Zoom founder Eric Yuan speaks before the Nasdaq opening bell ceremony in New York on April 18, 2019.
Kena Betancur | Getty Images
Zoom shares rose as much as 8% in extended trading on Monday after the video-calling software provider announced fiscal second-quarter results that exceeded analysts’ expectations.
Here’s how the company did:
Earnings: $1.34 per share, adjusted, vs. $1.05 per share as expected by analysts, according to Refinitiv.
Revenue: $1.14 billion, vs. $1.12 billion as expected by analysts, according to Refinitiv.
Zoom’s revenue grew 3.6% year over year in the quarter that ended on July 31, according to a statement. Net income jumped to $182 million, or 59 cents per share, in the quarter, compared with $45.7 million, or 15 cents per share per share, in the fiscal second quarter one year ago.
Still, the company is moving at a much more sluggish pace than it was two years ago, when it said revenue multiplied almost by five after the arrival of Covid pushed companies and schools to sign up for premium accounts and keep their people collaborating remotely.
The company claimed around 218,100 enterprise customers at the end of July, up 1% from 215,900 as of April 30. Zoom defines enterprise clients as business units that Zoom’s direct sales teams, resellers or partners work with.
Zoom’s quarterly guidance came up just short. Executives called for $1.07 to $1.09 in adjusted earnings per share on $1.115 billion to $1.120 billion in revenue in the fiscal third quarter. Analysts polled by Refinitiv had expected $1.03 in adjusted earnings per share and $1.13 billion in revenue.
Management raised Zoom’s full-year forecast. Executives now see $4.63 to $4.67 in adjusted earnings per share and $4.485 billion to $4.495 billion in revenue for the full 2024 fiscal year. The revenue range implies 2% growth at the middle of the range. Three months ago Zoom said it was looking for $4.25 to $4.31 in adjusted earnings per share and $4.465 billion to $4.485 billion in revenue. Analysts polled by Refinitiv had predicted that Zoom would produce $4.30 in adjusted earnings per share and $4.49 billion in revenue.
“Our increased total revenue guidance reflects a consistent view on Enterprise, with tempered expectations for Online for the remainder of the year,” Kelly Steckelberg, Zoom’s finance chief, is expected to say on a conference call with analysts, according to prepared remarks.
During the quarter Zoom said that through free trials, certain customers could start requesting call summaries that they can share without recording conversations, and the company said it invested in artificial-intelligence startup Anthropic.
Notwithstanding the after-hours move, Zoom stock has declined about 1% so far this year, while the S&P 500 index has risen 15% over the same period.
Executives will discuss the results with analysts on a conference call starting at 5 p.m. ET.
This is breaking news. Please check back for updates.
The Huawei flagship store and the Apple flagship store at Nanjing Road Pedestrian Street in Shanghai, China, Sept. 2, 2024.
Cfoto | Future Publishing | Getty Images
Huawei reclaimed the top spot in China’s smartphone market in the second quarter of the year, while Apple returned to growth in the country — one of its most critical markets — data released by technology market analyst firm Canalys showed on Monday.
Huawei shipped 12.2 million smartphones in China in the three months ended June, a rise of 15% year on year — equating to 18% market share. It’s the first time Huawei has been the biggest player by market share in China since the first quarter of 2024, according to Canalys.
Apple, meanwhile, shipped 10.1 million smartphones in the quarter in China, up 4% year on year and ranking fifth. It is the first time Apple has recorded growth in China since the fourth quarter of 2023, Canalys said.
Shipments represent the number of devices sent to retailers. They do no equate directly to sales but are a gauge of demand.
The numbers come ahead of Apple’s quarterly earnings release this week, with investors watching the company’s performance in China, a market where the Cupertino giant has faced significant challenges, including intense competition from Huawei and other local players such as Xiaomi.
Huawei, which made a comeback at the end of 2023 after its smartphone business was crippled by U.S. sanctions, has eaten away at Apple’s share.
Apple’s return to growth in China will be a welcome sign for investors. The U.S. tech giant “strategically adjusted its pricing” for the iPhone 16 series in China, which helped it grow, Canalys said. Chinese e-commerce firms discounted Apple’s iPhone 16 models during the quarter. And Apple itself also increased trade-in prices for some iPhone models.
Meanwhile, competition in China has intensified. Huawei has aggressively launched various smartphones in the past year and has started to roll out HarmonyOS 5, its self-developed operating system, across various devices. It is a rival to Google’s Android and Apple’s iOS.
“This move is expected to accelerate the expansion of its independent ecosystem’s user base, while also placing greater demands on system compatibility and user experience,” Lucas Zhong, analyst at Canalys, said in a press release.
Alibaba announced plans to release a pair of smart glasses powered by its AI models. The Quark AI Glasses are Alibaba’s first foray into the smart glasses product category.
Alibaba
Alibaba on Monday unveiled a pair of smart glasses powered by its artificial intelligence models, marking the Chinese firm’s first foray into the product category.
The e-commerce giant said the Quark AI Glasses will be launched in China by the end of 2025 with hardware powered by the firm’s Qwen large language model and its advanced AI assistant called Quark.
The Hangzhou, headquartered company is one of the leaders in China’s AI space, aggressively launching new models with capabilities that compete with Western counterparts like OpenAI.
Many tech companies see wearables, specifically glasses, as the next frontier in computing alongside the smartphone. Quark, which was updated this year, is currently available as an app in China. Alibaba is stepping into the hardware game as a way to distribute the app more widely.
The Quark AI Glasses are Alibaba’s answer to Meta’s smart glasses that were designed in collaboration with Ray-Ban. The Chinese tech giant will also now compete with Chinese consumer electronics player Xiaomi who this year released its own AI glasses.
Alibaba said its glasses will support hands-free calling, music streaming, real-time language translation, and meeting transcription. The glasses also feature a built-in camera.
Alibaba owns a range of different services in China from mapping to an online travel agent. Its affiliate company Ant Group also runs the widely-used Alipay mobile service. Alibaba said users will be able to use a navigation service via the glasses, pay with Alipay and compare prices on Taobao, its China e-commerce platform.
The firm has yet to release other details such as the price and technical specifications.
A Samsung flag flies outside the company office in Seoul, South Korea on February 05, 2024.
Chung Sung-jun | Getty Images News | Getty Images
Samsung Electronics has entered into a $16.5 billion contract for supplying semiconductors to a major company, a regulatory filing by the South Korean company showed Monday.
The memory chipmaker, which did not name the counterparty, mentioned in its filing that the effective start date of the contract was July 26, 2024 — receipt of orders — and its end date was Dec. 31, 2033.
Samsung declined to comment on details regarding the counterparty.
The company said that details of the deal, including the name of the counterparty, will not be disclosed until the end of 2033, citing a request from the second party “to protect trade secrets,” according to a Google translation of the filing in Korean.
“Since the main contents of the contract have been not been disclosed due to the need to maintain business confidentiality, investors are advised to invest carefully considering the possibility of changes or termination of the contract,” the company said. Its shares were up nearly 3% in early trading.
Local South Korean media outlets have said that American chip firm Qualcomm could potentially place an order for Samsung’s 2 nanometer chips.
While Qualcomm is a possibility, given its potential 2 nanometer project with Samsung, Tesla seems the more probable customer, Ray Wang, research director of semiconductors, supply chain and emerging technology at The Futurum Group, told CNBC
Samsung’s foundry service manufactures chips based on designs provided by other companies. It is the second largest provider of foundry services globally, behind Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company.
The company said in April that it was aiming for its foundry business to start mass production of its next-generation 2 nanometer and secure major orders for the advanced product. In semiconductor technology, smaller nanometer sizes signify more compact transistor designs, which lead to greater processing power and efficiency.
Samsung, which is set to deliver earnings on Thursday, expects its second-quarter profit to more than halve. An analyst previously told CNBC that the disappointing forecast was due to weak orders for its foundry business and as the company has struggled to capture AI demand for its memory business.
The company has fallen behind competitors SK Hynix and Micron in high-bandwidth memory chips — an advanced type of memory used in AI chipsets.
SK Hynix, the leader in HBM, has become the main supplier of these chips to American AI behemoth Nvidia. While Samsung has reportedly been working to get the latest version of its HBM chips certified by Nvidia, a report from a local outlet suggests these plans have been pushed back to at least September.