Following closely in the blowout victories of the trio of Google, Apple and Facebook, Amazon – the last of the Big Four tech companies to publish its Q1, 2021 financal result – nevertheless impressed, posting $108.5bn in revenue to beat analyst estimates of $104.5bn. The result posted is a jump of 44 per cent year-over-year, with earnings a record $15.79 a share.
Recall that all four companies in previous quarter results posted, exceeded expectations, and did even better this term as online businesses thrived amid the pandemic.
Amazon’s reported revenue is its second biggest quarter ever for sales, following $125.6bn clinched in last quarter of last year.
Due to improved sales of Amazon Web Service, net income hit $15.79 per share, about $8.1bn, more than triple of $2.5bn a year ago. This has made the company the third largest in U.S. with a market capitalisation of $1.8tn.
Even Founder/CEO Jeff Bezos was amazed.
“In just 15 years, AWS has become a $54bn annual sales…business competing against the world’s largest technology firms, and its growth is accelerating up 32 per cent year-over-year,” he said.
Earlier on Wednesday, Apple posted revenue of $89.6bn, a 54 per cent jump from the first quarter of 2021. Sales of iPads leapt by 79 per cent, while iMac sales grew by 70 per cent, and iPhone sales rose by 65 per cent.
Profits jumped to $23.6bn, double the year-ago period. However, “Apple’s main revenue driver continues to be the iPhone, which rose 65 per cent to hit $47.9bn.
“The increasing uptake of 5G phones also helped boost demand for iPhones,” Apple said.
While revenue from its Macs was $9.10bn, iPad sales grossed $7.80bn.
At Facebook, total revenue, which primarily consists of ad sales, rose by 48 per cent compared to the same quarter last year – to $26.17bn.
Earlier on Tuesday, Google’s parent company, Alphabet, posted soaring quarterly sales of $55.3bn – a 34 per cent increase over Q1, 2020.The company beat quarterly revenue estimates of $51.7bn to accelerate its advertising and cloud businesses.
“Google ad sales surged 32 per cent in the first quarter, while cloud sales increased 45.7 per cent.
“Over the last year, people have turned to Google Search and many online services to stay informed, connected and entertained,” said Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google and Alphabet.
