Quick hits: May 2018

Samsung has re-emerged as the world’s top smartphone manufacturer in Q1 2018, according to IDC. Apple had briefly claimed the top spot in market share the previous quarter, edging out the South Korean firm. Rounding out the top five are Huawei, Xiaomi, and Oppo, all recording slight gains for the quarter.

Strategy Analytics, however, reports that the iPhone X, iPhone 8 and 8 Plus, and the iPhone 7 (?!) take four of the top five top-selling smart devices for the very same quarter. Samsung’s Galaxy S9 is expected to gain back ground, having been released near the end of the quarter. We are already beginning to see that happen, says Bloomberg. Apple’s performance on the stock markets hit a rough patch as sales cooled on the iPhone X at quarter’s end. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, who produces the iPhone’s chipset, reported sales of $1 billion USD less than expected, which caused Apple’s stock prices to take a slight tumble during the latter half of April. Stock value has since mostly recovered.

In the midst of Facebook being under fire for data breaches in the Cambridge Analytica scandal and pledging to be more transparent, Bloomberg reports that the social media company spent $3.3 million USD on lobbying in Congress, an all-time high for them. Issues Facebook has lobbied on include an information transparency bill, which they support.

Cloud computing company Pivotal amassed a market capitalization of $3.9 billion USD after its IPO in mid-April, according to Forbes. Pivotal, whom Dell has a 70% stock in, makes software designed to bridge IT architectures built on private and public clouds. They compete with IBM and Oracle, who offer similar services.