Over the next week or so, well be posting some of the best features from the latest edition of our quarterly magazine. Alternatively, if you want the full experience, with pictures, boxouts and all, you can read the issue online here or subscribe to receive the print edition here.
Google. Apple. Facebook. Amazon. Theyre often spoken of in the same breath, as the four giants of the internet – the GAFA Gang for short – but how do these four giant companies actually compare to one another in terms of revenues?
To find out, weve gathered together the quarterly results of each company over the last two years, and compared their revenues and profits.
Big Players
Stating the obvious, all four of these companies are very different entities, and each fills a significantly different space.
Google is an internet services company with a wide variety of products under its belt, including the worlds most widely used smartphone OS, Android; its own internet browser, Chrome; an app and digital media store, Google Play; and the forthcoming Google Glass wearable devices. For the vast majority of its money, however, Google still relies on advertising, which made up 85 per cent of its total revenues in Q1, 2013.
Apple, founded 37 years ago, is by far the oldest of the four. It started out as a personal computer company, and while the range of devices it sells has widened greatly since – with the iPod in 2001, iPhone in 2007, and iPad in 2010 – its business still lies in selling its software and hardware. Its the largest smartphone and tablet manufacturer in most Western countries, and according to a recent Canalys study, its App Store accounts for 74 per cent of all app revenue.
Facebook is the youngest company, founded just eight years ago, and its interests are arguably the narrowest, with all of its business derived from its social network, and the advertising it displays to its more than 1bn users. Facebooks IPO in May 2012 was the sixth biggest of all time, raising $16bn, but in its filing, it identified an inability to monetise its mobile user base as a potential risk. It has since worked hard to correct this, with a series of mobile launches – from the introduction of ads to its full mobile offering, to Facebook Home, an Android launcher app.
Amazon is first and foremost an online retailer, and derives around 80 per cent of its revenues from selling products through its site and apps. More recently, it has also developed a hardware side with its Kindle devices, initially a range of eReaders, before the introduction of the Kindle Fire tablet in September 2011.
As some of the companies label their quarters differently, we have consolidated the quarters for the purposes of this article, so that Q1 relates to the period 1 January–31 March, Q2 to the period 1 April—30 June, and so on.
Thats the introductions out of the way – lets move onto the numbers.
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State of Play: Q1, 2013
Looking at Q1, 2013 – the period running from the beginning of January to the end of March – it is clear that Apple is by far the biggest earner, in terms of both revenue and net income. Thats perhaps obvious, given that its consistently the worlds most valuable company, but the extent to which it dwarfs even these other giants is impressive.
Its revenues for the quarter ($43.6bn/£28.4bn) were higher than the other three combined. Even more impressively, its net income ($9.5bn) was actually nearly triple that of the other three combined.
Combining Google, Amazon and Facebook like this doesnt tell the full story, though, with each companys results for the quarter painting a different picture.
Google was the second largest company by net income ($3.3bn), but only third in terms of revenues ($14bn). Meanwhile, Facebook had the lowest revenue of the four ($1.5bn) but was third when it came to income ($219m).
Perhaps the most interesting case, though, is Amazon. Its revenues were the second highest ($16bn) during the period, but it came a distant fourth in terms of net income ($82m), meaning it had a net profit margin of just 0.5 per cent for the quarter. 
Google actually has the highest profit margin of the four (at 24 per cent) followed by Apple (22 per cent) and Facebook (15 per cent). The gap between Amazon and the others can be put down to the narrower profit margins in the retail sector, but that only goes to highlight how different its business model is from those of its GAFA counterparts.
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Q2, 2011 – Q1, 2013
Looking back over the last eight quarters, the picture remains largely the same. Apple has consistently held the dominant position, and the remaining three have remained in the same positions more or less throughout.
All four companies saw a spike in revenues during Q4, in both 2011 and 2012, due to the effect of the Christmas period. As might be expected, this has the strongest effect on the companies which make their money from selling products – in Q4, 2012, Apples revenues jumped by 52 per cent quarter-on-quarter, and Amazons by 54 per cent.
Of the four, Facebook and Amazon reported a net loss over these eight quarters – Amazon in Q3, 2012 (-$274) and Facebook twice, in Q2 (-$157m) and Q3 (-$59m), 2012.
The overall trend is positive, with all four companies reporting higher revenues in Q1, 2013, than a year before. Facebook actually saw the largest growth here, up 38 per cent year-on-year, followed by Google, up 31 per cent, and Amazon, up 22 per cent. With a year-on-year growth of 11 per cent, Apple is actually growing the slowest of the four. However, that could actually be due to the companys leading position, which arguably gives it less room to grow.
Taking an average value of the last eight quarters, its again clear how much Apple overshadows the other three. In terms of net income, Google is the only company which is even comparable – on this pie chart, Amazon and Facebook are barely visible slivers.
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Beyond GAFA
But what about the other big mobile players, who arent included in the GAFA gang? How do Microsoft, Samsung, BlackBerry, Yahoo, and Nokia stack up
Looking at each companys results for Q1, 2013, Samsung is far and away the biggest of these companies, with revenues of 52.9 trillion won ($47.6bn) – actually higher than Apples revenues for the quarter. It still cant hold a candle to Apples profits, though, with net income of 7.2 trillion won ($6.5bn).
Microsoft is the next biggest contender, with revenues of $20.5bn and net income of $6bn. In both respects, its position lies somewhere above Google, but below Apple.
Despite its recent fortunes, Nokia still pulled in revenues of €5.9bn ($7.6bn) in Q1 – five times higher than Facebook – but its net income was just €323m ($420m).
BlackBerry, which has had a similarly difficult couple of years, reported revenues of $2.7bn, and net income of $98m. Its worth noting that BlackBerry uses a different financial calendar to the other companies, ending March 2, meaning this quarter includes December – however, its revenues arent significantly different to the previous quarter, suggesting the figures arent too artificially inflated by the effect of Christmas.
Finally, Yahoo is the smallest of these companies by revenue, at just $1.1bn – less even than Facebook. However, thanks to a stronger profit margin, its net income is $391m, higher than those of Facebook, Amazon, Nokia, and BlackBerry.
