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RIM posts impressive second quarter, expects even better third quarter
Coming off some negative press in the hands of the Torch, RIM would just like to remind everyone that it's still selling a crap ton of BlackBerrys... and it's got the cash to prove it. The company's second-quarter results are out, showing revenue growth of 31 percent year-over-year and shipment growth of 45 percent over the same period -- up to 12.1 million, meaning the company has now shipped a grand total of around 115 million devices bearing the BlackBerry label. Of those 12.1 million shipments, about 4.5 million accounted for new account activations, meaning that the company isn't simply keeping existing customers in the fold with new hardware -- it's still managing to sell noobs on the platform, too (or at the very least, there are still companies out there forcing BlackBerrys into new employees' pockets). Net income was up a tick against the prior quarter, though a stock repurchase of around $1.5 billion means that RIM finished out Q2 with significantly less cash on hand than it had in Q1, around $2.03 billion at the moment. The company's forecasting even better third quarter numbers, too, with somewhere between 5 and 5.4 million new account activations and EPS up another 16 to 24 cents. High hopes for the Curve 3G and BlackBerry 6 upgrades, perhaps?
AT&T's bullish earnings report suggests iPhone exclusivity is almost over
You can tell a product ranks high in the public consciousness when something like this is news: AT&T's quarterly earnings report makes it sound like the telecom may finally lose its iPhone exclusivity deal. While a class-action lawsuit recently confirmed the handset was originally locked to AT&T / Cingular for a full five years, the company's Q2 SEC filing has the company making a considerable number of familiar excuses why AT&T's cellular business will thrive even "as these exclusivity arrangements end." While the iPhone isn't mentioned by name, it's hard to imagine sentences like "We believe offering a wide variety of handsets reduces dependence on any single handset" could refer to anything else -- but before you start defecting to Team Red, know there's nothing in there that suggests a date, much less proof of the fabled CDMA iPhone.
T-Mobile's second quarter: revenue up, but customers still leaving
The good news for T-Mobile USA is that it seems to be moving upmarket thanks to a huge push into the smartphone space with devices like the HD2 and the myTouch 3G Slide -- enough of a push, in fact, so that it recorded slightly higher revenues in the second quarter of 2010 both year-over-year and against the first quarter ($5.36 billion in total). The bad news, though, is that it continues to lose customers -- roughly 93,000 this time around, 16,000 worse than the 77,000 it shed in the first three months of the year. Indeed, ARPUs were generally up over the first quarter, with data revenue up a whopping 18 percent against the second quarter of 2009; blended ARPU was down year-over-year, though, likely accounting at least in part for the $180 million decline in net income over the same period. With Sprint starting to add customers again, could this mean a merger's more appealing than ever? Follow the break for the full press release.
Garmin: revenue from phone segment in Q2 was 'below our plan'
Garmin's second-quarter results hit the wires this week, and overall, the company seems to be pretty healthy; its automotive, outdoor, aviation, and marine businesses all posted growth, average selling price was up, and shipped units grew a solid 8 percent year-over-year. If you read a little deeper, though, there's one segment that undelivered -- smartphones, a joint venture the company shares with ASUS -- which contributed $27 million in revenue in the last three months. $27 million in profit would be business as usual for a division of a company of Garmin's size, but $27 million in revenue is a drop in the bucket -- and sure enough, the earnings report goes on to say that the performance was "below [its] plan." They go on to say that they're "working aggressively with T‐Mobile and other carriers around the globe on the appropriate positioning and pricing of our devices in the competitive smartphone space," interesting wording considering our shock at the Garminfone's initial pricing (and the fact that it's more recently come down to $130 for new subscribers). In Garmin's own words, the smartphone business is competitive to say the least -- you can't waltz in with an overpriced first-gen product and expect the world -- so it'll be interesting to see how they adjust going forward.
LG, Samsung report earnings, phone businesses not in perfect health
South Korean archrivals Samsung and LG have both come clean with their second-quarter earnings this week. While there's still black ink across the board, LG suffered a 33 percent decline in net profit year-over-year, undoubtedly due in large part to a little bit of bleeding going on in the giant mobile division where they've posted a year-over-year loss "due to investment in R&D and expansion of channels in emerging markets for future development." Samsung, meanwhile, saw a 7.2 percent profit margin in its mobile business and a respectable 22 percent year-over-year improvement in shipments, but it came at the cost of higher price pressures -- margins are razor-thin for these guys, and they seem to be getting even smaller. The company ends on a positive note by saying that the Galaxy S series and the Wave should help push it through the third quarter, but considering how these guys flood the low end (read: the part of the market where it's especially difficult to make a buck) with dozens of devices every year, it seems like it's going to take superhuman efficiency to keep shareholders smiling.
Apple has another record quarter, posts $3.07b profit
Apple might not be too happy about having a fourth-gen iPhone prototype get stolen, but there's nothing like cold, hard cash to turn a frown upside-down -- and the company certainly made plenty of it in the second quarter of 2010, posting a $3.07b profit on $13.5b in revenue. That's the Apple's best non-holiday quarter ever -- profits were up 90 percent while revenue was up 49 percent -- and yet another record quarter for Steve and the gang. Mac sales were up 33 percent from a year ago with 2.94m units sold, iPhone sales were up 131 percent with 8.75m units sold, and iPod sales were down one point with 10.89m units sold. We're just about to jump on the analyst conference call, we'll let you know if we hear anything good -- we wonder what people might be asking about? Update: Oh, why not -- let's liveblog this thing. Follow along after the break at 5PM ET.
Samsung unveils Aura and Eclipse Montevina-based laptops
Montevina-based laptops are slowly but surely starting to trickle out, and Samsung's the latest to joint the party with a new Aura machine and the entirely new Eclipse line. The new R510 Aura sports a 15.4-inch screen, 2.53GHz T9400 Core 2 Duo on Montevina's 1066MHz bus with integrated X4500 graphics, 4GB of RAM, a dual-layer burner and a 320GB drive in a five-pound package, while the new Eclipse R710 17-inch desktop replacement sports a 2.53GHz P9500 Core 2 Duo and 512MB NVIDIA GeForce 9600M GT graphics in a new case design with colorful accents. Rounding out the Eclipse line are the 12.1-inch Q210 and 13.3-inch Q310 (pictured), which are being billed as ultraportables. Both feature NVIDIA 256MB GeForce 9200M GS, 4GB of RAM, 320GB drives, and dual-layer burners in the new Eclipse case design, but the Q210 makes do with a 2.26GHz P8400 Core 2 Duo, while the larger Q310 gets a 2.4GHz chip. No pricing information is available yet, but scroll past the break for pictures of the other machines.Read - Eclipse Q210 and Q310Read - Eclipse R710Read - Aura R510
