Apple captures 52% of phone industry profits with just 4.2% of the market

Even though Android is handily winning the mobile market share battle, Apple is still trouncing everyone else when it comes to actually making money from its phones.

In the last quarter, Apple snapped up 52 percent of total handset industry profits, while the iPhone accounted for only 4.2 percent of global phone market share, according to Canaccord Genuity analyst T. Michael Walkley. And that was for a quarter where Apple ended up disappointing Wall Street analysts.

Walkley expects Apple’s December quarter to more than make up for its last (and he’s not the only one), with iPhone sales hitting 29 million. He predicts that Apple will sell 104.4 million iPhones for the fiscal year 2012, and 140.8 million in fiscal 2013.

Come the next quarter, Walkley predicts that Apple will command 60 percent of industry profits (jaw, meet floor). Apple was close to reaching that goal in the second quarter, when it reached 57 percent of industry profits (likely because of the Verizon iPhone).

Apple has been ruling phone profits for some time now — Asymco’s Horace Dediu had a great analysis of Apple’s revenues versus other major smartphone companies in August — but the company’s continued ability to make piles of cash is still worth pointing out. One reason is Apple’s command of its supply chain, which allows it to get high-quality components at far better prices than its competitors.

And of course, it helps even further that Apple has full control over its hardware and software ecosystem, which means the company is making even more from every iPhone sold thanks to app and media purchases, as well as advertising.

Via AllThingsD