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HTC’s Unaudited Q1’12 Financial Report Confirms Brand Was Getting Stale

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It wasn’t too long ago that HTC admitted they were going about things the wrong way in the smartphone game, and it was even sooner that they did something about it. The Taiwanese company released its unaudited Q1 2012 earnings report today, and things just aren’t looking good.

The report shows that HTC took sharp hits in both revenue and net income compared to the same quarter last year. Their total revenue was down 35% from $3.5 billion in Q1 2011 to $2.3 billion last quarter.

More than that, profits were way down from Q1 2011 – by an alarming 70%. There were no losses to report, but they definitely didn’t have the huge gains that they’re used to.

It’s troubling for them to think that things could possibly get even worse as they transition their portfolio and strategy. The HTC One series was HTC’s “rebirth,” so to speak, as they sought to show people that they could return to their innovative ways of yesteryear.

Their strategy is to introduce less smartphones each year, which will allow them to give more attention to each individual smartphone. The end-result should be better quality and more focused marketing, and it looks like it is working.

The HTC One X released to rave reviews with many touting the powerful camera features, internal hardware and a toned down, revamped version of HTC Sense as killer features. The design of the phone also received high praise.

It remains to be seen whether or not things will improve much in Q2, but we’re willing to bet it’ll take more than a few quarters to see if HTC’s latest moves have been enough to steer the ship in the right direction. [HTC (PDF) via Next Web]

Quentyn Kennemer
The "Google Phone" sounded too awesome to pass up, so I bought a G1. The rest is history. And yes, I know my name isn't Wilson.

Three New Samsung Phone Name Trademarks Registered: Galaxy Lift, Sire, & Perx

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24 Comments

  1. I am sure that after all of the One devices are out and all of the Carrier modifications are done HTC is going to make killer profit. These new phones are just sick in my opinion better that the current Nexus device!

    1. they completely crush the galaxy nexus but then again the galaxy nexus wasn’t realy top of the line even when it was released the only big advantage to it was 4.0.

  2. hello microsoft payments, they do add up. 

    I bet they’re rethinking that whole extortion shakedown now. another 60-100M would have gone a nice way towards making this not as bad.

    Also, sense having been a total piece of crap (and continuing to be) is a part of the issue too.

    1. has nothing to do with the numbers posted here.  Nice try though, and I agree that all of these companies should give the finger to MS and Apple both.

    2. lol Samsung has Microsoft payments too, hell they even have court payments, but they still sold over 40+ million android devices in the first quarter of 2012 gaining nearly a 3 billion profit in that time alone, it has nothing to do with that, the galaxy s2 is available on how many carriers world wide ? nearly 70-80%  the htc rezound, evo, one x and whatever other phone they have is available on how many carriers world wide ? 30-40% for each model , you cant have huge sales if you don’t have allot of customers, htc thinks just because it has a high end phone its going to sell allot but nobody is willing to switch networks just to buy a phone.

  3. Hopefully their new plastic phone will beat sammys plastic phones. It’s about time Sammy stops cloning the galaxy 1020193 times.

    1. The first six digits you wrote would be the same first 6 digits if I wrote my birthday down…  just thought it was weird

      1. You were born in 1919?

        1. I meant they’d be the first 6 if I wrote my whole birthday as in 10 20 19XX

    2. It’s about time HTC stops cloning the desire 1020193 times.

      1. I don’t understand what you’re talking about, yes the fronts all look the same but there’s only so much you can do with the fromt of a candybar phone. From the sensation, Mozart, titan, desire HD to the vivid one x and the desire z htc phones always look so different and unique.

        You can’t deny at all every single phone samsung has made lately are 100% inspired from the success of the galaxy.. cheap, light, and plastic-y.

  4. I lost all respect for this shitty company after THEY KNOWINGLY put out DEFECTIVE screens on the Tmobile my touch 4G. I than got the underpowered shitsatuon and that was enough for me to jump to the SGS2.

    1. Many feel the same way after Samsung knowingly put out unworking GPS on the SGS before learning for the SGS2.

      The best that we can hope for is for the companies to improve products over time, and they have.
      No need to continue the harsh language. ;)

      1. Actually, their non-functioning GPS goes back to at least the Moment.

        1. That’s the thing, all of the makers need to step it up in QA. Every model and brand gets complaints.

  5. Hmmm.  Being a bit of a phone swapper, within the last year and a half I have had the myTouch 4g, Vibrant, myTouch4G slide, Galaxy S II, and Sensation (three times for that one).  I like something about each of them, but ALL were/are GREAT phones.  HTC didn’t mention what the real problem was, they got absolutely run over by Sammy and the SGS line.  So many people I know have either the first or second generation of this phone.  I much prefer the Sensation to the Vibrant, but versus the SGSII, it’s not even close.  I also had a Motorola Photon (sprint, the rest were Tmo) from work, and HATED it. It should have been awesome, but instead was awful. I like Sense, using version 4 on a rommed Sensation now, its great. Also like TouchWiz. Bottom line, Samsung is moving units like mad, something had to give and so HTC fell off a bit. Adjust, move forward.

  6. my prediction?  more pain.

    do you hear me Chou???????????

  7. HTC didn’t mention what the real problem was, they got absolutely run over by Sammy and the SGS line.

    http://goo.gl/urqzK

  8. The problem with most android manufacturers is that when they make a device they only make it available on one or two carriers in certain areas and they need a larger consumer base, for instance the HTC one x is only going to at&t and its not going to make as much profit as it would available on all carriers, apple has the right idea make the iPhone available to more people = more profit, after the iPhone was made avialble to other carriers, apple started reporting ground breaking numbers like 3 million the first week , hell even the galaxy s2 would have prob sold around 10 million more sales if it was available to everyone on day one . you already know the htc one x isn’t going to sell very well although its an amazing phone, its only available on at&t in the u.s. Now if you subtract all the people who aren’t going to buy a smartphone, all the people who cant afford a high end smartphone, all the people who aren’t going to buy an android phone and finally all the people who just recently upgraded your left with a very small consumer base and its like this all over the world, so no wonder they cant make a profit their business model sucks

    1.  >The problem with most android manufacturers is that when they make a
      device they only make it available on one or two carriers in certain
      areas

      No, that’s what the carriers demand. In the US the carriers are the customer of the manufacturers.

      People are customers of the carrier.

      If enough people were willing to pay full unsubsidized phone prices, this would change. It’s a function of the credit culture.

      1. I understand that but these android manufacturers make a different variant of the same phone with slightly different hardware and then name it something else for a different carrier, why not just make one phone brand and spread it across all carriers. for instance the galaxy s2 on at&t has 3 different variants the galaxy s2, galaxy s2 skyrocket, and galaxy infuse and then the equivalent of the skyrocket is named the galaxy s2 epic for sprint, and htc is the worst at doing this, they have like 3-4 phones spread out through each carrier each named different but when you look at them in terms of design and hardware there pretty much almost the same phone with a slight difference, even after htc shortly announced that they will only focus on the ONE series they then later leaked that a mid range phone was coming to Verizon that dint have the one branding, seriously they need to get a plan and stick to it not change their mind ever week, if carriers like Verizon, at&t, sprint, t-mobile were only given the htc one x as an option they would have surely picked it up but knowing that htc puts out a new phone every 2 months they just pick up the equivalent to it. And another question arises if carriers decide which phone they want then how come sprint is carrying phones like the iPhone which they themselves reported last quarter to be hurting their profits. I bet anything if sprint was offered the HTC one x they would have bought it instantly, not only is it an amazing device but it also would make a better profit then half the phones they have in stock at the moment, but HTC prob made a contract with at&t to make it exclusive to just them.    

  9. what went wrong?  they got fat and lazy and they failed to innovate.

  10. we want vanilla android phones! i loved my n1, my gn is good to but there was something about htc…

  11. Always liked HTC phones better than Samsung.  I think their problem was more about the way they ran things and not their products.  Somewhere along the line I think they just had too many models.  All with only slight differences between them.  That must increase their overhead considerably.

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