Update Google (G OOG)

Just in case you were in danger of forgetting, Google’s (GOOG) second quarter earnings report on Thursday, July 14, should remind you: It’s good to be out in front of the market, but as an investor you don’t want to be too far out in front.

I can pick a ton of holes in Google’s competitive position and the challenges it faces over the next couple of years. But the market right now doesn’t want to hear about anything so far off. The news that counts is that Google is producing great numbers from its current dominance of the Internet search space.

For the second quarter Google reported earnings of $8.74 a share (excluding one-time items). That was 91 cents a share above the Wall Street consensus estimate of $7.83. Net revenue (for Google you have to subtract the cost of acquiring traffic from the revenue the traffic brings in) climbed 26% from the second quarter of 2010 to $9.03 billion. (Wall Street was looking for $8.63 billion.)

Operating income grew to $3.32 billion for the quarter from $2.67 billion in the second quarter of 2010.

Analysts who dinged the company last quarter on rising costs were relatively quiet on that front this quarter even though operating expenses climbed 49% from last year. Read more

Google misses as costs climb on bet that economic recovery will continue

Good news for the economy. Just okay news for Google (GOOG)

After the market close on July 15 Google reported second quarter earnings of $6.45 a share. That was worse than the $6.52 Wall Street analysts had projected. The stock dropped 4.2% or $20.62 in after hours trading to $473.40.

The problem wasn’t revenue—which is good news for the U.S. (and global economy) since most of Google’s revenue comes from advertising and higher revenue means more advertisers are buying ads. Read more

Google’s earnings are good news–let me count the ways

Google’s (GOOG) good earnings news is an indicator of something,  but just what?

On October 15, after the market close,  Google reported earnings of $5.89 a share, 47 cents a share above the consensus estimate of $5.42. Revenue, after traffic acquisition costs, climbed 8.4% from the third quarter of 2008. That was about $160 million ahead of the Wall Street consensus of $4.24 billion.

But what do the numbers mean? Read more

Apple and Google go head to head in China’s mobile phone market

Ladies and gentlemen. In this corner, wearing the Macintosh red trunks, Apple (AAPL) and its partner China Unicom(CHU)

In the other corner, wearing the Chrome trunks, Google (GOOG) and its partner China Mobile (CHL).

That’s the lineup that’s about to cross gloves in China’s smartphone market later this year, according to The Financial Times.

Apple is days, weeks, months away from signing an exclusive, three-year deal with China Unicom, the country’s No. 2 wireless operator, for its iPhone.

Google is about to launch a line of smartphones based on its Android operating system with China Mobile, the country’s biggest wireless operator.

At stake is not just China’s wireless market but momentum in the global battle over smartphones. Read more

Nobody else could shake up the smart phone and net book markets this way but Apple. Oh, and give Google headaches too.

Not a bad’s day work for any company.

You could have once described Apple (AAPL) as a niche company that produced cool products for a tiny sliver of the market. No more. On Monday, August 3, Apple demonstrated that although it may not have the market share of a Microsoft (MSFT), Google (GOOG), Hewlett-Packard (HPQ), or a Nokia (NOK), increasingly the company picks the tune that the elephants dance to.

For example, Apple announced that Eric Schmidt, Google’s (GOOG) CEO, had resigned from Apple’s board of directors. Schmidt had ben a member of Apple’s board since 2006. But no more. With Apple set to go head to head with Google in the browser market–where Google has just introduced Chrome to go against Apple’s Safari browser–and in the cell phone market–where Google’s Android operating systemn will go up against Apple’s iPhone–no way that Schmidt could keep his seat on the board.

Sure, he could recuse himself every time a senstive competitive issue came up but on current trend Schmidt would have spent most of Apple board meetings out in the hall.

Schmidt’s presence on Apple’s board got trickier last week when Google announced that Apple had rejected a Google app (application) for the iPhone that would have let users make free calls and text messages.

And that was just the beginning of Apple’s Monday.

Barron’s Online and the Financial Times reported that same day that Apple does indeed have the long-anticipated tablet computer in the works. The machine, with a 10-inch screen, would be Apple’s entry into the very  hot netbook or smaller-than-laptop market segment. Rumor says look for a September announcement with a November release–just in time for the Christmas shopping season.

The rumor has, according to Barron’s and the Financial Times, frozen a good part of the computer industry in place.  Nobody wants to design a competing product until they see what Apple has come up with. You can bet that CEOs at Lenova and other PC makers, and at the Asian original device makers (ODMs) that now design and manufacture so much of the world’s supply of computers are spending their nights tossing and turning as they wonder what Apple will come up with. Rumor pegs the price of the Apple device at a premium (of course) $699 to $799.

And no day would  be complete without news of a counterattack on the iPhone from Motorola (MOT), Palm (PALM), and Research In Motion (RIMM). According to Collins Stewart, Motorola’s Android-based phones would join Palm’s Pre (and lower end Pixie) in trying to take back mindshare that now belongs to Apple. Research In Motion is said to  be launching a new lower cost Curve.

Should make for interesting Christmas shopping, anyway.