Quit your worrying. That seemed to be the message from Apple CEO-in-Waiting (AKA Chief Operating Officer) Tim Cook Wednesday. Cook tried to dispel talk that the tech giant’s gargantuan profits would be hurt as Japan-based suppliers recovered from last month’s devastating quake and tsunami.
Although acknowledging dozens of items used to build Apple products originate from Japan, Cook stressed Apple employees have “literally been working around the clock with our supplier partners in Japan and have been able to implement a number of contingency plans.”
Wall Street analysts reacted to Apple’s 83 percent year-over-year revenue growth with a mix of awe and relief. J.P. Morgan’s Mark Moskowitz late Wednesday described the revenue figure as a “magical growth story,” deriding observers who felt Apple’s profit margin could be reduced by supply chain concerns as “bogey investors.” Prior to the second quarter revenue statement, some worried Apple’s profit margin could fall to 36 percent. Instead, the tech giant reported a 41.4 percent profit margin.
Well-known Mac watcher Gene Munster, analyst with Piper Jaffray, declared Apple had a “monster” quarter. He said Cook’s statements about the effect of Japan on product supply removed a “key risk in the June quarter.” It will take until June for the iPad supply to equal demand, according to Munster.
[WSJ, AppleInsider]
Ed Sutherland is a veteran technology journalist who first heard of Apple when they grew on trees, Yahoo was run out of a Stanford dorm and Google was an unknown upstart. Since then, Sutherland has covered the whole technology landscape, concentrating on tracking the trends and figuring out the finances of large (and small) technology companies.
6 responses to “Apple: Supply Chain Unaffected Despite Japan Quake”
Do you know how many blogger and pundit articles there were about Apple’s supply chain getting totally wrecked by the Japan disaster? It was amazing how these people just spread rumors and speculate about all things Apple when they know nothing at all. I saw articles that claimed Apple was going to suffer the most of all companies due to supply shortages because there were brownouts in certain regions of Japan. This without knowing how many components Foxconn had already stockpiled before the disaster. There is absolutely too much misinformation on the web brought about by outright ignorance or people deliberately spreading FUD.
Apple’s not big on Java these days; you should use Objective-C code instead. ;)
It hasn’t stopped. bnet article today questions Tim Cook’s credibility and says that supply problems from Japan are going to happen anyway. His evidence? Because he thinks so, despite having the company CEO say otherwise.
These a**es are making George upset!