Sales of PC&#39;s Buoy Results at Microsoft
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Buoyed by continued strong worldwide sales of personal computers, the Microsoft Corporation yesterday reported strong growth in profits and sales even as it faces the challenges of being a mature technology company.
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Microsoft Corp. said its fiscal first-quarter earnings rose 11 percent, beating analysts' expectations, as the software company benefited from stronger-than-expected computer and server shipments.
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Windows, Office software lead Microsoft to record stronger-than-expected sales, as online rival Google stumbles.
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The OS is chugging along on strong PC sales and antipiracy efforts, but Microsoft still faces some grumbling and a long haul in corporate sales.
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Microsoft Corp. said its fiscal first-quarter profit rose 23 percent compared to last year, bolstered by brisk sales of the new "Halo 3" video game, Windows and Office.
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In Microsoft&#39;s latest SEC filing again, Redmond warns that next year won&#39;t see the handsome growth in PC sales that it has seen over the past twelve months.
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Despite underwhelming consumers and being&#160;snubbed by enterprises,&#160;Windows Vista&#39;s numbers keep growing, with Microsoft&#160; saying Thursday that it has now shipped 88 million copies of the operating system, almost double the number of copies of XP in the same amount of time at its launch.In late July, Microsoft said it had hit the&#160;60 million shipment mark with Vista.Microsoft had previously said that it had&#160;shipped 20 million copies of Vista&#160;in its first month and 40 million copies of Vista in the first 100 days.Microsoft credited Vista with helping it&#160;beat Wall Street expectations&#160;and raise financial projections for the rest of the year. The company reported revenue of $13.76 billion for the first quarter ended Sept. 30, up 27 percent from the same quarter in 2006.Revenue in its client segment, which includes all consumer versions of Windows, was $4.14 billion, edging out the $4.11 billion in revenue from the Microsoft Business Division where Office is produced.CFO Chris Liddell credited strong sales in emerging markets, due in part to anti-piracy and legalization programs there.Client revenues, however, did not top those of the first calendar quarter this year, when Vista was officially launched. Revenues at that time were $5.32 billion.Three-quarters of the copies sold of Vista were higher-priced &#39;premium&#39; versions, compared to 59 percent of the copies of Windows -- primarily XP -- available a year ago.The 88 million figure mostly includes Vista-installed PCs bought by consumers and small businesses, as well as packaged copies of Vista sold in stores or online.It does exclude the tens of millions of Windows corporate volume licenses. There, many enterprises continue to hold off on deploying Vista, acknowledged CFO Chris Liddell, though he expects them to start deploying it when Vista Service Pack 1&#39;s arrival in the first quarter of next year.Nevertheless, revenue from companies renewing their volume licenses for Windows, which gives them the right to upgrade to Vista, was up 27 percent.Other highlights from the statistics:-- Unit sales of Windows Server&#39;s premium enterprise edition were up 35 percent year-over-year;-- A release candidate for Windows Server 2008 has been downloaded more than one million times in its first month;-- Unit and revenue growth of SQL Server were both up more than 15 percent;-- Halo 3 generated $330 million in revenue;-- Xbox 360 console unit sales increased 90 percent, driven by a price cut in August and Halo 3-related demand;-- Client revenues, including those for Vista, are expected to grow 62-64 percent year-over-year in the current fiscal Q2, or 13-14 percent excluding certain revenue deferrals in the prior year;-- Microsoft Business Division revenues, including those for Office, are expected to grow 15-16 percent in Q2 after normalizing for impact of technology guarantees and pre-shipment deferrals in the prior year;-- A beta version of Office Communications Server has been downloaded 80,000 times;-- There are 10,000 customers in the Customer Technical Preview (CTP) program for PerformancePoint Server, its new business intelligence offering.Computerworld is an InfoWorld affiliate.
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Demand for personal computers loaded with its Windows operating system and strong sales of its Halo 3 video game helped lift Microsoftâs quarterly profit to $4.29 billion.
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Microsoft is expected to report a sharp  rise in quarterly profit this week, boosted by surging revenue  as strong computer sales drive demand for its Windows operating  system and Office software.
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Strong sales of new and old products alike led Microsoft to its fastest first-quarter growth in eight years with the company reporting growth in all five business segments and both revenue and EPS (earnings per share) that beat analyst expectations.Revenue for the fiscal quarter ended Sept. 30 was up 27 percent at $13.76 billion compared to $10.81 billion a year ago, Microsoft said Thursday. Consensus estimates from Thomson First Call analysts were for the company to generate revenue of $12.57 billion. Microsoft&#39;s EPS for the quarter was $0.45, which also soundly beat Thomson First Call consensus estimate of $0.39. Net income for the quarter was $4.29 billion, a 23 percent increase over the $3.48 billion reported a year ago.At $5.92 billion, operating income for the quarter also had double-digit percentage growth: An increase of more than 25 percent over operating income reported for the same period last year of $4.47 billion.Microsoft&#39;s first quarter was buoyed by the highly anticipated launch of the Xbox 360 game Halo 3 on Sept. 25, just days before the quarter&#39;s close. In its first 24 hours on sale, the game brought in $170 million in sales; it became the fastest selling video game in history after being in the market for just a week and a half, according to the company.Strong performances from Microsoft&#39;s client, business, server and tools, and online divisions also contributed to revenue growth in the quarter. In particular, Microsoft said sales of its Windows Vista OS experienced double-digit growth through multi-year business contracts, and demand for Microsoft Office, Windows Server, and SQL Server was also high.Looking ahead, Microsoft said it expects to report revenue in the range of $15.6 billion to $16.1 billion for its second quarter, which ends Dec. 31. Operating income is expected to be in the range of $5.9 billion to $6.1 billion, while diluted EPS are expected to be between $0.44 to $0.46 for the second quarter, the company said.For its fiscal year 2008, Microsoft expects revenue in the range of $58.8 billion to $59.7 billion and operating income in the range of $23.3 billion to $23.7 billion. Diluted earnings per share are expected to be between $1.78 and $1.81 for the fiscal year, the company said.
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THE PC market in Asia is looking positive this year on the back of strong results in the fourth quarter of 2006.
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Higher-end Home version of the Microsoft OS appears in PCs sold in first week of Vista's availability.
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Strong sales of new and old products led Microsoft to its fastest-growing Q1 since 1999, the company reported today.
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Microsoft Corp  lifted its full-year estimates and posted a 23 percent rise in quarterly profit on Thursday, topping investor expectations on strong demand for "Halo 3" and Windows Vista, and sending its shares up 11 percent.
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Demand for the Vista Windows system and other products helps Microsoft to quarterly profits of $3.03bn, up 11% on last year.
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PC buying uptick won't last. Corporations are upgrading at a normal pace, while consumers who waited for Vista have now made the switch.
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The Wow starts now... It might have had a mixed response from critics but Vista is being credited with a big jump in US retail computer sales. The launch of Microsoft's latest operating system apparently helped PC sales jump 173 per cent compared to the week before.â¦