Strong iPhone sales lift Apple as iPad stagnates, new product categories coming in 2014

iPhone lifts Apple

UPDATE: During the conference call following the earnings announcement, Tim Cook revealed that Apple will enter a new product categories.

Speaking to investors he said: “[There is] significant opportunity ahead of us in both current product categories and new ones. We believe that we can use our skills in building other great products that are in categories that represent areas we do not participate in today. We’re confident in that.”

Could we finally see the iWatch, Apple iTV next year?

Original story continues below…

Apple sold 33.8 million iPhones in the last three months en route to strong quarterly profits of £4.6 billion, the company revealed on Monday.

In its fourth quarter (fiscal) earnings call, the company beat the expectations of Wall Street, with the sales of the iPhone up 26 per cent on the previous year.

Those sales include the first month of iPhone 5S and iPhone 5C sales, suggesting interest in the latest Apple handsets is as strong as ever.

The news was less impressive in the iPad department, however. Sales barely rose year on year from 14m during the same period of 2012 to 14.1m during the last three months. That haul missed estimates of 15 million

With more folks snapping up tablets than ever before, Apple’s stagnation seems to indicate the rise of more affordable Android tablets from the likes of Google, LG, Samsung, ASUS and Amazon.

During last week’s keynote address, Apple CEO Tim Cook played down the importance of market share as he pointed out 81 per cent of tablet usage originates from iPads.

So, by Apple’s rationale, its grip on the market is slipping, but it doesn’t matter because iPad owners are getting way more use out of their slates. Apple will also hope that the launch of the Retina Display-toting iPad mini 2 and the slimmer and lighter iPad Air will boost sales going forward. Alongside the iPad slide, shipments of Mac computers dropped to 4.6 million from 4.9m a year ago.

Apple’s announcement also marks the first time in over a decade, the company’s profits have slowed over the course of an entire year.

As usual the man in the CEO seat was full of optimism: “We’re pleased to report a strong finish to an amazing year,” he said.

“We’re excited to go into the holidays with our new iPhone 5c and iPhone 5s, iOS 7, the new iPad mini with Retina Display and the incredibly thin and light iPad Air, new MacBook Pros, the radical new Mac Pro, OS X Mavericks and the next generation iWork and iLife apps for OS X and iOS.”

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