Here is your daily Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) stock news and rumors for October 22. The iPhone’s long-standing partner AT&T reports strong third quarter earnings thanks to Apple’s smartphone, but their press conference showed the company beginning to distance itself from the Cupertino, California-based Apple. A new Nielsen survey shows that while the iPad might be breaking sales records, iPad apps are not. Finally, Apple CEO Steve Jobs meets with President Barack Obama to talk about the economy and job creation.
AT&T Activates Record 5.2 Million iPhones in Third Quarter: They may be losing their exclusive lock on the iPhone market in the next twelve months, but that doesn’t mean that AT&T (NYSE: T) is admitting defeat in the smartphone carrier business. The telecom reported their third quarter earnings last night, revealing that between July and September 2010, AT&T activated 5.2 million iPhones for use on their 3G network, 2 million more than in the previous quarter. 24% of those phones activated in the third quarter were for new AT&T subscribers.
The iPhone 4 has been a pillar of AT&T’s mobile business in the back half of 2010, but the company has also started distancing itself from Apple’s smartphone in anticipation of losing exclusivity to rumored carriers Verizon Wireless (NYSE: VZ) and T-Mobile USA. In a section of their presentation titled “Mobile Broadband Leadership,” AT&T flashed a slide touting their support for Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) Android products, Hewlett-Packard‘s (NYSE: HPQ) WebOS, Nokia‘s (NYSE: NOK) Symbian, Microsoft‘s (NASDAQ: MSFT) Windows Phone 7, and Research in Motion‘s (NASDAQ: RIMM) BlackBerry platform. Amazon.com‘s (NASDAQ: AMZN) Kindle was even included, so all of Apple’s competitors in the mobile space were represented in the company’s strategy while Apple wasn’t mentioned. AT&T’s message to shareholders: We’re going to be just fine.
32% of iPad Owners Have Yet to Download an App: A new study from the Nielsen Company has found that while iOS apps are big business on the iPhone, they’re not capturing the fast-growing iPad audience in the same way. After polling five thousand iPad owners, Nielsen found that one-third of them had never downloaded an app, let alone purchased a paid app off of the Apple App Store. Nielsen believes that the barrier between potential customers and app sales is getting those customers to actually look in the App Store. The survey found that once an iPad user activates the App Store on their tablet, 63% end up purchasing an app.
Apple CEO Steve Jobs Meets With President Barack: When your country is the home to the world’s most valuable technology company, a company that has seen monumental growth during a financial crisis entering its third year, it’s not a bad idea to talk with the man behind the company about ideas on how to stimulate industry. From that point of view, it’s not surprising that Apple CEO Steve Jobs met with President Barack Obama yesterday at the president’s request. According to a Reuters report, the two discussed job creation in the United States, energy independence, and education.
As of this writing, Anthony Agnello did not own a position in any of the stocks named here.
