Little over a year since its debut, Microsoft’s latest operating system Windows Vista has sold over 100 million licences worldwide and the company reported revenues of US$16.3bn for its second financial quarter, up 30pc on a year ago.
The company’s operating income grew 87pc year-on-year to US$6.4bn.
The performance was impacted by the deferral of US$1.6bn in revenue and operating income. Without this, second quarter revenues and operating income would have grown by 15pc and 27pc respectively.
“Revenue of over US$16bn this quarter exceeds our previous record by US$2bn,” said Chris Liddell, chief financial officer at Microsoft. “We are extremely pleased by the broad-based strength of our business performance and field execution. Throughout the first half of our fiscal year, all of our businesses met or beat our expectations.”
In addition to sales of over 100 millions licences for Windows Vista, Microsoft’s Client business has also grown over 20pc on average.
“We’ve hit our stride with partners and customers and are looking forward to the release of our first service pack later this quarter,” said Kevin Johnson, president of the Platforms and Services Division at Microsoft.
The company said sales to business customers remained brisk in the quarter with Microsoft Business Division and the server and tools business each experiencing double-digit revenue growth rates over the prior year and together increased revenue to over US$1bn compared with last year.
Microsoft Business Division generated 23pc revenue growth driven by the versions of Microsoft Office, Microsoft SharePoint and Microsoft Exchange that were launched last November.
“We are in the midst of another strong year with great momentum heading into calendar year 2008,” said Kevin Turner, chief operating officer at Microsoft.
“We continue to see healthy demand from both businesses and consumers in the US and our growth in emerging markets is especially strong. Looking across Brazil, Russia, India and China, our field revenue reached a combined growth rate of over 65pc this quarter.
“As we look ahead, our Windows Server 2008 launch, with our virtualisation solution, will further our quest to bring exceptional value to our customers.”
During the second quarter, Microsoft rolled out new consumer-focused products including Windows Home Server, new versions of the Zune media player and the next generation of Windows Live Online Services.
By the end of 2007, the number of Xbox 360 consoles sold worldwide reached 17.7 million units, representing a 70pc increase on 2006.
By John Kennedy
