Google has just announced its latest quarterly earnings results, with revenue rising 36 percent compared to last year, and eight percent compared to last quarter.

Google
Google's Q4 2012 results show revenue up 36 percent year-on year, but the cost per click rate of its ads declined six percent. (Credit: Reuters) Reuters

The company posted consolidated revenue, which includes its Motorola Mobility mobile phone business but not the television set-top box business it recently agreed to sell, of $14.42 billion (£9.09bn) on Tuesday.

This brought Google's total revenue for 2012 to over $50bn for the first time in the company's short history. The company's revenue for 2012 matched almost exactly the company's cash stockpile, which stood at $48.1bn on the 31 December of 2012 (including cash equivalents and marketable securities).

However the average cost-per-click, a critical metric that denotes the price advertisers pay Google, declined 6 percent from a year ago, the fifth consecutive quarter of decline.

Looking at the UK alone, Google's core business grew 22 percent, according to Patrick Pichette, Google's Chief Financial Officer said during the earnings call after the results were announced.

Launched

Google launched a number of devices during the last three months of 2012, inlcuding the Acer Chromebook costing just £199, as well as two Nexus-branded products, the Nexus 10 tablet and LG-made Nexus 4 smartphone.

Larry Page, Google CEO and co-founder also spoke to analysts during the earnings call and addressed the issue of lack of stock for the Nexus 4, saying: "Clearly work [needs] to be done to manage our supply better."

He also hinted at the work being carried out by Motorola Mobile on new and "innovate" hardware, particularly mentioning battery life, toughness and speed.

Looking at Motorola specifically, Google continues to record losses for the smartphone company it purchased last year, of $353m for the three months to the end of 2012.

Google also pointed out to analysts that Google's results have been separated from Motorola Home results, following the sale of the set-top box business in December. Google acquired Motorola Home as part of its purchase of Motorola Mobility in 2012.

In the earnings call, Pichette responded to a question about Motorola's profitability - or lack of it - by saying: "Just to remind everyone, we do care about profitability. We are 180 days into this journey and we have made huge progress. We're outsourcing manufacturing and I just want to remind everyone that we inherited 12-18 months of product pipeline that we have to work through."

Release

In an earnings release, Page said: "In today's multi-screen world we face tremendous opportunities as a technology company focused on user benefit. It's an incredibly exciting time to be at Google."

In an earnings release, Page said: "In today's multi-screen world we face tremendous opportunities as a technology company focused on user benefit. It's an incredibly exciting time to be at Google."

Google's net revenue in its core internet business increased more than 20 percent in the fourth quarter, after the world's biggest search engine introduced new product ads during the Christmas shopping season.

Shares

Shares of Google were up roughly 4.5 percent at $734.46 in after-hours trading on Tuesday.

The company posted consolidated revenue, which includes its Motorola Mobility mobile phone business but not the television set-top box business it recently agreed to sell, of $14.42 billion on Tuesday.

Consolidated net income in the fourth quarter was $2.89bn or $8.62 per share, compared to $2.71 billion, or $8.22 per share, in the year-ago period when Google had not yet acquired Motorola.

Excluding certain items, Google said it earned $10.65 per share in the fourth quarter.

Excluding traffic acquisition costs, Google's core Internet business generated net revenue of $9.83 billion in the fourth quarter, compared to $8.13 billion in the fourth quarter of 2011.