Apple Earnings Show 183% Increase in iPad Sales

Apple released its fiscal Q3 2011 (calendar year Q2 2011) results on Tuesday, and the results were not just great, but also showed a rather shocking statistic: after only 1 1/2 years of sales, the iPad is now worth more to Apple than its Mac computers are.

During the quarter ending on June 25, 2011, Apple sold 9.25 million iPads for $6 billion in revenue (that is a 183 percent unit increase year-over-year). In comparison, it sold 3.95 million Macs for $5.1 billion in revenue (a 14 percent increase year-over-year).

The company also sold 20.34 million iPhones in the quarter, worth $13.3 billion in revenue.

As expected, and as more people move to smartphones and tablets for their music, standalone iPods continued to drop. Year-over-year, iPod sales dropped 20 percent, to 7.54 million units.

Overall, Apple posted record quarterly revenue of $28.57 billion and record quarterly net profit of $7.31 billion, or $7.79 per diluted share. In the same period in 2010, Apple had revenue of $15.70 billion and net quarterly profit of $3.25 billion, or $3.51 per diluted share, which means they nearly doubled their revenue and more than doubled their net profit, year-over-year. International sales accounted for 62 percent of revenue.


Earlier, Apple, which traditionally lowballs its guidance, had projected earnings of $5.50 a share on revenue of $25 billion. Wall Street is expecting earnings of $6.45 a share on revenue of $27.7 billion.

Not only have iPads overtaken Macs in terms of their effect on Apple's bottom line, the iPhone and iPad now represent about two-thirds of Apple's revenue. Last year, the iPhone and iPad represented 48 percent of Apple’s overall sales.

During their analyst conference call, Apple also added the following:
  • A "product transition" in the September quarter that may hamper margins (but no further details were given). We can guess at an iPhone 4S or iPad 3, or both.
  • The company reiterated that the iPhone and iPad are strong in the enterprise.
  • The company noted that the iPad 2 is indeed cannibalizing MacBook sales.
In terms of its "bank account," Apple ended the quarter with $12.1 billion in cash and cash equivalents. It also had another $16.3 billion in short-term marketable securities.
Tags:  Apple, iPhone, ipad