The latest Ford Focus, at least in its entry-level design, is not an especially profitable product for Ford, says the analysis firm iSuppli.

Who pays these guys to state the obvious?

Seems obvious the Mini is not a massive profit point for Apple.

As time goes on and the component prices come down, Apple will make better money off of each Mini.

"120GB hard drive is worth $46"

You can get a 160GB drive from New Egg for $40. I'd bet 120GB drives in lots of 1,000 are considerably lest than $46.

Don't know what the guys at iSuppli were drinking when they wrote this one but a number of the figures including the cost of both optical and hard-drive are hogwash, pure and simple. On the basis of their inflated figures Apple nonetheless has a gross margin of nearly 70% which is twice what Dell have before all that "cost of sale" sh1t. Don't go shedding any tears for Apple just yet.

Agreed dwesnor - they are buying in bulk- Instead of dollars how about %? I mean they can't really make it 9,000% markup but anything over 15 or 20% seems ok profit to me.

Apple's profit margins are typically estimated to be around 40% and these numbers are in line with that.

...is a loss leader to help people to switch platforms with their existing PC peripherals. and an appliance for very specific uses for advanced mac user, for home theater, etc.

and those margins are better than most industry's margins.

as usual, subpar reporting from subpar sources.

The Mini ain't no loss-leader! Didn't you read the article. Less profit is not the same as a loss, dude!

Apple had better not remove the Mac Mini from its lineup. It is the last desktop option for users to obtain a Mac with a matte screen (albeit now a non-Apple-made matte screen). The website http://macmatte.wordpress.com indicates 40% of Apple users prefer matte, while 20% absolutely refuse to buy an Mac with a glossy screen. If Apple thinks that, because of razor thin margins, it is not profitable to make the Mac Mini, it will lose more customers.

Schwinn had a very successful sales strategy: sell the kid their first bike and they will buy Schwinn the rest of their lives.

This is what an entry level machine is about. It's a loss leader, it's that free sample at the food court.

How many first time Mac users are Mini users? How many buy up to the iMac, how many buy iPods or iPhones to go with their Mini's?

Profit margin is not the end all.