COVID-19 both helped and hurt Apple earnings in the company’s most-recent financial quarter. CEO Tim Cook and CFO Luca Maestri discussed the nitty-gritty details of the results Thursday. They also shared what’s really going on with Apple as it tries to keep releasing best-selling products in the middle of a pandemic that’s upended the world economy and ordinary people’s lives.
Here are seven things we learned from Apple’s Q4 2020 earnings call.
Apple pulled in more revenue last quarter than in any previous July-through-September period, despite the COVID-19 pandemic. Growth came from sales of Mac and iPad, as well as revenue from services.
But iPhone revenue was down dramatically because of the delayed release of the iPhone 12 series. That hurt earnings significantly.
The COVID-19 pandemic is causing unexpected consequences, including a sudden sharp rise in tablet sales, according to a market-research firm. Specifically, there’s significantly increased demand for large tablets with removable keyboards that can function as laptops.
Apple reportedly placed multiple rush orders for iPad screens with LG Display. The tablet saw increased demand in Asia this quarter, with COVID-19 forcing so many people to attend classes and work from home.
Revenue from iPad sales dropped 10% during the first quarter of 2020. And shipments dropped 3%, according to a market-research firm. But analysts say that people working and studying from home during the pandemic could bring a burst of purchases this quarter.
While COVID-19 certainly overshadowed Apple’s most recent financial quarter, the company actually saw an annual increase in revenue, with the growth primarily coming from services and wearables.
Looking ahead, the company predicts that Mac and iPad sales will be strong. And CEO Tim Cook remains confidant about Apple’s future.
Apple has a real hit on its hands with the 10.2-inch iPad it launched last fall. It helped push Apple to a 22.7% year-over-year increase in tablet shipments last quarter, according to a market-research firm.
iPadOS devices continue to vastly outsell all their rivals, and Apple increased its lead in the final three months of 2019.
Apple pulled in more revenue and profits last quarter than it ever has before. These numbers were buoyed by strong iPhone and wearable sales. But the news isn’t all good.
Check out these charts that show with a glance how the company made its money last quarter.
A quick glance at the Apple Q4 2019 earnings report shows the company just finished a record three months, but a deeper dive into the numbers reveals how Apple managed to pull in more revenue than it ever has in a July-through-September period, including strong increases from wearables, iPad and Services.
Just two companies saw increased tablet sales in the second quarter of this year. Both Apple and Amazon enjoyed strong improvement, while all their rivals dropped.
Apple further increased its dominance of this market, as iPad now makes up 38.1% of all tablets sold worldwide, gaining 4 percentage points year over year.
The total number of all Apple computers in active use is growing strongly, and is about to pass the 1.5 billion mark. This includes Macs, iPhones, and iPads.
That said, most of the total are iPhones. An industry analyst predicts there will be a billion of these in active use by early next year.
After several rocky quarters, Apple set a new record for third-quarter revenue. Plus there’s good news in iPad and Mac sales. However, iPhone revenue slipped considerably.
Check out these charts that demonstrate with a glance how the company did last quarter.
Taking a close look at Apple’s financial results during the first three months of this year in hard numbers shows how the company is changing. Services are getting more important to its bottom line, and so are iPads. While iPhone is still a big part of Apple’s business, it’s not as significant as it used to be.
Check out these charts that demonstrate with a glance how the changes play out.
iPad shipments grew by double digits last quarter, giving Apple its best holiday period for tablet sales since 2015. Shipments of slates and 2-in-1s had dropped earlier in the year, but analysts correctly predicted this was the result of people holding off for the new iPad Pro.
Some of Apple’s rivals also saw gains at the end of 2018.
Apple saw a decline last quarter in the number of iPad models it shipped globally. But there’s good news hidden amidst the bad: a market-analysis firm says consumers were just holding off purchases of new iOS tablets until this quarter.
Plus, Apple’s Q3 shipments were still more than sufficient to dominate this product category. If that’s not enough, as the company pointed out at its October press event, in the past four quarters, iPad sales beat every laptop vendor in the world.
Virtually every configuration of the new iPad Pro models sold out in the first day of pre-orders. Many went within a few hours, including the most expensive options.
This isn’t a guarantee that demand for these tablets is heavy because we don’t know how many units Apple had prepared for release day. Still, it’s a good sign.
There’s a lot of good news in Apple’s second earnings report of 2018 that should keep investors happy going into the next quarter.
Revenue during Q2 2018 hit an all-time high for a March quarter at $61.1 billion, thanks in large part to 52.2 million iPhones sold. Apple CEO Tim Cook says iPhone X sales are still killing it, too.
The iPad continues to dominate the tablet market, but the tablet market continues to decline.
For a 10th-straight quarter, year-over-year sales of tablet computers fell to a five-year low, according to the market research firm IDC. Even with enviable sales figures, iPad revenues have had a year-over-year slide for the last 13 quarters, according to the IDC report.
With quarterly revenue declining for the first time in more than a decade, Apple execs Tim Cook and Luca Maestri put on their game faces during today’s Apple earnings call to tell us why things aren’t really all that bad in Cupertino.
The sad truth is that slumping iPhone sales, which joined the iPad and Mac lineups in the down column, will likely take a toll on Apple’s image — and on its stock price.
Still, there were plenty of other intriguing and optimism-inspiring things we heard during Apple’s Q2 2016 earnings call. Here are the most important takeaways from this historic Apple moment.
After gloomy early reviews and alleged lower-than-expected orders by Apple, it seems the iPad Pro may have struck a chord with users after all.
A research firm claims that Apple’s giant tablet performed impressively over the all-important December quarter, despite its high price point.
Apple hopes the iPad Pro will reinvigorate slumping tablet sales, but the company’s not showing much faith in the device, if initial orders are to be believed.
According to supply chain sources, Apple is taking a “rather conservative attitude” toward iPad Pro, ordering just 2.5 million for the rest of 2015 — and possibly even less for the first quarter of 2016 if holiday sales prove weaker than expected.
According to a new report by the Pew Internet and American Life Project, one in four adults in the United States owns a tablet of some kind. Two thirds of those adults have purchased them in the last year, according to the study, which was reported by The Economist. Further, the data doesn’t even include the new Google Nexus tablet, nor the new Kindle Fire HD from Amazon.
Is iPad in trouble? Is this a new era for Apple, one in which it must play catch up? The numbers of units do seem to tell that story.
I’m not buying it, though.
In yet another another analyst forecast, Mac sales are expected to decline as demand for the iPad continues to increase. According to a report by BMO analyst Keith Bachman, the last two quarters of 2012 will be “challenging” for Apple, due to increased iPad demand and the expectation of a new iPhone.
Bachman has lowered his Mac sales forecast by 1.6 million units, while raising iPad sales expectations by 3.8 million. In fact, for the next six quarters, Bachman predicts a reduction in Mac sales by 40% of the increased iPad sales.