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NPD credits Verizon iPhone with stemming the Android tide in Q1 smartphone sales
As much as we were hoping to get some definitive statements from AT&T and Verizon's Q1 2011 financials about the Verizon iPhone's impact on the smartphone market, none were really forthcoming. It's left to analyst outfits like the NPD, therefore, to try and parse the data for us and read between the official lines. The latest numbers from the NPD Group's Mobile Phone Tracker indicate that Apple's share of US smartphones sales jumped from 19 percent in Q4 2010 to 28 percent in the first quarter of this year, which helped stymie Android's prodigious expansion. The Google OS went from being on 53 percent of all smartphones sold to a flat 50 percent in the quarter. Also intriguing about the period is that, for the first time, smartphones accounted for more than half of all mobile phones sold in the US, at 54 percent. The top five best-selling cellphones also happened to be smartphones, with Apple and HTC providing two each; the iPhone 4, iPhone 3GS, Droid X, EVO 4G, and the Droid Incredible took home the NPD commendations. [Thanks, Matt] Disclaimer: NPD's Ross Rubin is a contributor to Engadget.
Panasonic will layoff 17,000 workers globally (updated)
No matter how you slice it, 17,000 is a big number, especially when its seventeen thousand humans looking for jobs. The layoffs represent a four-percent reduction of Panasonic's 380,000 global workforce due to restructuring efforts, according to Nikkei. They are expected to begin this year and will mainly impact employees outside of Japan. Update: Post updated to reflect the actual number of job cuts, not the 40,000 originally quoted by Nikkei or the 35,000 quoted by the AFP. The cuts will come over two years. The news comes as Panasonic reported a ¥40.7 billion ($499 million) loss for quarter, largely on account of a ¥61 billion ($748 million) restructuring cost. Panny says that its bottom line was also affected by a strong Yen, stiff competition in television sales, and the recent earthquake and tsunami.
Netflix Q1 report shows 23.6 million subscribers, embraces rerun TV moniker
Netflix has issued its Q1 letter to investors, revealing a subscriber count that has grown by 3.3 million to 23.6 million subscribers. Among the financial details were a few tidbits about its position and plans for the future, including acknowledging Comcast -- which now has fewer customers than Netflix -- CEO Brian Roberts' calling Netflix "rerun TV" as "fundamentally correct" and reiterating its belief that Netflix strengthens traditional video channels. There's also terms like "cord mending" thrown about, though it does also acknowledge TV Everywhere and video on-demand as potential competitors. In terms of new competition like Hulu Plus and Amazon Prime Instant Video the plan is simple: grow faster and buy more content than them while also developing "two or three" similar deals to the already announced original series House of Cards. We'll wait for the investor call at 6 p.m. to hear more details, click through to read the PDF for yourself.
Nintendo sells 3.61 million 3DS handhelds, but sees 2010 net profit decline by 66 percent
It's a "good news, bad news" kind of a day in Super Mario land, as Nintendo's announcement of a Wii successor has been followed up with the delivery of the company's financial results for fiscal year 2010, which don't make for happy reading. Nintendo's net sales of $12.4 billion for the period ending on March 31st 2011 was 29 percent less than it tallied during the previous year, while its $825 million of net profit was also a staggering 66 percent lower than it earned last year. The 3DS has sold well so far, reaching 3.61 million transactions worldwide, but the Wii is down to 15 million global sales, which marks a 25 percent contraction from its FY2009 total of 20 million. So the impetus for a hardware refresh of the Wii is clearly there, now it's just a matter of waiting for E3 to find out exactly how Nintendo plans to go about it.
AMD collects half a billion in Q1 profit, Fusion APUs now account for half of its laptop shipments
AMD's net income for the past quarter was $510 million, generated from $1.61 billion in total revenues. That should make happy reading for a company that's been raising similar gross revenues previously but finding itself losing cash -- though the more intriguing figures are a little deeper in its latest disclosure. CFO and interim CEO Thomas Seifert has noted that AMD "tripled" its Fusion APU shipments relative to last quarter -- meaning that at least 3.9 million units have made their way out to OEM partners in Q1 -- which now account for "roughly half" of the company's notebook shipments. In less upbeat news, average selling prices in both the microprocessor and graphics divisions were down sequentially, with AMD having to react to pressure from its traditional foes Intel and NVIDIA. You might surmise that with the mainstream Llano APU out and shipping to computer makers, AMD might have a happier second quarter, but the company's guidance is for revenues to be flat or slightly down. A final note of pride is reserved for the Radeon HD 6490M and HD 6750M GPUs, which figured prominently in Apple's latest MacBook Pro refresh and mark a bit of a coup for AMD, who's now responsible for all of Apple's discrete graphics across the MacBook Pro and iMac computing lines. Click the links below for even more intel on Advanced Micro Devices.
Verizon reports 'strong' Q1 earnings: $27 billion revenue, 2.2 million iPhone activations
Yesterday was AT&T's turn, and today it's Verizon revealing its earnings for the first quarter of 2011. The company has reported $27 billion in consolidated revenue from its wireless and wireline businesses, which is up 5.3 percent year over year (on a non-GAAP basis), while profits rose to $1.4 billion. Fueling that growth was 1.8 million net additions to its wireless customer base, which now totals 88.4 million customers (and 104 million connections). It also saw 207,000 net additions to its FiOS internet business and 192,000 net additions to FiOS TV, which bring those total customer bases to 4.3 million and 3.7 million, respectively. As for that little iPhone 4 launch, Verizon says it's resulted in 2.2 million activations -- that's quite a bit less that AT&T's 3.6 million iPhone activations for the same quarter, as you've no doubt noticed, although it does also have the benefit of a much cheaper iPhone 3GS in addition to the iPhone 4. Verizon also said that demand was "strong" for its new LTE devices (including 260,000 HTC Thunderbolt activations), and that deployment of its LTE network remains on track, with it expected to be available in more than 175 markets by the end of the year -- in fact, that's actually up a bit from the 147 figure we last heard. Head on past the break for the company's full earnings report.
Nokia's Q1 2011: smartphone share down to 26 percent, 'more challenging' times ahead
Nokia has just published its first quarterly results in the era of its Microsoft partnership and things aren't looking too bright. Smartphone market share, which had been at 41 percent this time last year and 31 percent in January, has now dipped to 26 percent, while operating profits have taken a 17 percent tumble relative to last year. The company managed to ship one percent more phones in Q1 2011 than in Q1 2010, but its 108.5 million units was an 18 percent drop from last quarter's totals. CEO Stephen Elop describes the first quarter as solid, but warns that the second will be "more challenging." The impact of Japan's disaster earlier in the year will be felt more strongly in Q2, we're warned, with respect to component supply and logistics, while new products won't figure too strongly as Nokia intends to "start shipping the majority of our new products in the second half of the year." Elop is, however, encouraged by the "roadmap of mobile phones and Symbian smartphones" that Nokia has in store for 2011, which sounds good on the surface, but we'd be more comforted if he'd have inserted the words "Windows Phone" or "MeeGo" in that sentence too. Hit the links below to see the full financial details.
Apple announces record revenue for 2nd quarter FY11
Ahead of today's 5 PM conference call, Apple released its earnings report for the second quarter of fiscal 2011 (otherwise known as the first calendar quarter). Profit number: $5.99B in the quarter. Total revenue for the quarter is US$24.6 billion, versus 13.5B year-over-year. Earnings per diluted share comes in at $6.40, versus $3.33 last year. Forecasting $23B revenue for the next quarter. Product sales numbers rolled in as follows: 28% up year over year in Macs with 3.76M sold in the quarter, 18.6M iPhones (113% unit growth), 9.02M iPods (including the iPod touch) and 4.69M iPads, including the iPad 2. (The number on iPad sales disclosed via the Samsung lawsuit was thought to be only counting the original iPad, but it may have included the iPad 2, which was supply-constrained.) We were expecting a big Mac number based on the predictions from Gene Munster and sales data from NPD. You can compare and contrast the actual numbers against the predictions made by Wall Street analysts and top stock bloggers via the compilation done over at Apple 2.0/Fortune Tech. We'll be listening in to the conference call and liveblogging all the fun -- join in! Full press release below. Show full PR text Apple® today announced financial results for its fiscal 2011 second quarter ended March 26, 2011. The Company posted record second quarter revenue of $24.67 billion and record second quarter net profit of $5.99 billion, or $6.40 per diluted share. These results compare to revenue of $13.50 billion and net quarterly profit of $3.07 billion, or $3.33 per diluted share, in the year-ago quarter. Gross margin was 41.4 percent compared to 41.7 percent in the year-ago quarter. International sales accounted for 59 percent of the quarter's revenue. Apple sold 3.76 million Macs during the quarter, a 28 percent unit increase over the year-ago quarter. The Company sold 18.65 million iPhones in the quarter, representing 113 percent unit growth over the year-ago quarter. Apple sold 9.02 million iPods during the quarter, representing a 17 percent unit decline from the year-ago quarter. The Company also sold 4.69 million iPads during the quarter. "With quarterly revenue growth of 83 percent and profit growth of 95 percent, we're firing on all cylinders," said Steve Jobs, Apple's CEO. "We will continue to innovate on all fronts throughout the remainder of the year." "We are extremely pleased with our record March quarter revenue and earnings and cash flow from operations of over $6.2 billion," said Peter Oppenheimer, Apple's CFO. "Looking ahead to the third fiscal quarter of 2011, we expect revenue of about $23 billion and we expect diluted earnings per share of about $5.03." Apple will provide live streaming of its Q2 2011 financial results conference call beginning at 2:00 p.m. PDT on April 20, 2011 at www.apple.com/quicktime/qtv/earningsq211. This webcast will also be available for replay for approximately two weeks thereafter. This press release contains forward-looking statements including without limitation those about the Company's estimated revenue and earnings per share. These statements involve risks and uncertainties, and actual results may differ. Risks and uncertainties include without limitation the effect of competitive and economic factors, and the Company's reaction to those factors, on consumer and business buying decisions with respect to the Company's products; continued competitive pressures in the marketplace; the ability of the Company to deliver to the marketplace and stimulate customer demand for new programs, products, and technological innovations on a timely basis; the effect that product introductions and transitions, changes in product pricing or mix, and/or increases in component costs could have on the Company's gross margin; the inventory risk associated with the Company's need to order or commit to order product components in advance of customer orders; the continued availability on acceptable terms, or at all, of certain components and services essential to the Company's business currently obtained by the Company from sole or limited sources; the effect that the Company's dependency on manufacturing and logistics services provided by third parties may have on the quality, quantity or cost of products manufactured or services rendered; risks associated with the Company's international operations; the Company's reliance on third-party intellectual property and digital content; the potential impact of a finding that the Company has infringed on the intellectual property rights of others; the Company's dependency on the performance of distributors, carriers and other resellers of the Company's products; the effect that product and service quality problems could have on the Company's sales and operating profits; the continued service and availability of key executives and employees; war, terrorism, public health issues, natural disasters, and other circumstances that could disrupt supply, delivery, or demand of products; and unfavorable results of other legal proceedings. More information on potential factors that could affect the Company's financial results is included from time to time in the "Risk Factors" and "Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations" sections of the Company's public reports filed with the SEC, including the Company's Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended September 25, 2010, its Form 10-Q for the quarter ended December 25, 2010, and its Form 10-Q for the quarter ended March 26, 2011 to be filed with the SEC. The Company assumes no obligation to update any forward-looking statements or information, which speak as of their respective dates. Apple designs Macs, the best personal computers in the world, along with OS X, iLife, iWork and professional software. Apple leads the digital music revolution with its iPods and iTunes online store. Apple has reinvented the mobile phone with its revolutionary iPhone and App Store, and has recently introduced iPad 2 which is defining the future of mobile media and computing devices.
AT&T reports best-ever first quarter for smartphone sales with 5.5 million, 60 percent of them are iPhones
We've been waiting for this one, the first indicator of the mythical Verizon iPhone's impact on the fortunes of the formerly exclusive Applephone carrier, AT&T. As it turns out, business is rolling along as usual over on the blue team, where AT&T spent Q1 2011 activating a total of 3.6 million iPhones, a nice round million more than the same period last year. Also interesting is AT&T's note that somewhere around 40 percent of its smartphone sales come from Android, BlackBerry and Windows Phone 7 devices, leaving the iPhone to account for the remaining 60-ish percent. Taken as a whole, that group totaled up 5.5 million sales in the quarter, a new best for AT&T in the first three months of the year, and the smartphone segment is now said to account for 46.2 percent of the company's postpaid user base. Jump past the break for more details in AT&T's press release.
Philips sells HDTV business to Hong Kong-based TPV Technology, will sate itself with royalty payments
Philips has been making teevees for over 80 years, but today its new CEO has announced that this storied history is coming to an end. Unable to generate a profit from its HDTV division -- it lost the company €87 million in the first quarter -- Philips will soon sell the majority stake in it to Hong Kong manufacturer TPV Technology, while retaining a 30 percent ownership share and agreeing guaranteed royalty payments of €50 million per year from 2013 onwards. It's not a bad deal for the Dutch consumer electronics maker, whose bottom line for the first quarter was €137 million in the black, but would have been double that had the new arrangement been in place. All 4,000 Philips employees working under the HDTV umbrella will be transferred over to TPV, though the company says it doesn't want the "market to misread that [it] intend to lay-off a lot of employees." Which is not to say that it won't. A video interview with Philips' chief Frans van Houten discussing the change of direction can be found after the break.
Google announces Q1 earnings: $8.58 billion gross revenue, $2.3 billion net income
Well, it looks like Larry Page had a bit of good news and some bad news to deal with on his first quarterly earnings call as CEO of Google. The company has just reported $8.58 billion in gross revenue for the first quarter of 2011, which represents a 27 percent increase over the first quarter of last year, but is actually a bit less than analysts were expecting. That figure also doesn't include the company's so-called traffic acquisition costs, however, which totaled $2.04 billion for the quarter and bring the company's actual revenue down to "just" $6.54 billion. Net income for the quarter was $2.3 billion, which represents a more modest gain from $1.96 billion in the first quarter of 2010. Also cutting into profits quite a bit was Google's operating expenses, which were up a hefty 33 percent to $2.8 billion -- a sizable chunk of which went to the nearly 2,000 new employees the company hired during the quarter. Interestingly, Google also revealed a few Android stats during its earnings call, saying that app downloads are up a full fifty percent from the fourth quarter of 2010, and that there's a total of three billion Android apps installed worldwide. As for Android devices, there's apparently 350,000 of those being activated every day. Head on past the break for company's full earnings report.
SSX to descend in January 2012
During EA's Season Opener event yesterday, SSX creative director Todd Batty revealed a launch window for the snowboarding revival: January 2012. The game will be playable at E3 in June, so expect a more detailed evaluation from us at that point. The presentation was very light on SSX gameplay footage, though we were shown some new mechanics. An overhauled physics system in the game will attempt to eliminate invisible or man-made boundaries, allowing you to trick off rocks and find you own way down through the particular track in question. You'll also be able to employ a wingsuit in mid-air, making it possible to clear large, otherwise unnavigable terrain. Expect some familiar faces to return for this latest entry, too -- you can see the new version of Elise in the gallery below. During our interview with Batty following his presentation, he explained that dynamic snow particles, imbued with their own physics, could influence spontaneous avalanches throughout descent (now that sounds deadly).%Gallery-121051%
HTC breaks its own sales and profit records, keeps riding the smartphone wave to success
Another quarter, another spectacular set of financial results for HTC. The once-small Taiwanese phone maker reports its net income for the first quarter of 2011 nearly tripled earnings in the same period of 2010, now totaling an impressive $513 million. Overall quarterly revenue was in the vicinity of $3.6 billion and the causes cited were, rather predictably, demand for Android smartphones and higher-speed internet connectivity (as provided by the likes of the EVO 4G and Thunderbolt). Guess now we know why the stock markets are loving HTC so much -- the company just can't stop growing! [Thanks, Karan]
The most interesting things from Apple's Q1 earnings call
Perhaps, like me, you find most financial news and statistics boring. Perhaps, like me, when the AAPL liveblog came up yesterday, you decided it was probably time to go get some lunch instead. Fortunately, we have access to Business Insider, where they've compiled a quick and easy list of truly interesting items from the call yesterday, in plain English, with nary a mention of terms like "general allocation accounting" or "high-interest stock targets" (yawn). The long and short of it: There was no mention of Steve Jobs' illness, but Tim Cook and Peter Oppenheimer impressed, as did the company's standing in general (not surprising -- that's been the case for a while now). Apple's revenue grew 70% year over year, an astounding feat in an otherwise down economy. iTunes is now a $4 billion dollar industry in itself, and in just the first year of its life, the iPad has replaced 7% of all PC business. That's incredible, as are most of the other things on BI's list. Oh, and that $40 billion in cash that Apple's had to throw around for the past few years? Make that $60 billion. Yowza! Now that's worth paying attention.
Apple on iPad competition: Windows is 'big and heavy,' next-gen Android tablets are still vapor
Apple's COO (and current Steve Jobs stand-in) Tim Cook thinks "there's not much" competition to the company's iPad tablet. When queried about Apple's view on what the rest of the market offers, Cook was brutally candid in describing Windows-driven machines as generally being big, heavy and expensive, while current generations of Android-based slates are in his opinion merely "scaled-up smartphones." While we agree that Windows 7 isn't a terribly touch-friendly affair, we don't know that Cook's comments on Android are quite so pertinent now that Google's tablet-savvy Honeycomb iteration has been unveiled. Then again, he has something to say about the next generation of Android tablets as well, noting that the ones announced at CES lack pricing and release schedules, leading him to conclude that "today they're vapor." Ouch. As a parting shot, Tim took a moment to reaffirm Apple's belief that its integrated approach will always trump the fragmented nature of Android and its plurality of app stores. Hear his comments in full after the break.
Apple could sell record-breaking 4.3 million Macs this holiday
Sometime in January Apple will hold their FY2011 Q1 earnings call, and you will be sure to hear these words: "The quarter that just ended was the best quarter in Apple's history." It's something many of us have gotten used to hearing as Apple has said it (or a derivative of it, adding "non-holiday" between "best" and "quarter") every quarter for at least the last seven years. That familiar catchphrase shows no sign of stopping as NPD says Apple is on track to sell between 4.1 million and 4.3 million Macs in the December quarter. As AllThingsD points out, Apple's U.S. Mac sales are up 20 percent year-over-year for the first two months of the current quarter. International sales are growing even faster than domestic sales with 22 to 28 percent year-over-year growth for the first two months of the current quarter. Still haven't picked up Apple stock? There's still time as many think there's a 30ish-percent 12-month upswing coming.
Additional sources suggest cameras on iPad 2
Another rumor from Asian sources suggests the iPad 2 will ship with front- and rear-facing cameras, a thinner design, and possibly a retina display.* According to the report from supply chain sources, Asian component suppliers are ramping up for an early 2011 production run. This date jives with a rumor out of Digitimes that suggested the iPad 2 would ship within the next 100 days. Component suppliers involved in this upcoming manufacturing effort are thought to include Chinese touchscreen supplier Wintex, battery manufacturer Simplo Technology, digital camera chassis maker AVY Precision, and an unlisted manufacturer that supplies covers for electronic devices. The details leaked from these manufacturers match anaylsts' expectations and previous rumors. One manufacturer that claimed to be working on the iPad 2 suggests it would have dual cameras, while the other hinted at a higher resolution display (retina?) and thinner design. The sources also claim that two camera module suppliers, Genius Electronic Optical and Largan Precision, have recently received new supply orders from Apple. Thought to be for the rumored iPad 2, the source could not confirm the iPad was the intended device. These rumors come hot on the heels of leaked iPad cases from two seperate sources, both of which include cut-outs for a rear-facing camera. *We'll be interested to see what is meant by "retina display" here. Matching the iPhone 4's 326 PPI would require a screen resolution at or around 2560 x 1920 - nearly 5,000,000 pixels. Just powering such a thing would be difficult to say the least. [Via Engadget and AppleInsider]
Stark SouthPeak Q1 financials due to My Baby issues
SouthPeak's first quarter results saw the shaky publisher report a net loss of $1.2 million, compared to the $687K profit it reported during the same time last year. Revenues during the period were $1.4 million, a steep drop from the $16.7 million reported in the previous fiscal year. The publisher claims sales during the quarter were "largely impacted" by the My Baby mama-drama currently going on in the courts. SouthPeak is hopeful that a summary judgment granting the company the rights to resume production of My Baby: First Steps and "reinstate the contract with Nobilis" for future My Baby sequels will be upheld on December 2. Beyond praying that it gets My Baby back and sequels popping out, SouthPeak also spent time, and the bulk of its marketing costs during the quarter, promoting Two Worlds 2 -- which will arrive in the UK and US in January -- and getting the hype machine rolling for Stronghold 3.
Square Enix profits down, but not out as familiar franchises keep sales alive
If you think we're going to explain that mess of scribbles above -- fuggedaboutit! What we have parsed from Square Enix's six-month financial report (April–September 2010) is a rather slight net income: ¥1.723 billion ($21.4 million). While any company would take pocket change over a loss, Square Enix profits are indeed down 36 percent from the same period last year, and software sales for the first half of this fiscal year have relied heavily on "contribution from highly profitable carryover sales of major titles released in March" -- in other words: Final Fantasy XIII picked up the slack. And who were the slackers? Square Enix highlighted five "major titles" released during the period: Dragon Quest Monsters: Joker 2 (DS) - 1.28 million units sold (Japan-only) Final Fantasy XIV (PC) - 630K units sold (worldwide) Just Cause 2 (multiplatform) - 560K units sold (worldwide)* Kane & Lynch 2: Dog Days (multiplatform) - 1.12 million units sold (worldwide) Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep (PSP) - 510K units sold (worldwide)* *Title released in some regions prior to April 2010; sales only reflect those recorded in the six months ending September 30, 2010. Finally, Square Enix heralded its recent partnership with Chinese online games publisher Shanda Games; a deal indicative of two of the company's three proclaimed growth strategies: globalization and becoming "network centric." As for the third? Square Enix's three-pronged attack also stresses "strengthening our own-IPs." So when's that next Final Fantasy coming out again? [Image: Year-over-year comparison of monthly revenues from existing outlets; source: Square Enix]
Square Enix lowers six-month financial forecast, cuts expected sales by $100M
It looks like Square Enix characters will have to hold that spiky hair with generic product, as the company lowered its earnings forecast today for the six months (first half of its fiscal year) ending September 30, 2010. The publisher reduced new sales expectations by 10.5 percent to ¥68 billion ($846 million), which is far below the ¥90.6 billion the company took in during the same period last year. Squeenix also lowered its net income expectations for the two quarters to ¥1.7 billion ($21 million), a reduction of just over 29 percent from the original forecast. The company said that the declining figures were due to the "challenging operating environment" in which new games experienced "relatively slow growth." Squeenix's operating income remains high, however, thanks to "profitable carryover sales of major titles released in March of the previous fiscal year" -- i.e., Final Fantasy 13 et al. Square Enix will release its actual second fiscal quarter results in the near future.
