Samsung Electronics’ record earnings see it overtake Apple
SEOUL: South Korean giant Samsung yesterday posted record quarterly earnings, putting it on course to overtake Apple as the world’s most profitable tech firm as it seeks to move past a bribery scandal and last year’s recall debacle.
The firm said huge sales of its new Galaxy S8 smartphone and demand for its memory chips were behind the jump in April-June and predicted another blockbuster report for the current quarter to September.
It said operating profit soared a forecast-beating 72.9 per cent from the previous year to 14.07 trillion won (US$12.6 billion), compared with consensus forecasts of US$10.6 billion for US titan Apple, which is due to report next week.
However, Greg Roh, an analyst at HMC Investment Securities, told AFP: “Samsung has surpassed its rivals for now but Apple usually sees little fluctuation in its profits whereas Samsung’s profits fluctuate largely on memory chip prices.”
The world’s top maker of smartphones and memory chips also said net profit surged almost 90 per cent to 11.05 trillion won, its best quarterly result in five years.
“The S8 has indeed helped get Samsung back onto its feet, hopefully putting the Note7 debacle behind it,” Bryan Ma, a technology industry analyst at IDC, said before the announcement.
“But we also have to keep in mind that a lot of Samsung’s momentum is from memory and displays too, so it’s not all about the S8, either,” he said, according to Bloomberg News. — AFP