Apple shares soar thanks to enterprise iPad traction

Apple's profits grew 11% year-on-year to $8.72 billion in its latest quarterly results, thanks largely to iPhone sales and an unexpected bump in iPad demand.

The tech giant also recorded a 7% hike in revenue from the same period last year to hit $45.4 billion revenue. Shares in the company jumped by 6% to a record 159.29 at the end of trading.

Apple CEO Tim Cook said: "We're happy to report our third consecutive quarter of accelerating growth and an all-time quarterly record for services revenue.We hosted an incredibly successful Worldwide Developers Conference in June, and we're very excited about the advances in iOS, macOS,watchOSand tvOS coming this fall."

iPhone sales grew 2% year-on-year to 41 million, and it sold 11.4 million iPads, up 15%. It also sold 4.2 million Macs, up 2%, whileApple services, includingApple Payand iCloud Storage, reached $7.2 million for the quarter, an increase of 22%.

As transcribed bySeeking Alpha, Apple CFO Luca Maestri pointed to growing popularity within enterprises too, with Walmart deploying 19,000 iPads for employee training, and planning to train 225,000 associates with iPads by the end of the year.

He added: "Our enterprise business continues to expand, and our customers are transforming the way work gets done with iOS and iPad."He highlighted how businesses such as Bank of America and Medtronic are going to roll out the10.5in iPad Proto key areas of their organisations, saying: "Initial response from businesses to iOS 11 and the new iPad Pro has been amazing."

Maestri pointed at traction with enterprise partners such as Cisco, which adds new security features to Apple products to help enterprises defend against cyber threats. "We're also seeing real traction with our enterprise partners," he said. "Just last month, we unveiled the next set of technology announcements in our partnership with Cisco. This new wave adds a whole new category of security features designed to help enterprises and employees defend against growing cyber threats. We believe this investment in our joint security solutions for iOS will make cyber insurance even more attainable for businesses."

Lastly, he talked about SAP and how it released SuccessFactors Mobile to support 47 million iPhone and iPad users worldwide in different industries.

Geoff Blaber, VP research for the Americas at CCS Insight, said: "The June quarter is always the low point for the year as iPhone demand slows ahead of new September iPhone announcements. Nonetheless, it was a solid quarter despite slowing iPhone demand in the face of mounting expectations for the 10th anniversary launch."

Blaber said Aple's China results - where revenues fell 10% - are a concern: "Competition from domestic players is intensifying and it's clear that its ecosystem advantage in the West is far harder to replicate as powerfully in the East where Tencent and others dominate."

But he added: "Apple's Services business continues to be the shining light. Not only is $7.3 billion in revenue hugely significant in its own right, it underlines the ecosystem advantage it has over its competitors outside of China."

Picture: Bigstock

Zach Marzouk

Zach Marzouk is a former ITPro, CloudPro, and ChannelPro staff writer, covering topics like security, privacy, worker rights, and startups, primarily in the Asia Pacific and the US regions. Zach joined ITPro in 2017 where he was introduced to the world of B2B technology as a junior staff writer, before he returned to Argentina in 2018, working in communications and as a copywriter. In 2021, he made his way back to ITPro as a staff writer during the pandemic, before joining the world of freelance in 2022.