“Apple sold 2.29 million Macs with a growth of 51% y-o-y that is about 3.5 times the overall PC market rate of growth. Macs accounted for 59% of the revenue in the quarter, up from 47% last quarter. Our household now boasts a beautiful, large-screen iMac on which we’re playing with photos and music to create iMovie clips of our travels, horse, and such. We still have two Vista laptops, which are a source of continuous annoyance. Those two are probably on their way out,” Sramana Mitra writes for Seeking Alpha.
“Meanwhile reports of Apple’s $278 million acquisition of microprocessor design company PA Semi has overshadowed its earnings reports. PA Semi is known for its design of low-power chips. This acquisition has thrown cold water over Intel’s (INTC) hopes of securing a design win for Atom, its latest low-power lineup and will cause a shift in the iPhone component ecosystem. But more than that Apple has taken on a significant risk by vertically integrating into semiconductors with the hope that they can achieve differentiation in their core electronics, not only in design, OS and applications. If Apple’s move succeeds, then we’re going back to a vertically integrated computer industry, which is where it all started. The interim Wintel model will come to be looked upon as the detour. We can always trust Steve Jobs to create drama, and to be ambitious,” Mitra writes.
Full article here.