Rich pickings from Apple's quarterly crop of results

The voracious global appetite for all things Apple shows no sign of abating. Quarterly results published yesterday ( April 24 ) show more sales, more profits, more turnover, more everything. Revenue for the quarter ending March 31 reached USD 39.2 billion, well up from the USD 24.7 billion in the same quarter last year, while net profits nearly doubled – USD 11.6 billion from USD 6 billion for the same quarter in 2011.

“We’re thrilled with sales of over 35 million iPhones and almost 12 million iPads in the March quarter,” said Apple CEO Tim Cook. Sales for iPhones and iPads accounted for the majority of the total and also posted the fastest growth. The 35.1 million iPhones sold represented an 88 percent increase on sales in the same quarter in 2011, while growth in iPad sales was even bigger – a 151 percent increase on the same quarter last year, taking quarterly iPad sales to 11.8 million units. As in other recent quarterly results, sales of Mac computers were steadier – 4 million units and 7 percent growth on the same quarter in 2011. The iPod, however, is continuing its decline, 7.7 million units sold, down 15 percent on the same quarter last year. The gap between iPod and iPad sales is widening, in the previous quarter they were almost neck and neck, now iPad sales are far outstripping sales of iPods. Compared against the previous quarter, ending December 2011, total sales of all four mentioned products were slightly lower. Apple's CFO, Peter Oppenheimer expects around USD 34 billion in revenue for the current quarter. Liam Lever, liam@romania-insider.com