America
Apple breaks records with iPhone 6 sales
Los Angeles, Jan 28
Technology giant Apple
closed 2014 with a record breaking quarter thanks to the sales of
iPhone, particularly the new iPhone 6, which raised its net profit to
$18.02 billion, a 37.8 percent year-on-year increase, the company said.
According
to a company statement Tuesday, the company took in $74.5 billion
between October and December -- 29.5 percent more than a year ago --
with a 36.1 percent increase in its margins.
Apple CEO Tim Cook
described the results as historic and incredible surpassing the
expectations of financial investors where technology shares climbed more
than five percent on trades executed following the end of the day at
Wall Street Tuesday.
In total, Apple marketed 74.5 million phones
in the fourth quarter -- 46 percent higher than a year earlier -- and
although Cook gave no details, he said the iPhone 6 was the most popular
device, much more than iPhone 6 Plus and the earlier iPhone 5S and 5C.
"We
are doing well in almost all places of the world," said Cook with
respect to the iPhone sales that attracted a greater number of
smartphone users than ever before, and the highest percentage of change
from Android to Apple devices in the past three years, according to its
data.
China and Brazil registered the highest sales of these phones.
Apple
saw a turnover of 57 percent more per sale of iPhones in the last
quarter than in the same period in 2013, and its phone business
accounted for 68.6 percent of total revenues.
The company also
celebrated the sales of Mac computers, which grew 9 percent, and the
activities through their electronic commerce platforms, such as the App
Store, which also grew nine percent year-on-year.
However, the
sale of iPads registered a fall of 18 percent (21.4 million total) in
terms of units and a 22 percent year-on-year decline in revenue, a trend
that Cook believes will remain in the next quarter.
A factor
listed by Cook for the tablet's declining sales is the life cycle of the
iPad, since users usually do not renew the device as often as they
change phones.
Cook was also pleased with the iPhone payment technology, Apple Pay, and believed that 2015 would be the yea