88 billion and 77 million
We recently reported that Apple was looking to dramatically cut iPhone X production due to “soft demand,” but apparently the demand has been hot enough since the launch of the halo phone to propel Apple to its biggest quarter in company history. Tim Cook and company reported revenues of over $88 billion for Q1, and he said the latest figures are a new quarterly record for the world’s biggest tech company.
Helping propel Cupertino’s fortunes? iPhones of course, and not just the iPhone X, but its $1,000 base price certainly helped, netting Apple just short of $800 per iPhone sold on average – that’s every iPhone – and they sold over 77 million of them. That’s a lot of iPhones, but it’s actually a bit less than last year, and Apple’s stock is actually down a few bucks today. Cook also said Apple Watch sales are up 50 percent over last year, but he didn’t say how many were sold.
Apple sells a lot more than iPhones of course, so go here if you want to take a deeper dive into the company’s numbers.
AI FTW
From the biggest tech company in the world to the biggest up and comer: Jeff Bezos says sales of their smart devices – and basically anything to do with smart homebot Alexa – far exceeded even their most optimistic expectations last year and over the holidays.
No surprise there as Alexa has sort of become the Kleenex of smart-home tech, and you can expect the cheery digital assistant to show up in more products, and do a lot more things, in the very near future. Bezos said Amazon is “doubling down” on everything Alexa, and that even at this point in the tech’s relatively short time on the market, developers have given Alexa over 30,000 skills or “apps” to work with.
So what’s on the way? Much more Alexa AI horsepower and capabilities, of course, but also, some premium voice-activated services you may have to pay for.
Something cool in the Air
If you’ve been waiting to pull the trigger on a high-performance drone, the latest flying robot from DJI may convince you that the time is now to make your move. DT’s Drew Prindle just reviewed the new Mavic Air, and he likes it – a lot.
Like a cross between the spendier Mavic Pro and the more sporty Spark, the Mavic air packs in the best bits from both birds: The small size and portability of the Spark and the great 4K video and top-notch flying fun of the Mavic Pro. The Air features a robust suite of self-protection features both front and back so learners stay out of trouble, and experienced pilots are going to love the high-speed sport mode. On top of that, the 4K camera rides on a new three-axis gimbal.
Video we shot with the Air looks very nearly as good as what we’ve seen from the Mavic Pro, which already was highly portable, but the Air is almost half the size. It also has a ton of autonomous flight features and is just flat fun to fly. If you were waiting for a super-capable, super-portable flying 4K camera, your drone has arrived, and it’s only $800. Check out Drew’s full review and video.
We’ve got more news on our Facebook page and YouTube channel, and be sure to tune in to this week’s DT podcasts: Trends with Benefits (general tech shenanigans) on Thursdays, and Between the Streams (movie and TV topics) every Friday.
