Flush with activity at its Macworld Conference & Expo, Apple Computer reported strong financial results for the first quarter ended December 25, 2004, much of it coming from sales of its iPod digital music player.The results were announced Wednesday amidst Apple’s show in San Francsico, where the company is displaying a raft of new iPod features as well as small, affordable iMacs and other products.For the quarter, Apple said it earned a profit of $295 million, or $70 cents per share. These results compare to a profit of $63 million, or $17 cents per share in the same quarter last year. Revenue for the quarter reached $3.49 billion, up 74 percent from the year-ago quarter. Apple said it shipped 1,046,000 Macintosh units and 4,580,000 iPods during the quarter, representing a 26 percent increase in CPU units and a 525 percent increase in iPods over the year-ago quarter. “We are thrilled to report the highest quarterly revenue and net income in Apple’s history,” Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO, said in a statement. “We’ve sold over 10 million iPods to date and are kicking off the new year with a slate of innovative new products including iPod shuffle, Mac mini and iLife ’05.” “We’re pleased to report 74 percent revenue growth, 26 percent Mac unit growth and 525 percent iPod unit growth,” said Peter Oppenheimer, Apple’s CFO. “Looking ahead to the second quarter of fiscal 2005, we expect revenue of about $2.9 billion and earnings per diluted share of about $.40.” Gordon Haff, a senior analyst at Illuminata, said iPod sales are clearly driving Apple profits in a consumer market. “It’s pretty clear that the iPod, while not the only force behind Apple’s revenue, is it’s biggest one.”Apple’s Xserve server and Xsan storage device, announced last week, offer enterprise value, he said. “I don’t see Apple as being a mainstream enterprise server vendor, but I see it having pockets of success, like today,” he said. Technology Industry