Submitted by Bob Bhatnagar on
Incredibly, what began as a project in the shadow of Apple's computer business is forecast to account for 45-50% of total company revenues in 2011. Bernstein Research analyst Toni Sacconaghi believes Apple is on track to hit these targets, as the iPhone made up 30% of its revenues in 2009.
20.7 million iPhones were sold in 2009. Apple is forecast to move up to 50 million units in 2011. Sacconaghi, agreeing with other industry figures, has also forecast iPad sales in 2010 at 2.2 million units.
iPhone profit margins hovered around 58% in 2009, significantly larger than Apple's company-wide average of 41%. The iPad is expected to have similar profit margins to the iPhone.
Apple CEO Steve Jobs spoke at the company's shareholder meeting today. Apple has $40 billion in cash, and no plans to offer a share buyback or pay a dividend to shareholders. Jobs sees the money as an insurance policy against technical risks in product development and a way to provide Apple with flexibility should it be interested in acquiring another company.
The iPhone-related ecosystem continues to expand as the 10 billionth song was recently downloaded from iTunes. Shares of Apple were up $1.34 to close at $202.00 today.