Apple has managed to nab three of the top 5 spots for the top-selling mobile phones in the U.S. during Q4 2012 according to the NPD Group, with the iPhone 5, iPhone 4S and iPhone 4 ranking first, third and fourth, respectively. Apple also retained the crown for best-selling overall smartphone maker, accounting for 39 percent of smartphone sales in Q4 2012, compared to Samsung’s 30 percent.

iPhone 4 sales rose 79 percent compared to Q3 2012, and iPhone 4S sales grew 43 percent sequentially, while the iPhone 5 accounted for 43 percent of all iPhone sales in Q4 2012, which is roughly in line with the numbers we’re seeing out of carrier data as well. It also made up nearly two-thirds of all smartphone sales on post-paid plans with a value over $200, NPD says. Samsung made considerable gains on the year, going up to 30 percent of all U.S. smartphone sales in Q4 2012 from 21 percent in the year ago quarter, but the gains were mostly at the expense of other Android OEMs, including HTC, while Apple’s overall share remained constant.

Net Applications also released its monthly report on mobile OS share, which found that Apple’s iOS increased slightly in terms of traffic, accounting for 60.56 percent of all mobile operating systems, while Android actually took a bit of a dip to 24.51 percent, continuing a decline that has occurred over the past two months from a peak high in November of 28.02 percent. It looks like Apple’s release of the iPhone 5 might have essentially begun to erase earlier gains made by the longer availability of the Samsung Galaxy S III, but Apple still has some ground to make up if it wants to climb back to its 2012 high of nearly 66 percent web traffic share among mobile devices.

Apple’s holiday quarter, which included 47.8 million iPhone sales and 22.9 million iPads, looks to have helped it in terms of remaining the leader in both smartphone and mobile device sales in the U.S., and in keeping the hold it has on mobile browsing. The strong quarter also accounts for Apple’s regaining the role of largest mobile phone maker by volume in the U.S., an honor it reclaimed according to the latest data from Strategy Analytics released earlier today.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

There’s a new Apple TV on the way. Per these FCC documents, the new model is physically slightly smaller and as noted by TheNextWeb, rocks an A5X SoC. With the faster core, the new model should provide a better user experience with a smoother UI and improved app performance. Plus, with the recent Apple TV update that added a bunch of features, it seems the Apple is about to make another assault on the living room.

In traditional FCC fashion, the documents fail to reveal anything tantalizing about the upcoming model. There’s no mention of additional capabilities over the current model — nothing about Siri, motion control or anything hinting that this is something special. Without additional information, this model looks like an exercise in supply chain management rather than reinventing the Apple TV experience.

It only makes sense for Apple to move the Apple TV onto the A5X, the same chip used in the third-generation iPad. It had to happen sometime. As Apple moves other products off the 32 nm A5 chip, it cannot forget its little hobby in the Apple TV.

The revised 32 nm A5 chip is still used in the iPad 2, iPad mini, and the latest iPod touch. But with the exception of the evergreen iPod touch, the other two are set for changes sooner versus later. The iPad 2 will be cut from the team while Apple will likely release an upgraded iPad mini with an A5X to allow the hot little tablet to keep up with iOS revisions.

Apple has long treated the Apple TV as a so-called hobby. But even though the company doesn’t treat it as a pillar of its business, the Apple TV remains the company’s best path into consumers’ living rooms. During its Q1 2013 conference call last week, the company revealed that it sold 2 million Apple TVs during the holiday quarter, an increase of 60 percent over the previous year.

There’s no word on when this new model will hit stores. But chances are, since it passed through the U.S. government wireless gatekeepers, it will be in the near future — maybe as soon as this week.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

Facebook has just filed an amendment to its S-1 to IPO that notes that it now has 500 million mobile users, 901 million monthly active users, and that it paid 23 million shares at $30.89 a share plus $300 million cash for Instagram for a total of $1,010,470,000. Facebook also made $1.058 billion in revenue in the first quarter of 2012, up 44.7% from Q1 2012 but down 6.5% from Q4 2011.

Read on for more on the performance of Facebook’s ad business, and to see our embed of the full amended S-1.

Advertising made up $872 million of Facebook’s Q1 2012 revenue, while payments and other fees accounted for $186 million. Those numbers are down from the $1.131 billion in total revenue, $943 million in advertising, and $188 million in payments from the holiday quarter of Q4 2011. However, they’re still way up from the $637 million in ads, $94 million in payments, and total of $731 million total revenue it made in Q1 2011.

Despite Mark Zuckerberg noting about the Instagram acquisition that “We don’t plan on doing many more of these, if any at all”, the amended S-1 notes that a lack of similar companies to acquire could actually be a risk: “Our ability to acquire and integrate larger or more complex companies, products, or technologies in a successful manner is unproven. In the future, we may not be able to find other suitable acquisition candidates, and we may not be able to complete acquisitions on favorable terms, if at all.”

Other information Facebook now lists include that it will IPO on the NASDAQ, collects 300 million photo uploads a day, hosts 125 billion total friendships, and sees 3.2 billion likes and comments per day. It’s mobile interfaces gained 12 million monthly active users just since March when Facebook listed 488 million monthly users of its mobile products, and now has over 500 million.

Facebook’s momentum wasn’t enough to push revenues above the especially high holiday quarter when brands make huge ad buys and users are flush with money and gift cards to spend on virtual goods. Still, the 44% year on year growth for Q1 2012 should assure investors that the social network’s not done growing its business even as it starts to runs out of users to sign up that are of age and don’t live in countries like China where Facebook is banned.. With 901 million users and 7.009 billion Earthlings, now one in 7.7 people in the world have a Facebook account.

Here’s the full amended S-1 from April 23, 2012:

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

A week and a half ago, after Apple announced their blowout earnings for the holiday quarter, I wondered if the third and final pillar of Microsoft’s financial strength over Apple was about to fall: profit. In 2010, Apple surpassed their longtime rival in market cap and revenue, but profit has remained elusive (mostly because Microsoft mainly sells high-margin software while Apple mainly sells relatively lower margin hardware). Well it’s still elusive — for at least one more quarter.

As I suspected, Microsoft was barely able to eek out a profit win over Apple. For the quarter, Microsoft earned $6.63 billion in profit compared to Apple’s $6 billion. Assuming the trends hold, Apple should indeed take the profit crown next quarter.

Let’s look at the numbers. Apple’s $6 billion profit quarter was easily their best ever — a full $1.7 billion above their previous record (set only the quarter before). Microsoft, meanwhile, saw their profit dip a bit year-over-year, by around $30 million. Microsoft’s profit did rise quarter-to-quarter, but not as high as Apple’s did. Instead, Microsoft’s profits were up about $1.2 billion quarter-to-quarter.

The holiday quarter is typically the best for both companies. So next quarter should produce a dip for both. But again, following the trends, Microsoft’s should dip further than Apple’s.

When Apple passed Microsoft is revenue for the first time October, they beat them about about $4 billion. This most recent quarter, they pushed the revenue gap to almost $7 billion. Apple now holds about a $70 billion edge over Microsoft in terms of market cap.

As Reuters noted yesterday (while incorrectly guessing Apple would pass Microsoft in profit today), the last time Apple’s profits were ahead of Microsoft’s was 1990. Times were much different than. Microsoft was just releasing Windows 3.0. Apple was gearing up to release System 7. Microsoft was rising, Apple was falling.

Times have changed. And we should see that fully next quarter.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch