Wednesday, April 23,2008 @ 7:35pm
Education grows 35%, Macs generate 59% revenue
Apple today posted its best second quarter in company history, with good news from its education, computer, and iPhone segments. Educational revenue growth was revealed to be 35-percent, which Apple says is the highest growth rate it has seen
Desktop revenue grew 37-percent thanks to strong demand for iMacs, as well as increased sales of its newly-updated Mac Pro. Laptops saw strong growth, with 61-percent additional revenue, due to strong sales of the revised MacBook and MacBook Pro computers, as well as the introduction of the MacBook Air. Apple also commented that MacBook Air numbers are indicative that more than just "road warriors" are purchasing them – the company notes that many students and higher education staff members are using the portable in increasing volume.
Apple remains confident in the 10 million iPhone estimate, with 1.7 million units sold throughout the quarter, thanks to expanded coverage in Austria and Ireland. Total deferred revenue from the iPhone and Apple TV sat at $1.93 billion, up from $1.44 billion from the December quarter.
The recently unveiled iPhone SDK beta has drawn over 200,000 developers to sign up and download a copy, with Apple calling the response "tremendous". Activity concerning the Enterprise beta program – which allows users to synchronize with a Microsoft Exchange server – was dubbed as being "off the charts", with one third of all Fortune 500 companies signing up for the program, and another 400 higher education institutions. Apple states that hundreds of companies and institutes have been accepted, while more are added every week.