LG sees record smartphone sales during Q1 2014, revenue is also up

LG just released its financial results for the first quarter of the year. It seems that things are going well for the tech giant, as its revenue increased 6% year-over-year to $3.19 billion. Additionally, the operating margins of LG have also experienced a spike compared with the previous fiscal quarter. The giant says that this is mostly due to two reasons - the release of the LG G Pro 2 phablet on the domestic South Korean market and more efficient marketing spending. Kudos for the latter, LG!

However, LG does not reveal information about the profits that its mobile division accounted for during the quarter.

But what's significantly more interesting is the disclosed data about the amount of devices LG shipped during the quarter. We have a new record here, folks! The manufacturer revealed that it has sold more than 5 million LTE-enabled smartphones during the quarter – this is an all-time record for LG. As a side comparison, the company states that it had sold 79% less of these a year ago. LTE-enabled smartphones are now responsible for 41% of LG's smartphone sales, whereas back in Q1 2013, 4G-capable devices comprised just 27% of all phone shipments of the company.

As a whole, the tech giant revealed that it has shipped 12.3 million smartphones during the first trimester of the year. It's unclear if we have a record here, however, the company claims that this amount of smartphones makes no more or less than 75% of all mobile device shipments that LG is responsible for – hence, simple calculations reveal that the giant has sold roughly 16.4 million handsets for the said time period.

The current quarter, Q2 2014, is also expected to be record-breaking for LG. Some analysts expect LG to sell around 15 million smartphones during Q2, which will beat all previous records. Additionally, the company is anticipating increased revenues during the second quarter and the main reasons for these expectations are the release of the upcoming flagship, the LG G3, as well as a "wider roll-out of the mass-tier L Series III". You got that right, LG actually confirmed that the flagship will be released some time during the next quarter!

Hopefully, the G3 will help LG see even bigger operating revenues after it gets released. You can check out our rumor roundup of the anticipated flagship here.

source: LG