Apple Inc. (AAPL) has had yet another management shift, making it the third retail executive departure from the company in the past year. According to IFOAppleStore, Apple’s VP of Retail, Jerry McDougal has left the company to spend more time with his family. McDougal has been a part of the company for 12 years, running Apple’s retail marketing, product merchandising, store operations, loss prevention and customer loyalty programs and worked under Apple’s former retail chief, Ron Johnson. Johnson left the company to become CEO of JC Penney to help the company reshape its retail future.

A key player in the birth of Apple’s retail chain and a potential candidate to lead the retail stores has left the company. Jerry McDougal, Vice-President of Retail, said goodbye to his colleagues last Friday, sources say. His departure was explained as not work-related, but rather so he could spend more time with his family.

McDougal was considered as a replacement for Johnson when he left the company for JC Penney and then again for John Browett who left the company late last year, alongside iOS chief Scott Forstall who was ousted from the company because of issues with Maps and Siri, as well as personal issues with other executives. According to AllThingsD, McDougal will be replaced by Apple’s VP of Finance, Jim Bean.

Jim Bean is moving to Retail to help support our store teams. Jim has been at Apple for 15 years and is a great leader who understands our culture and focus on customer service.

Apple expects employees on the campus to dedicate large portions of their daily time and lives to the company, and recently has been placing the duties of departing executives on other vice presidents at the company. Ultimately, Apple is restructuring the management team that once operated under former CEO and Chairman, Steve Jobs.

{Via MacRumors}

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL), over the past two years has been not only increased its revenue but also its quarterly profits and on Tuesday, the company reported their best quarter ever for the 1st quarter of 2012. AAPL posted a revenue of $46.33 billion and net quarterly profit of $13.06 billion, which equals to $13.87 per diluted share.

This is much improved and higher than the same time last year, where Apple reported $26.7 billion and net quarterly profit of $6 billion, or $6.43 per diluted share.

Q1 2012 gross margin was at 44.7, higher than the 38.5 from last year, and international sales, unsurprisingly accounted for about 58% of the quarter’s revenue. This was a new record for the Cupertino company, in both profit and revenue, with the company increasing drastically higher each year, and is showing no signs of any slow down.

We’re thrilled with our outstanding results and record-breaking sales of iPhones, iPads and Macs,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “Apple’s momentum is incredibly strong, and we have some amazing new products in the pipeline.

Apple also shipped 5.2 million Mac computers during the quarter, a unit increase of 26 percent from the previous year. iPhone unit sales reached 37.04 million, up 128 percent from a year ago quarter, and the company sold 15.4 million iPods during the quarter, representing 21 percent unit decline.

Apple has not been experiencing the same heavy iPod sales as they once did, making the popular devices now a small part of the company’s revenue, with majority coming from the iPhone and iPad. Apple’s projected revenue for the second quarter of fiscal 2012 is $32.5 billion and earnings per diluted share of $8.50.

In early January, Verizon CFO noted that Verizon had activated over 4.2 million Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) iPhones during the fourth quarter of 2011, doubling the amount activated during the 3rd quarter of 2011. AAPL experienced heavy sales of the Verizon iPhone upon release and both companies were seeing an increase in revenue.

On Tuesday, Verizon officially announced its earnings for the 4th quarter of 2011, noting that they activated 4.3 million iPhones during the 4Q. With total smartphone sales of 7.7 million units, the iPhone comprised of 55% of Verizon’s the total amount of sales.

Smartphones now count as 44% of Verizon’s postpaid customer phone base, moving up from 39% in the third quarter. However, with this increase in iPhone sales, Verizon’s margins were affected slightly because of the upfront costs that Verizon paid to the manufacturers for their phones. This decrease in margin will later be regained from the 2 and 4 year contracts that many customers signed with the carrier.

This allows carriers such as Verizon, Sprint, and AT&T to buy large shipments of iPhones with a major upfront cost, and profit on the back end. Ultimately, the carriers make more money off contracts as they activate more and more iPhones. Verizon is rumored to release a 4G LTE iPhone 5 later this year, which could potentially increase the current 55% of total smartphone sales.

{via MacRumors}

It seems that not a day goes by without somebody telling me that I should be budgeting my finances to make my money go further and to make sure that I know where all my money is going. Well I took that advice many years ago and have used a variety of methods.

From spreadsheets and shareware software to paid of apps and web based options I’ve tried them all, well now Paper Finance is bringing a new alternative option to the table that they claim is both fully featured and easy to use.
If this is the first time you’ve started to manage your finances then the brief tour when you launch the app helps you get started. But in all honesty just as the app suggests everything is kept nice a simple.

If you just want to track a single account then everything is ready to go out of the box so to speak although if required you can add multiple accounts to keep track of.

Of course the simplicity of the application means that you aren’t going to be able import all of your transactions so you’ll have to add them all manually as they occur. This is done via the home screen and you can simple use the new expense or new income button as required. Whichever you chose you can simply add the amount, category, account and date as well as adding optional fields for name and notes.

It’s also possible to add additional categories and accounts direct from the new expense/income page keeping the overall simplicity of the app intact.

Your new additions will automatically be reflected in your balances on the home page so it’s easy to keep track of things. Paper Finance also features recurring transactions. To make a recurring transaction you can tap on the date’s detail disclosure button from the new transaction screen. This takes you to the date details screen where you can set a few recurring options.

Being able to add transactions is one thing but being able to report on them is more important if you are going to keep your finances in order. A swipe to the left will take you to the reports page where you can choose from a range of pre-built reports.

The reports are pretty basic but cover all the main requirements, you can report your expenses or income, or report by category or date. Not only that but you can then view them as a chart which you can export to a PDF file or export the data to CSV.

Both of the exports utilize the email functionality of the iPhone/iPod Touch and just like the reports themselves they are generated quickly even when there is a large amount of data involved.

There are a range of settings so that you can personalize Paper Finance to your own requirements including the ability to add a passcode to the application so that you can keep your data private.

In this day and age where there are applications available where you can automatically import all of your transaction from your online bank accounts Paper Finance feels a little retro.

However, if you want a simple budget app that is a replacement for pen and paper or even a spreadsheet then Paper Finance completes that requirement very nicely.

The Good

• Basic finance management made easy
• Simple controls a navigation
• Export to PDF and CSV

The Not So Good

• No way to import your transactions
• Limited reports

Price: $2.99 (iTunes Store)
Released: Apr 22, 2010
Reviewed Version: 1.0
Size: 1.3 MB
Language: English
Seller: idealSky Software, LLC
© 2010 idealSky Software, LLC
Rated 4+
Requirements: Compatible with iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad. Requires iPhone OS 3.1 or later.

App Description

WalletWhiz is your personal financial tool for easily tracking your spending habits against a budget.

Unlike most budget applications on the App Store, WalletWhiz gives you the choice of managing your budget through a unique Calendar view, a traditional Categories view, or both. By using the Calendar view in tandem with the Categories view, you can manage your budget more efficiently.

With WalletWhiz, you can:
– Track your expenses and income through the unique Calendar view or the regular Categories view;
– Quickly set up a Period, then assign different budgets to each monthly or weekly Cycle in the Period;
– Export transactions to CSV format so you can easily view and re-use the data in your spreadsheet or financial application of choice;
– Easily protect your data by setting a passcode;
– Experience the benefit of iPhone’s built-in support for your currency and language.

With WalletWhiz, your budget is in your hands.

Coming Soon: v1.1 update has been submitted for approval. Thanks for your support!ü

Price $0.99

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WalletWhiz Screenshots

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CompareMe is a very simple yet very useful app making shopping decisions earier for you.

This utility application compares and converts prices of products with many different package sizes, volumes, and lengths. Discounts and premiums are calculated and displayed directly or can be set by the user.

With so many great new apps being launched everyday, I am always on a look out for new, creative and useful apps. Recently I noticed this Finance App and it amazes me how developers want their apps to be a part of almost everything we do, in this case it could be Shopping, bargaining and much more!

CompareMe offers a very simple and intutive interface to calculate how much discount you are getting or how much premium you are paying by entering three values which are Amount, Unit and Price.

It offers various options to set the unit ranging from Piece Number, Mass, Volume, Surface and Length. So, whether you are shopping for clothes or groceries or anything else CompareMe will help you crack the best deal.

CompareMe is a must have for all who love to shop and even for those who just like to compare anything and everything!

Price $1.99

The Good

• Multiple uses
• Will make you a smart shopper
• Its fun comparing!

The Not So Good

• Option to Name and save all your comparisons could be added.

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