Quotations from Tim Cook at Apple Annual Meeting

Tim Cook gave an interesting presentation at the Apple Inc. (AAPL) Annual Meeting today.

"Apple's revenue growth is greater than Google (GOOG), Microsoft (MSFT), Dell (DELL), Hewlett Packard (HPQ), Lenovo (LNVGY), and RIMM (RIMM) combined."

"Apple generated $13 billion in profit for the latest quarter, one billion a week."

"On Black Friday, more iPads were sold than all Android devices combined."

"The 700 million smartphone market is expected to double by 2016."

"Apple is doing $10 billion in China, more than any other US tech company."

"Over 50% of the buyers of iPads were the buyers' first Apple product purchase."

In response to question about losing market share to Samsung/Androids, "We don't have our heads stuck up ... stuck in the sand."

"Apple is building a new campus on 175 acres nearby. The property currently has 26 buildings amounting to 2.7 million square feet. The plans are to bulldoze all buildings and building one brand new building of 2.8 million square feet. Goal is completion in 2006. Currently, 80% of the property is asphalt and concrete. That will all change with lots of park land."

"Apple uses 100% renewable energy sources, most produced on site."

"Apple has trained over a million people in China about human rights."

"I still think that David Einhorn's proposal was a silly side show."

In response to a question about the iPad Mini cannibalizing the iPad, "If we don't cannibalize it, someone else will. We take a long view of it; win a customer for life."

"Apple owns the largest solar farm of any commercial company in the world."

"Apple has removed toxics from its products and is surprised that more tech companies haven't followed suit."

"95% of Fortune 500 companies use iPhones and iPads."

Why Doesn't the Revenues per Employee Ratio (R/E Ratio) Get More Respect?

One obscure way of measuring how efficient a company operates is the amount or sales or revenues that are generated for each employee at the company, also known as the Revenues per Employee Ratio or R/E Ratio. It is also sometimes referred to as the Sales per Employee Ratio or S/E ratio. I've written about the R/E ratio in the past a couple times, but there doesn't appear to be much interest in this metric.

The concept is simple. Let's assume there are two companies in the same industry generating the exact same amount of revenues. But Company A has 1,000 employees and Company B has 10,000 employees. Which company do you think would generate higher net earnings? Which stock do you think would perform better?

Let's take some real life examples, using the technology sector. With only 19,665 employees and raking in $182.95 billion in revenues, Google (GOOG) is by far the top large cap tech company with the highest R/E ratio at $9,303,330 for every employee. And to top things off, the stock is up 79% so far this year. Apple (AAPL) is close behind with an R/E ratio of $5,408,163 and the stock is up an amazing 127% for the year. Then there is Amazon (AMZN) at $2,746,376 per employee. Amazon has a top return year-to-date of 142%.

Now let's look at some of the tech stocks that don't have as high an R/E ratio. Yahoo (YHOO) has a revenue per employee ratio far below the others at $1,646,323 and the stock was only up 24%. Both Dell (DELL) and IBM (IBM) generate almost identical revenues per employee at $410,000 and are up about 49% for the year; not even close to the returns for Apple or Amazon. And Hewlett Packard (HPQ) only has a R/E ratio of $372,866 and has the lower year-to-date return to show for it at 38%.

So next time you are trying to decide which stock you want to buy in a particular industry or sector, take a close look at the R/E ratio.

Author owns AAPL, AMZN, and YHOO.

By Fred Fuld at Stockerblog.com