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What Color's That Ink? (4/4/98)
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The day draws ever closer-- in a few weeks, Apple will announce its Q2 financial figures, and we'll all see just how they did in what is historically their worst quarter of the fiscal year. Despite Apple's insistence early on that people should not expect a profit this quarter to follow the surprise black ink from Q1, many analysts seem to be ignoring that advice and are in fact predicting a small profit this quarter. Strong sales of the Powermac G3's seem to be the biggest factor in that vote of confidence.
To add fuel to the fire, a Mac OS Rumors source states that not only will Apple post a profit, but that profit will be larger than Q1's $47 million, possibly in the range of $60-$80 million this time around. Whether this is the start of a recouping of the $2 billion that Apple lost over the last few years still remains to be seen, but any black ink is a nice start. As for Q3, things so far are looking good: the AIO (Artemis) is finally available as of yesterday, though only to the educational channel; new Powerbooks (which we've been waiting for since the beginning of time) should finally surface by the end of next month; and Rumors continues to report that a sub-$1000 G3-based Mac will possibly ship before July's MacWorld New York.
All this is prologue to our quarterly "Beat the Analysts" contest, in which AtAT viewers can win fabulous (cough) prizes by guessing Apple's final numbers before they're posted. We expect to start the contest later this week, so stay tuned for details.
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And Now For A Word From Our Sponsors |
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 | | The above scene was taken from the 4/4/98 episode: April 4, 1998: The Q2 numbers draw nigh, and the world watches and waits to see whether Apple can continue the profit of last quarter. Meanwhile, the FTC has made an example of Dell, by serving up a hefty fine for 1995 vaporware charges, and Digital might just make a hearty meal for Compaq...
Other scenes from that episode: 597: Sins of the Past (4/4/98) Wintel manufacturer Dell made history on Thursday, as they were slapped with the largest fine the Federal Trade Commission has ever ordered against a mail-order company. The $800,000 fine is punishment for a 1995 violation of the Mail Order Rule, when the company sold software that didn't exist... 598: Chomp Chomp-- Bye, DEC (4/4/98) In other Wintel news, it seems like Digital Equipment Corporation may go the way of the dodo, following its recent buyout by big hungry customer Compaq. Originally it looked like Compaq planned to run DEC as a wholly-owned subsidiary, which probably would have allowed DEC to run things pretty much how they wanted to on a day-to-day basis-- think of the relationship between Apple and the erstwhile Claris corporation...
Or view the entire episode as originally broadcast... | |  |
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