q12016
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Nintendo's lack of breakthrough games hit profits hard (update)
Despite Nintendo's attempts to lower expectations ahead of announcing its financial results, its latest quarterly earnings aren't good. At all. Net sales are down 31 percent compared to the same quarter last year, down to 62 billion yen ($587 million). Meanwhile, it saw an operating loss of 5.1 billion yen (roughly $48 million). Nintendo managed to sell 220,000 Wii Us, nudging the total number of consoles sold over 13 million, while the aging 3DS notched another million sales. Despite the company owning parts of Pokémon Go, it isn't reflected in the earnings, as the game was released after the quarter that ended in June. However, the company took to Twitter to announce that its curious Pokémon Go Plus accessory has been delayed two months until September.
Over one million people swiped right for premium Tinder
According to Match Group, more than one million people have ponied up the $9.99 per month (or more, if you're over 30) for Tinder's premium service level in the first quarter of 2016. That figure is a relatively small portion of Tinder's 50 million global users, but there are still more than a million people out there whose app-based dating experience includes unlimited swipes, extra Super Likes and the ability to change their location to swipe from afar. If you want a robotic meat-swiper, however, you'll have to build one yourself.
Moving the Galaxy S7 launch up helped Samsung's profits
Samsung's Galaxy phones drove rapidly growing profits until sales peaked a couple of years ago, but the company just reported its Q1 2016 operating profit is up 12 percent from 2015. Coming at the same time as Apple faced its first revenue drop in a decade, Samsung is getting a boost from releasing its Galaxy S7 earlier in the year than usual. Even a "one time royalty expense" didn't make a noticeable dent in the segment's performance, which is the highest it's been since the second quarter of 2014.
The smartphone market is peaking
It's not just Apple taking a tumble in the smartphone market, apparently. IDC has published estimates for first quarter market share which not only suggest that shipments are virtually flat (up a mere 0.2 percent), but that the mobile landscape is changing rapidly. While Apple was the only company in the top five manufacturers to see a big hit, Samsung shrank slightly as well... and even the Chinese contingent is shaking things up a bit. Huawei is still sitting comfortably in third place, but Lenovo and Xiaomi are out of the top ranks -- instead, it's the popular but not-quite-household names like Oppo and Vivo (both owned by BBK) that are storming up the charts.
Twitter's 5 million new users aren't enough
First the good news: Twitter added an additional 5 million monthly active users during the first quarter of 2016. The company can now boast 310 million subscribers. That's both a year-over-year and quarterly increase. The bad news is that the company is still not profitable, as it booked a $79 million loss for the quarter.
T-Mobile continues the good times with 2.2 million new customers
T-Mobile's hot streak isn't ending any time soon. The magenta-hued carrier has posted results for the first quarter of 2016 that suggest its strategy of loading on perks is paying off. It racked up 2.2 million total new customers, over 1 million of which were highly coveted postpaid (regular subscription) users. For context, Verizon added "just" 640,000 postpaid users in the same quarter -- although T-Mobile's 65.5 million total customers still pales in comparison to Verizon's 112.6 million, it's catching up. The jury's still out on AT&T and Sprint, which respectively post their figures later today (April 26th) and on May 3rd, but they'll have a high bar to clear.
Microsoft's phone business is in free fall
To no one's surprise, Microsoft isn't turning much of a profit from its phone business. According to its latest quarterly report, the company saw a dip of mobile revenue by as much as 46 percent. It sold 2.3 million Lumias over the past three months, which is a 73 percent drop from this time last year. Sadly, this is an ongoing trend; last quarter, it reported a phone sales drop by as much as 54 percent.
Netflix is putting five percent of its cash budget into films
Now that Amazon is offering a monthly video subscription and Netflix's delayed price hike is kicking in, how are things going for the video streaming king? According to its just-released Q1 2016 earnings report (PDF): Pretty well. Netflix beat its own estimates by growing to 81.5 million customers worldwide (with nearly 47 million of them in the US), while releasing a new original series or film every week. Expect more of those films too, as Reed Hastings confirmed Netflix will release Bright in 2017 starring Will Smith, after debuts this year that include Brad Pitt's War Machine and Mascots with Christopher Guest. The company "will invest 5 percent of our cash budget in original films," and is also getting ready to launch its "near live" 3-nights-per-week talk show with Chelsea Handler.
Oculus Rift goes mainstream early 2016
Quarter one 2016. It's the answer to a question we've asked basically every time we've spoken with Oculus VR since 2012: "When does the consumer version of the Rift come out?" Aside from that revelation, we're also getting our first look at the final design of the headset, but that's it! No word on price or launch games, experiences or Facebook apps, either. Come to think of it, "no" probably fits as an answer to any other question you might have at this point. Oculus teased that it'll have more to share soon, specifically hinting at June's Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3), but for now we'll just have to make do with these morsels. If Sony hoped to have early 2016 to itself in terms of VR for the masses with Project Morpheus, those dreams have effectively been dashed.
