DailyTech writes that despite record shipments, ARM fails to beat analyst expectations due to weak sales of flagship phones, which is the company's most lucrative market:
ARM's processor licensing revenue rose 26 percent to $107.2M USD, beating the analyst expectation of $94.7M USD. But overall licensing royalties came in at just 7 percent growth at $146.4M USD. The up-front fees that ARM gets from customers (licensing revenue) came in at $127.4M USD, less than the Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S average expectation of $137.9M USD.
A major factor in that miss was weak sales of ARM's licensable mobile GPU cores and lucrative A50 Series cores. Both Apple and Samsung Electronics Comp., Ltd. (KRX:005935) (KRX:005930) -- the world's two biggest and most profitable smartphone makers reported lower than expected unit sales of its flagship phones last month.