Apple profit surges due to iPod sales

Sales of Apple's iPod have gone through the roof in the last quarter. Picture / Reuters

SAN FRANCISCO - Apple Computer's quarterly profit nearly doubled as the company sold more than 14 million of its market-leading iPod digital music players in the holiday-sales-fueled period.

Apple, which also makes Macintosh computers, said net income for its first fiscal quarter ended in December rose to US$565 million, or 65 cents per share, from US$295 million, or 35 cents per share, on a split-adjusted basis. Revenue rose 64 per cent to US$5.75 billion from US$3.49 billion.

In addition to selling 14 million iPods, a figure that Chief Executive Steve Jobs disclosed last week at the Macworld conference, the company sold more than 1.25 million Mac computers - less than some analysts had expected - and it had its first US$1 billion sales quarter at its retail stores.

Apple has sold some 42 million iPods since their introduction in October 2001 and the company has about 75 per cent of the US market for digital music players. The company is also transitioning to Intel microprocessors from those produced by Motorola, a partner it used for years.

Apple shares more than doubled in 2005, after tripling in 2004. In the past 12 months, its shares are up more than 140 per cent, compared with a more than 130 per cent increase in shares of Google, another high-flying tech stock.

- REUTERS