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Nokia and Samsung both enjoy profits from Q4 2012 mobile sales

by Mark Tyson on 10 January 2013, 16:06

Tags: Nokia (NYSE:NOK), Samsung (005935.KS)

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Samsung reported a very positive set of results within a preliminary financial report on Tuesday. The Korean electronics giant boasted of a record operating profit for the fifth successive quarter. Its profits were up a whopping 88 per cent year on year. Many analysts believe that the profit growth is driven by its sales of mobile handsets. We all know Samsung is one of the smartphone kings in the market right now and it seems like even the Apple iPhone 5 launch didn’t damage its growth record during Q4 2012.

Looking at the numbers, Samsung raked in profits equivalent to £5.2 billion on sales worth £32 billion during Q4 2012. The FT reports that the new iPhone 5 “failed to slow Samsung’s momentum” in the smartphone market. An analyst speaking to the newspaper said that he estimated Samsung sold 15 million Galaxy S III smartphones and 8 million Galaxy Note II phablets during the quarter. Overall Samsung’s operating profits were ahead of analyst consensus forecasts.

Nokia earnings for Q4 2012 will beat forecasts

This news is probably more of a surprise than the Samsung news and will provide Nokia and its investors with a bit of New Year cheer. In preliminary results, published today by the Finnish mobile technology company there are signs of recovery. Nokia Devices & Services not only exceeded analyst expectations, but also delivered “underlying profitability” during Q4 2012.

Good sales performance of the Lumia range and cost cutting helped the results into positive territory reports Bloomberg Businessweek. The prelims have had a positive impact on the company share price which was up by as much as 22 per cent pre-market but has now settled to approximately 16 per cent up, as I write.

Looking at sales volumes, Nokia sold a total 15.9 million smartphones in Q4 2012 “composed of 9.3 million Asha full touch smartphones, 4.4 million Lumia smartphones and 2.2 million Symbian smartphones”. Nokia still sells a lot of non-smartphones as part of its business and brought in twice as much net income though this channel; however the company shifted 70.3 million of these lower-margin basic mobiles.

Looking to the near future, Nokia forecasts the “operating margin in the first quarter 2013 to be approximately negative 2 percent”. This is due to competitive industry dynamics and Q1 being a “seasonally weak quarter”. The company hopes new Lumias and Windows Phone success can help it grow through this difficult transition.



HEXUS Forums :: 7 Comments

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Well done Nokia, I knew the Lumia would get them back into the game, but was worried when I saw they decided not to continue with Maemo and were not making an Android version.
Good to see their faith in Microsoft paid off in the end :)
The lumia 920 is bloody amazing, Ive got it and its definitely the best smartphone on the market, the only things its missing is a large app store, but I'm sure it won't be long before its all there, and the Nokia apps are awesome, especially nokia music, absolutely free, no sign up, no ads unlimited music from all your favourite artists etc
There are some things the 920 does better than anything else I've tried using last year (S3 or 4S).

Maps
Music
Email
Web Browser

However, for games, its behind iOS, but livably so. The one that gets me are all the esoteric apps. Sure there are 120,000 apps for it apparently, but no SkyDeamon, no Philips Hue. These odd little edge cases I'd like. There wasn't a decent learn Thai or Vietnamese app either. Compared to the free ones on Andriod.
TheAnimus
There are some things the 920 does better than anything else I've tried using last year (S3 or 4S).

Maps
Music
Email
Web Browser
You need to try:
CoPilot
PowerAmp
?
Chrome

(although CoPilot and PowerAmp are both paid for apps). A lot of people seem to rate K9Mail for Android, but to be honest I've been pretty unimpressed with most of the email clients for Android (although to give props to Microsoft the Hotmail app is pretty slick). I'm looking for one that has better filtering.

As a self-confessed Nokia fan (although I've currently got an S3) I'm very glad to see them doing better. Hopefully next years figures will be even better! (and there won't be any Symbian rubbish). Latest WinMo is looking pretty slick, and the Lumia's have very nice designs.
crossy
You need to try:
CoPilot
PowerAmp
?
Chrome
I have, well all but poweramp!

CoPilot as you mention is paid, and its simply not as good. Where are the maps for Moroco?
The music was more about the integration of zune pass, it is really bloody slick, Spotify feals really 3rd rate on iOS (as it does on WP!) on Andriod they could do so much more. Not to mention it's navigation only. So look at:
http://here.com/18.7905264,98.9955725,15,0,0,gray.day
That is Nokia Navtech mapping. Then select say places for food. You get that, offline, for free. Amazing. If Nokia where punting the 820 as cheaply as the 720 was at launch (£100!) I would suggest it as an essential choice for anyone going ‘travelling’.

Andriod simply lacks a constant UI approach to playing music, what if I'm in a 3rd party app and want to switch track etc. The API simply isn't matured or well enough used.

I do like the new chrome, and it might be due to 4g LTE, but it doesn't feel as fast, despite the vastly better hardware.