UK iPhone

After Apple’s blowout best-ever quarter on Tuesday there was some speculation that Microsoft would not beat its forecast earnings for the quarter, and thus Apple would have higher revenue for the first time. Well, Microsoft did announce record revenue for its fourth quarter yesterday, and thus stays ahead of Apple for now.

Apple has already beaten Microsoft on market capitalisation (total value of all shares outstanding) and so the revenue benchmark is the next battleground between the two companies. But even when Apple wins that one, next quarter most likely, Microsoft will still remain ahead of Apple on one measure: net income. As Apple sells hardware as well as software, its margins are not as stellar as Microsoft’s: it will take a lot more revenue for Apple to surpass Microsoft at the net income game. But if Microsoft continues to flounder under Ballmer’s unsteady hand, and Apple continues with new products and stellar sales, it seems in time that hurdle will fall too.

This entry was posted on Friday, July 23rd, 2010 at 2:43 pm and is filed under News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.