Tech giant Apple has released its fiscal Q1 2014 earnings last week, announcing an $51.6 billion revenue with $13.1 billion in net profit resulting in a share price of $14.50. Comparing this to their quarter a year ago, the company has grown by 5.7% in revenue, 5% in EPS and net profit flat year over year.
The company has also announced the actual number of devices and products sold during this time. A total of 51 million iPhones, 26 million iPads and 4.8 million Macs were sold in this quarter alone, though experts had predicted that 55 million iPhones would be sold during this time, meaning that the results will be somewhat disappointing to the company.
However, when compared to the previous year’s quarter, sales of iPhones has grown by 6.7% while iPad sales increased by 13.5%. There are, of course, more products from the company, and TechCrunch have completed covered the results.
There’s a chance that more iPads could have actually been sold had inventory been greater. In fact, Peter Oppenheimer, CFO of Apple, said that: “We exited the December quarter near supply/demand balance.”
Oppenheimer also commented: “We are really happy with our record iPhone and iPad sales, the strong performance of our Mac products and the continued growth of iTunes, Software and Services. We love having the most satisfied, loyal and engaged customers, and are continuing to invest heavily in our future to make their experiences with our products and services even better.”
A spokesperson from helpingu2save.co.uk who specialise in repairing IPhones went on to say: “All apple devices are so popular that even we have seen a considerable amount in sales of IPhone paraphernalia compared to other brands. Their market hold is getting even bigger now that they offer a cheaper alternative to the standard iPhone.”
–Highs and lows
Analysts had expected Apple to report earnings of $14.36 per share with $58.1 billion in revenue, according to Fortune, with expectations of growth in revenue and EPS. However, even with an all-time high sale figure for iPhones, the revenue was below expectations for this quarter.
Fortunately, EPS was far above expectations resulting in a balanced flat net profit. These figures have shown that Apple’s projections have been pretty accurate, with their upper end forecast being reasonably close to the actual figures.
It’s not just the hardware devices that have grown in sales. Software has also enjoyed a growth of 26% from Q1 2013, with Ios7 being installed on 80% of all compatible devices. Oppenheimer has called it the “most popular operating system in the world”, with iWork apps being now free across several systems.
The popularity of software has grown so much in fact, that the likes of iTunes and the likes represent $4.4 billion in the quarter’s revenue.
–Cold hard cash
Apple famously once had more disposable cash than the US government, and their cash in hand has in fact grown from $146.76 billion to $158.8 billion and is a huge asset for the company. So what is expected for the next quarter?
Christmas sales obviously influence the success that many companies enjoy in that particular quarter, meaning that Apple projects a target of $42-44 billion with a margin between 37 and 38%. Meanwhile, revenue only continues to grow in Europe and especially China, showing that Apple’s work to improve its market share in an Eastern market is working.