Daily Tech Snippet: Tuesday, May 3

• Apple Sells Fewer iPhones in Last Quarter, Shares Slide: Apple Inc. reported falling iPhone sales, highlighting the need to deliver blockbuster new features in the next edition of the flagship device if the company is to fend off rivals like Samsung. Investor confidence has been mounting ahead of a major iPhone revampdue later this year. Yet competitors released new high-end smartphones recently, putting pressure on Apple to deliver a device that’s advanced enough to entice existing users to upgrade and lure new customers. Apple sold 50.8 million iPhones in the quarter ended April 1, down from 51.2 million units in the same period a year earlier, and less than the 51.4 million predicted in a Bloomberg survey of analysts. Apple stock slipped almost 2 percent in extended trading.  The Cupertino, California-based company also forecast $43.5 billion to $45.5 billion in revenue for the current quarter. China revenue fell 14 percent. Cook has repeatedly sought to highlight Apple’s services, the fastest growing part of the company last year. Sales of offerings like iCloud, the App Store and Apple Music grew 18 percent to $7.04 billion in the quarter.

• Infosys, an Indian Outsourcing Company, Says It Will Create 10,000 U.S. Jobs: Facing new corporate demands and political pressure from a Trump administration that wants to curb immigrant work visas, Infosys, one of India’s leading tech outsourcing companies, said Tuesday that it will hire up to 10,000 Americans to serve its clients in the United States. The move makes Infosys the latest Asian technology company to portray itself as a jobs creator as President Trump threatens to take action against companies he sees as hurting American workers. Last month, Mr. Trump signed an executive order directing government agencies to review employment immigration laws to promote “Hire American” policies. That included offering suggestions for how to reform the H-1B visa program, which operates as a lottery to bring skilled foreign laborers to the United States each year — usually tech workers. But Infosys is also making its move to hire American driven by other forces. Its home base of India has become a less appealing place to do the grunt work of programming as wages rise there and skilled labor has become more difficult to find. A study of 36,000 engineering students at 500 Indian colleges released last month found that only 5 percent could write software code correctly.

• Etsy Replaces CEO, Plans to Cut 8% of Jobs to Reduce Costs: Etsy Inc. named director Josh Silverman as chief executive officer, replacing Chad Dickerson, and said it’s cutting 8 percent of its workforce as it copes with slowing sales growth. The shares tumbled as much as 21 percent. Etsy also reported first-quarter revenue of $96.9 million, missing analysts’ average estimates. Though sales gained 18 percent, it was the company’s fourth straight period of slowing growth. The stock dropped as low as $8.96 in extended trading after news of the executive change and earnings report.

• Twilio stock plummets as major client Uber distances itself: A good report on revenue wasn’t enough to keep Twilio stock from taking a dive in after-hours trading. What at first glance appeared to be a positive story very quickly divulged into a financial nightmare. Shares in the cloud communications company have fallen 30 percent in after-hours trading, attributable to lower than anticipated guidance. On the earnings call, CEO Jeff Lawson addressed the unexpected guidance by explaining that Uber, one of Twilio’s largest customers, will be reducing its use of Twilio over the next year. This is a major hit for the company because Uber accounted for 12 percent of its revenue in this quarter. Twilio expects this number to fall off over the next year as Uber moves away from Twilio as its principle communication infrastructure provider. Outside of guidance, Twilio reported revenue of $87.4 million with a loss of 4 cents in non-GAAP earnings per share for its Q1 2017 earnings report. This overshot analyst expectations of $83.6 million in revenue by $3.8 million and nicely beat expected non-GAAP losses of six cents per share. Twilio has long struggled with its customer concentration and it just came back to bite them. Large clients like WhatsApp and Uber have historically made up large portions of the company’s revenue, causing some on Wall Street anxiety. But while Twilio has been moving to diversify its sources of revenue, a single customer, in this case Uber, was still able to extract almost a billion dollars in market value from the public company.

• Google success in U.S. schools forces Microsoft, Apple to scramble: Microsoft Corp's announcement of a suite of new education products on Tuesday shows the company's determination to reverse a major shift that has taken place in U.S. classrooms in recent years: for most educators and school districts, Google's Chromebook is now the computer of choice. The Chromebook has gone from a standing start in 2011 to wild popularity in the market for education technology, which tech companies have traditionally viewed as a critical way to win over the next generation of users.