In its earnings call, Apple’s Tim Cook said that the company has now reached an installed base of 1.3 billion devices, an all-time high level over a range of its products, up 30% in the last two years. The iPhone 10 did well and iPhone 8 and 8 Plus also did well, achieving record revenues. The installed base growth is allowing service to grow and revenue was at $8.5 billion, 18% up on 2016, with 240 million subscribers in the last quarter, up 30 million in the last quarter of 2017.
There are now over 2,000 ARKit-enabled Apps in the Apple App Store and Cook said that Apple is very happy with the response to ARKit. Cook continued his long term strategy of talking up the importance of AR. Apple Music, iCloud and Apple Pay all had record quarters. Cook said that two thirds of the US’s top retailers now accept Apple Pay and the service will expand to Brazil.
Apple Watch grew by over 50% for the fourth consecutive quarter and sales of Apple Watch Series 3 are now twice the level of the Series 2 device last year. iPad share is also growing with almost half of iPad sales to first-time tablet buyers. In Mac, 60% of sales were to first time buyers and that reaches 90% in China, Cook said. Total Mac sales were 5.1 million in Q4 with 13% growth in emerging markets. The installed base hit a new record, globally.
Sales of iPhones were 77.3 million, up 6% on Q4 last year with record revenues. iPads hit 13.2 million in the quarter and Apple quoted NPD as saying that Apple had 46% market share in tablets in the US in Q4.
Apple continues to grow its retail business and there were 538 million visitors in Q4. The company opened its first stores in Seoul, Korea and in Austria and it now has stores in 21 countries.
The firm will not run out of money for a while – it has net cash of $163 billion ($285 billion of cash and $122 billion of debt).
Looking forward, the company still expects growth in iPhone revenues, but at higher rates in wearables and services. The company is also looking forward to the shipment of HomePod.
