All the profit in the world isn't enough.
This week in technology was dominated by two things: dollars and rumors. On the dollars front we got earnings reports from both Apple and Microsoft, neither of which is in bad shape. but didn't quite meet analyst expectations or paint a gold-plated rosy picture of the future, and thus got punished. Microsoft, meanwhile, reported that beat Wall Street estimates, and despite the struggling of high profile segments was rewarded with an increased stock price.
For perspective, Microsoft earned $5.4 billion in profit on $23.8 billion in revenue. Apple registered an $18.4 billion profit on $75.9 billion in revenue.
On the rumors front, things are only heating up as we head towards the unveiling of a whole new slew of smartphones. Up first is the , which might ditch the back-mounted power and volume buttons that have been a signature of the G-series flagships. Samsung, on the other hand, appears to be maintaining carrying over its existing styles to the upgraded , but could actually for improved performance (as contradictory as that might seem on the surface).
There's plenty more going on, so let's dive right into this edition of Mobile Nations Weekly!
Android Central — Full steam ahead
Another steady news week has come and gone, with Google , the OnePlus X and the BlackBerry Priv .
Galaxy S7 talk is heating up again this week, with a coming to light alongside the rumor of a . We explored the reasoning behind an expected , as well as a breakdown of the best time to .
In further MWC-related news, we have even more leaks , and .
This week was all about further expanding availability of the Priv with BlackBerry having now launched the device on T-Mobile and and . That wasn't all though, BlackBerry also expanded their EMM offerings through Watchdox and Good Technology integration. Finally, there was also a new round of BlackBerry Priv app updates.
Apple earned more money than any company ever earned in the history of companies earning money this week… so of course the markets beat the stuffing out of them. (So. Doomed.) That's resulted in a ton of leaks on everything from a new 4-inch , to the long-rumored , to the newly-rumored , all in the hopes poor Wall Street will find something it likes. Apple, for its part, would love to tell you more about the massive services revenue the company .
The big news this week for tech companies were their quarterly reports. in revenue beating Wall Street estimates, which the markets welcomed with a 5-percent bump in Microsoft stock since the announcement. The Surface business , which is considered a success for the holiday release of the Surface Pro 4 and Surface Book.
Not all the financial news was great, however. The "More Personal Computing" segment dropped drop 5% to $12.7 billion. Although that number is ahead of the general PC business, there is still a recovery going on. Likewise, Microsoft's Windows Phone segment although this was entirely expected with .
