Apple: best quarter ever $13 Bajillion

Holy shit! 2nd most profitable quarter in any (US) company’s history!

The Android tablets are catching up this time, I’m sure of it.

I think Samsung just got Samsunged.

Man, the denial on Neowin.net is disturbingly hilarious.

-Wow thats a lot of money 96 billion cash on HAND! thats insane! What’s Microsofts cash on hand? Serious question not bashing
-Probably a lot lower because Microsoft actually spends money on R&D and Innovation, it also gives a lot to charity.

So I mean, yes, if you’re an Apple shareholder that’s huge news, of the good variety. If you’re looking at the future of mobile marketshare, it’s a little cloudier – it looks like Apple may have narrowly taken the lead over Android in this quarter (though I don’t think that’s certain?), but obviously they massively underperformed the quarter before, so in some sense, this is just shifting sales to align with a launch. Which you’d expect to see at least some of.

So the question is, what happens next? Is this just launch traffic, and it goes back to 70/30 Android; or is the existence of the free 3GS and $99 4 enough to change the shape of the market and give Apple a more substantial position? I suspect the former, but wouldn’t be terribly surprised to see at least some of the latter. But I think it’s certain that in the next quarter, Android outsells the iPhone as usual.

I expect 1Q to be a little flat, and they’ll explode in 2Q with the iPad 3 then followup with iPhone 5 later in the year. It’s not the Christmas season, sales were extremely high, and after a period of calm Android should be able to eat into the market share a bit more if the companies are aggressive.

— Alan

Oh Jesus, dude. You mean if every single other phone maker on Earth combines forces, Apple MIGHT have some competition for marketshare (and still absolutely NO competition when it comes to profits, which is the only thing Apple cares about)? “Massively underperformed” my ass.

No. I mean that historically, they have blown Apple out of the water for marketshare, and that this quarter is an exception to that, but the question is whether it’s just a blip or represents anything for the future.

(And if Apple vs. the world sounds unfair to you, well, y’know, that’s what it is. It’s the flipside to the vertically integrated, no OS-licensing model, that you’re competing against everyone else.

(and still absolutely NO competition when it comes to profits, which is the only thing Apple cares about)?

Yes, yes. I was careful to say that stockholders are delighted. But when it comes to the mobile landscape and how relevant iOS is, marketshare is important and Apple’s profitability a lot less so.

mkozlows, you are the Dawn Falcon of Apple haters. Congrats.

I think you’re being a little silly here. We’re not talking “Oh, Apple has a nice little profitable niche business off to the side” , I’m sure their stockholders are happy while the real smartphone business is happening over here."

We’re talking “Hrm, this may be the biggest quarter ever by…anyone, or damn near”, after the “disappointing” 4S rollout that was supposed to cement Android market dominance.

It’s just kind of hilarious. Apple has a ridiculously successful quarter, and your analysis is basically “well, I guess that’s okay if you’re interested in money, but clearly the real meaning of this is next quarter things will be awesome for Android.”

According to wikipedia, it’s the 4th largest corporate quarterly earnings ever. 2nd largest by a US company. Every other entry in the top 20 is an oil company, and most are ExxonMobile.

Further proof that Apple products are overpriced and you’re a sucker for buying them.

(Or, er, I’m a sucker for buying them. A lot of them. But I’m not happy that they could have made a respectable profit and not charged me 6X market price for the power-user maximum RAM I got in my iPad 2 and iPhone 4S! :)

Awesome!

Great quarter by Apple, I have been noticing that everyone I know has been dumping their Android phones for iPhones, we’ll see if that continues.

On a personal note: I do feel a little sad that I unloaded a metric ton of Apple stock in 2010. WHOOPS bad call on that one!

I’m not sure why people have such a hard time accepting that different metrics measure different things. I’m not interested in that money, because none of it gets to me. I am interested in the market share, because that’s what shapes the world we live in.

Haha mkozlows.

“Let’s not judge a company by the metric that matters but rather an arbitrary one that doesn’t. And even by that metric it’s kinda successful so let’s speculate that it won’t be in the future.”

Apparently the imaginary world you live in.

As for them ripping people off, you can always buys a equivalent or better product for the same price. Right? Where can I buy one of those?

I wonder if they will finally pay a dividend?

As to their pricing, the thing is when we’re talking $700 and under devices, Apple can be a bit higher and it doesn’t hurt them. If you want something like an iPod and the actual iPod is $180, are you really going to go for the cheap generic that’s $99? It’s only $80 more for the cool iPod that you know works really well.

Strange, because everyone I know has been dumping their iPhones for Android.

Ignoring worthless anecdotal data, mkozlows is right. Apple’s record quarter is good news for Apple shareholders… given that I’m not one, so what? Unless Android devices have seen a sharp unnoticed drop in sales, I don’t see anything in this news to suggest that the dynamics of the market have changed at all.

I think Samsung just got Samsunged.

Nyah, nyah… the producer of my phone made more money than the producer of your phone. Oh… wait.

The whole thing really is kinda silly. Perhaps what the numbers are showing is that the market is big enough for both iOS and Android phones to have extremely healthy businesses. It’s not necessarily a zero-sum game here. Can’t we all just get along?

Except Windows Phone. And RIM. And pretty much everyone else. They can all go DIAF.

The tablet market should be interesting in 2012. First, Apple doing great, as always. Second, Android tablets were supposed to penetrate in the market in 2011 but they didn’t succeed… but around the end of the year some tablets like the Asus Transformer Prime got praise from both the public and the critics, and with the ICS, it seems they finally will be stronger competition in 2012. Third, Windows 8 tablets at the end of the year! The previews are looking like a very strong entry from Microsoft.

So any chance we can start manufacturing these things in the USA now?

No?

Okay then.