profit

South Korea's Samsung Electronics reported on Friday (local time) a record quarterly profit of $7.4 billion, crediting strong sales of its Galaxy line of smartphones and tablets with making up for weak chip demand.

The electronics giant said its third-quarter operating profit increased 91 percent to $7.39 billion, in line with guidance offered earlier this month. Revenue for the quarter ended September 30 was 52.18 trillion won ($47.5 billion), a 26 percent increase over the same period last year.

The company's Mobile Communications division accounted for half that figure, logging 26.25 trillion won ($… Read more

Apple and Samsung Electronics' lead over the rest of the handset field only widened in the second quarter, with the two companies combining for a staggering 108 percent of the industry's operating profit.

How can two companies exceed the 100 percent mark? When several of the other companies, including Research in Motion, Nokia, Motorola, and Sony, posted hefty operating losses in the period.

"With Apple enjoying leading share of the high-end smartphone market and Samsung extending its overall smartphone and Android market share, competing smartphone (original equipment manufacturers) are increasingly struggling to compete with these dominant smartphone OEM,&… Read more

Symantec's CEO Enrique Salem stepped down today after the company's board of directors designated chairman of the board Steve Bennett as the new president and CEO.

This executive switch-over comes as the security software giant reported an abysmal year for revenue -- second-quarter growth was just 1 percent to $1.67 billion, and profits decreased by 10 percent to $172 million, according to Bloomberg.

"Enrique Salem has been a significant contributor during his 19 years' associated with Symantec, including the last three years as CEO," Bennett said in a statement. "While progress has been made … Read more

Google's first branded tablet was bound to rouse the interest of analysts across the globe, as well as appeal to consumers. Combine that with a bargain-rate price of $199 and curiosity becomes surprise.

Can Google make a fair profit margin on the device, which was announced last week for preorder? Or is the price tag on the Internet giant's first tablet model, the Nexus 7, based on gaining a customer base rather than profit margin?

This is where hardware specialists come in. Research firm UBM TechInsights recently came up with a preliminary cost estimate of $184 per device, … Read more

Apple's is movin' on up the Fortune 500 list, passing computer heavyweight IBM.

Apple landed at No. 17, up from No. 35, in terms of 2011 revenue, which was a cool $108.2 billion.

To put Apple's meteoric rise into perspective, blue-chip tech stalwart IBM dropped one spot to No. 19, with 2011 revenues of $106.9 billion.

And Hewlett-Packard is also feeling the heat from Apple. Though Apple's Silicon Valley neighbor moved up one spot to No. 10, with revenue of $127.2 billion, HP is not the profit juggernaut that Apple is.

Apple was No.… Read more

Foxconn parent company Hon Hai Precision Industry mustered a sizable profit during the first quarter, but its gains were tempered by rising employment costs.

During the first quarter, Hon Hai generated a profit of NT$14.9 (about $510 million), up slightly from the NT$14.4 billion profit it posted during the first quarter of 2011. According to Dow Jones Newswires, which polled eight analysts who profile Hon Hai, the profit was well below consensus of NT$22.1 billion in earnings.

Hon Hai's profit margin slid from 7.25 percent last year to 4 percent this year. … Read more

Google.org is spreading some end-of-the-year cheer to about four dozen nonprofits with $40 million in grants, including recipients that are fighting to eradicate slavery.

Many of the grant recipients are typical tech world targets, such as groups that encourage students to study math, science, technology and engineering; that help girls in developing countries get education; and that use innovative technology to help people in different ways.

But this time around Google is adding another target group -- modern-day slaves, such as forced laborers in African mines and sex trafficking in the U.S. -- a situation many people don'… Read more

Microsoft's Excel is everywhere in the business world, in part because it's such a versatile platform. Med-e-Forms offers several free Excel workbooks that handle a variety of tasks for small businesses such as physicians in private practice. The company's Free Excel Invoice Template & Profit Calculator is essentially a basic business suite in one Excel workbook.

Some of the free Excel templates we've seen from this publisher have been fairly plain, but this tool's clear, colorful instructions and efficient layout show what Excel is capable of doing. The Instructions sheet provides details for Excel 2007-2010 (… Read more

Will Facebook be more profitable than Amazon this year? TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington thinks so.

Arrington, writing on his new blog, Uncrunched, cited a source who said that Facebook generated $1.6 billion in revenue during the first half of 2011 and an operating income of $800 million. Assuming that same profit margin carries through the year, Arrington says, Facebook could tally an operating income of $2 billion this year.

It gets better, Arrington says. During the first half of the year, Arrington points out that Amazon posted an operating income figure of $523 million, which Facebook easily overshadowed. And … Read more