coming next month as well as the Surface RT that went on sale last fall.
Covert notes that while the Pro's Intel Core i5 processor makes everything faster and smoother, it runs legacy Windows apps on the full desktop version of Windows 8 and even includes a pressure-sensitive stylus, it's not only as or more expensive than some PC Ultrabooks starting at $899, it's also more than half an inch thick and weighs two pounds, which would be fine for a laptop, but for a tablet is borderline obese, and battery performance will likely also lag behind other tablets as well.
For the full commentary visit here:
http://goo.gl/xq74C
Microsoft's ARM blunder: 7 reasons why Windows RT was DOA
The Register's Neil McAllister thinks Microsoft's consumer level tablet OS was doomed from the start, and while comparisons of Windows 8 and Windows Vista are premature, with the holiday season behind us, it's now plain that Windows RT is a flop.
In his estimation, Microsoft choosing to launch Surface based on an ARM processor running Windows RT, delivered a machine with an oddly hobbled OS that's neither fish nor fowl, one that falls somewhere between Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8 but with the advantages of neither, and for all Microsoft's hype around Surface RT, customers aren't buying it - literally - with UBS analyst Brent Thill estimating that Microsoft has sold only +/- 1 million Surfaces since the RT launched in October 2012 - half what Thill himself had predicted, McAllister noting that even sales of 2 million would have been a spit in Apple's ocean of 14 million iPads sold in the three months before the holiday season.
Reasons for the failure cited:
1. Windows RT devices are too expensive
2. The software stinks
3. Microsoft is competing with itself
4. Microsoft is competing with everyone else, too
5. Windows RT is too closed
6. Hardware OEMs haven't bought in
7. Microsoft's marketing sucks
McAllister concludes that Windows RT is an OS that nobody asked for, sent in search of a market that's already well served by other options, and even ignoring everything else that's wrong with it, that's reason enough for it to go down in history as one of Microsoft's biggest bombs.
Hard to dispute. Ed.
For the full commentary visit here:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/01/18/7_reasons_windows_rt_was_doa/
Samsung Surpassed Apple as Top Global Semiconductor Customer, While Samsung and Apple Jointly Consumed 15 Percent of Total Semiconductor Demand in 2012
Samsung Electronics and Apple between then dominated semiconductor demand in 2012, although Samsung overtook Apple as the top worldwide semiconductor customer, according to Gartner, Inc. Based on analysis of the design total available market (TAM), Samsung and Apple together consumed $45.3 billion of semiconductors in 2012, an increase of $7.9 billion from 2011, to represent 15 percent of total semiconductor demand, while the total semiconductor market decreased by 3 percent overall.
"Although Samsung and Apple continue to go from strength to strength, other leading electronic equipment makers fared less well, and six of the top 10 reduced their demand in 2012," says Masatsune Yamaji, principal research analyst at Gartner. "In addition to a weak macroeconomic situation, a dramatic change in consumer demand contributed to a reduction in semiconductor demand in 2012. The PC market still represented the largest sector for chip demand, but desktop and mobile PCs did not sell well, as consumers' interest shifted to new mobile computing devices like smartphones and media tablets. This shift caused a substantial decrease in semiconductor demand in 2012, as the semiconductor content of a smartphone or a media tablet is far less than that of a PC."
The top 10 companies demanded $106.4 billion of semiconductors in 2012, to account for 36 percent of total semiconductor vendors' worldwide revenue of $297.6 billion (see Table 1). Of the top 10 companies, Nokia's semiconductor demand contracted most.
"While the growth of new mobile computing devices, notably smartphones and media tablets, has not fully compensated for the drop in the semiconductor demand from the PC market, the data center and communications infrastructure market will keep driving semiconductor demand. The limited computing and storage resources of new mobile computing devices will be compensated for by cloud computing services with light application software," continues Mr. Yamaji. "Price competition between smartphone and media tablet vendors was severe in 2012, as hardware differentiation was very difficult to achieve. Innovations in device hardware will soon be copied by competitors, as semiconductor vendors will soon provide commercial SoC (system-on-chip), software and reference designs to hardware vendors needing to catch up with innovative market leaders. Semiconductor vendors must aid, or at least monitor, the hardware innovations of the market leaders."
Design TAM represents the total silicon content in all products designed by a certain electronic equipment manufacturer or in a certain region. Design TAM is a useful index for semiconductor vendors when they are considering how to allocate their sales or field application engineer resources by customer or region.
More detailed analysis is available in the report "Market Insight: Semiconductor Demand From OEMs, ODMs and EMS Companies, Worldwide, 2012 (Preliminary)."
The report is available on Gartner's website at:
http://www.gartner.com/resId=2300515
Microsoft May Back Dell Buyout
The New York Times' Michael J. De La Merced and Nick Wingfield report that the effort to take Dell private has gained a prominent, if unusual, backer: Microsoft, which they say is in talks to help finance a takeover bid for Dell that would exceed $20 billion, according a person briefed on the matter saying on Tuesday.
For the full report visit here:
http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2013/01/22/microsoft-may-back-dell-buyout/
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