Here is a summary of recent earnings and reports for selected technology companies and what they reveal about the state of spending and the overall economy:
April 6: Samsung Electronics Co. says it is expecting a record operating profit of $5.1 billion for the first quarter. It says the result would be a 97 percent rise from its operating profit a year earlier. Samsung estimated that its first quarter sales rose 21.6 percent from a year earlier. More details will come when Samsung releases its full quarterly results.
April 12: Google Inc. reports adjusted earnings and adjusted revenue that beat expectations. Google's revenue was helped by a 39 percent increase in "paid clicks," but the prices of its search-driven text ads continued to decline. CEO Larry Page called the first quarter "very strong," but acknowledged there's more work to do.
April 17: Yahoo Inc.'s first-quarter earnings show signs of modest progress under recently hired CEO Scott Thompson. Net income grew 28 percent from the same time last year and exceeded expectations. Revenue grew less than 1 percent, but represented a breakthrough because the company's revenue has been steadily falling for years.
IBM Corp. says first-quarter net income grew 7 percent, helped by strong profit margins in its services business and strong revenue growth across its software and services businesses. Revenue was flat overall because of declines in the hardware and financing segments, and revenue fell short of analysts' expectations. IBM increases its full-year guidance to at least $15 per share, above the $14.93 expected by analysts.
Intel Corp. says its net income in the first quarter fell 13 percent as spending on research and marketing rose while sales were flat.
April 18: EBay Inc. says its first-quarter net income grew 20 percent thanks to higher revenue from its PayPal business and brisk sales at its e-commerce websites. The results beat Wall Street's expectations.
Mobile phone chipmaker Qualcomm Inc. says its quarterly profit more than doubled as strong demand for smartphones boosted its sales; but it expects costs to increase as it makes more chips.
April 19: Microsoft Corp. fares better than analysts anticipated in its latest quarter, boosted by a surprising rise in sales of its Windows operating system for personal computers
Chipmaker Advanced Micro Devices Inc. reports adjusted earnings and revenue that beat Wall Street's expectations. AMD's revenue forecast for the current quarter was at $1.59 billion to $1.68 billion, while analysts surveyed by FactSet were expecting $1.59 billion.
Nokia Corp. reports a huge net loss, one of the company's worst ever quarters, and blames tougher-than-expected competition. It has faced stiff competition from the likes of Apple Inc.'s iPhone and handset makers using Google Inc.'s popular Android software.
April 23: Netflix Inc. says it suffered its first quarterly loss in seven years, but the setback was far smaller than analysts expected. Netflix had rising licensing fees and a bill for an international expansion. Netflix predicted that it would make money during the current quarter. Still, Wall Street was worried about tougher competition. Skittish investors keyed on a second-quarter forecast that calls for a slowdown in subscriber growth during the spring and early summer.
Chipmaker Texas Instruments Inc. says first-quarter net income fell 60 percent from a year ago as revenue shrank. But the results still beat analysts' expectations.
Xerox Corp. says first-quarter net income fell 4 percent as the company spent more on building its services business, which now makes up more than half the company's revenue. The company says it's investing in new offerings and long-term contracts in order to increase growth. In the short term, that has hurt profitability.
April 24: Apple Inc. reported blowout iPhone sales — 35 million in the latest quarter, almost twice as many as it sold a year ago and above analyst expectations. Net income nearly doubled to $11.6 billion, and revenue was up 59 percent at $39.2 billion. IPad sales came in below analyst expectations, at 11.8 million units. But that was still two and a half times as many as it sold in the same quarter a year ago.
April 25: Motorola Solutions Inc., which sells communications equipment to government and corporate customers, says first-quarter net income declined from a year ago, when the company recorded a large tax-related gain. Revenue grew thanks to strong demand from the company's government customers.
April 26: Amazon.com Inc. reports strong quarterly earnings and says its Kindle Fire tablet computer remains its best-selling item. However, its outlook for revenue growth was slower than expected.
Online games company Zynga Inc. reports adjusted earnings of 6 cents a share, a penny better than what Wall Street expected. Revenue grew 32 percent.
April 27: A surge in Galaxy smartphone sales fueled earnings at Samsung Electronics to a record high in the first quarter, usually a tough season for the global consumer-electronics industry. The South Korean company outshined handset rivals such as Nokia Corp. Strong demand for high-end smartphones, such as the Galaxy Note and the Galaxy S2 introduced last year, helped mask lower profit from memory chips, another Samsung flagship business.
Tuesday: Mobile phone maker Motorola Mobility Holdings Inc. reports a slightly larger net loss in the first quarter as expenses grew more than revenue. Motorola says it still expects its acquisition by Google to close by the end of June. The deal still needs to be approved by authorities in China.
Coming up:
Thursday: LinkedIn Corp.
May 9: Cisco Systems Inc., Groupon Inc.
May 22: Dell Inc.
May 23: Hewlett-Packard Co.
June 19: Adobe Systems Inc.
June 28: Research in Motion Ltd.
Not yet known: Salesforce.com Inc., Oracle Corp. (June).
