Apple's Wearables Business Revenue Is Fortune 300-Class Company Says Tim Cook

Apple is rather notorious for being vague on just how many of each of its products that it sells (the company doesn't give sales breakdowns for specific iPhones and MacBooks, for example). CEO Tim Cook was recently at a shareholders meeting and gave some indication of how well Apple's wearables are doing overall. Wearables include the Apple Watch, AirPods, and Beats headphones. According to Cook, the combined revenue from all those products is nearing that of a Fortune 300 company.

How much revenue does that suggest? In 2013 to be a Fortune 500 company you needed at least $4.825 billion in revenue. A Fortune 300 company would no doubt earn more revenue than that. However, there were no specific sales figures offered for any of the products in the wearables line.

Cook also took the chance to remind that he isn’t fond of the word "wearables." While Apple gives no official sales figures, the product thought to be leading the wearables boom is the Apple Watch. Apple reported 50 percent growth year-over-year for the Apple Watch Series 3 in its fiscal 2018 Q1. For the same quarter, analytics firm Canalys estimated that Apple shipped more Watch units than the entire Swiss watch industry, a first for any wearables company.

Apple has also seen robust growth in the AirPods wireless headphones segment. However, that product has not come without some headaches. Recently a report alleged that a set of AirPods overheated and exploded during a man's workout. Cook did talk a bit about Apple Pay saying, "Mobile payments have taken off slower than I would have thought."

Cook took some time to talk about Apple's health devices and medical devices. Apple has freedom that pure medical firms lack because it can design products for the end user without worrying about insurance reimbursement. No one expects Medicare or Medicaid to pay for an Apple Watch, the user simply shells out the money for the device and moves on. This allows Apple more freedom in design. Apple has been positioning the Apple Watch as a health device with studies showing it effective in detecting abnormal heart rhythms and possibly being used to help diabetics manage their condition.