Pokemon has invaded earnings season

As Nintendo looks to capitalize on its popular “Pokémon Go” game, the mobile phenomenon has dominated recent earnings calls for other companies.

On Tuesday, Apple (AAPL) was asked about the impact of the addictive augmented-reality (AR) game after the company reported better-than-expected revenues.

CEO Tim Cook said the popularity speaks to the power of AR.

“It’s incredible what has happened there,” Cook said on the company’s conference call. “I think it’s a testament to what happens with innovative apps and the whole ecosystem and the power of being a developer being able to press a button, so to speak, and offer their product around the world.”

And Cook added he sees further opportunity for AR, which superimposes fake objects (e.g., little creatures in “Pokémon Go”) onto real-world images like the street outside your house.

“It also does show that AR can be really great. And we have been and continue to invest a lot in this. We are high on AR for the long run. We think there are great things for customers and a great commercial opportunity. And so we’re investing, and the number one thing is to make sure our products work well with other developers’ products like Pokémon. And so that’s the reason why you see so many iPhones out in the wild right now chasing Pokémons.”

Facebook’s (FB) Mark Zuckerberg also spoke about AR while reporting on a strong quarter for the social-networking giant. In his conference call Wednesday, Zuckerberg said the growth of “Pokémon Go” feeds into the power of the mobile revolution.

Here’s the biggest thing to remember when investing in AR or virtual reality (VR), according to Zuckerberg: Most consumers will use AR or VR on their own smartphones first rather than on specialized headsets.

“I, like everyone else, am enjoying ‘Pokémon Go,” he said. “The phone is probably going to be the mainstream consumer platform that a lot of these AR features first become mainstream rather than glasses form factor that people will wear on their face.”

This fits in with Facebook’s video strategy, Zuckerberg said.

“One of the big themes that we’re talking about here is becoming video first, and as people look for richer and richer ways to express themselves just like people in the past just shared a lot of text and photos on Facebook, we think that in the future more of that is going to be video. And more of these augmented reality tools I think are going to be an important part of delivering that experience to making that as fun to use and expressive as it can be.”

“Pokémon Go” also came up during McDonald’s (MCD) second-quarter conference call on Tuesday, when CEO Steve Easterbrook cited the fast-food chain’s “Pokémon Go” partnership in Japan as an example of McDonald’s ability to cultivate the best partners around the globe.

“We do have a competitive advantage that we are able to attract many of the best partners in the world because of our size and scale matching theirs. And like a recent example of the work in Japan, so I’m thinking with ‘Pokémon Go’ is a great example, where clearly we’re a preferred partner and it’s been a fun program,” Easterbrook said, referring to McDonald’s agreement to turn Japanese locations into important locations for “Pokémon” players.

The McDonald’s CEO added: “It’s doing great things for the business. And customers respond to that, both at a day-to-day level in the restaurants, but actually, they recognize that we’re a leadership brand and we attract leadership partners.”

Match Group (MTCH) — parent company of Tinder and other dating sites — was asked during its second-quarter conference call Wednesday whether “Pokémon Go” affected its dating app usage. Chairman and CEO Gregory Blatt responded that while he hadn’t fully investigated the issue, he had not yet seen an impact.

“Okay. I think on the ‘Pokémon Go,’ I have not done a forensic assessment,” he said. “I do know that this last weekend was Tinder’s biggest weekend ever. So I don’t — so I haven’t seen any correlation or assumed one, but I also haven’t looked for one. But from what I have seen without looking for it, the answer would be no.”

Even companies with no direct connection to the game phenomenon referenced “Pokémon Go” in the same breath has other major news stories during their earnings calls. On Rogers Communications’ (RCI) conference call, for example, CEO Guy Laurence characterized the game as an unexpected phenomenon at a time when other, more serious events are dominating the news cycle.

“I didn’t think that this summer, in amongst terrorist incidents, the Trump election potentially, that we’d see ‘Pokémon Go’ coming out and people walking into the middle of freeways to play on their mobile phone; so, I’m not going to forecast consumer trends,” he said.

Of course, investors are also questioning the effect “Pokémon Go” will have on other companies trying to expand in the mobile-game area, like Hasbro (HAS).

That company’s CEO, Brian Goldner, said the popularity of Nintendo’s game speaks to growth in the industry, and that he’s optimistic about his prospects.

“We’ve been developing our mobile gaming business for some time and we love that mobile games are really coming to the fore and the ability to use all of the capabilities of the smartphone in engaging a mobile gaming player is great,” he said. “We’ve not seen any negative impact on our business, nor would we expect to. But we certainly believe in the mobile gaming genre, it’s a wonderful way to contribute to storytelling as well as to get monetization of games through a premium model.”

Some investors say the strength of “Pokémon Go” is more a testament to the strength of the characters — in the the same way Disney (DIS) has built up its Marvel and Pixar characters — versus augmented reality specifically.

But no matter the reason for the game’s success, other companies looking for a similar boost will continue to scrutinize the “Pokémon” phenomenon.