Microsoft has announced its highest ever quarterly revenue, with 9pc growth over the same period last year.
The world’s largest software company posted US$11.84bn in revenue for the thee months to the end of December 2005. Net income for the quarter was US$3.65bn, a rise of 5pc from $3.46bn for the same quarter of the previous year.
Operating income for the quarter was down 2pc to US$4.66bn, a factor the company attributed to the impact of “significant” sales, marketing and product development expenses associated with major product launches.
Chris Liddell, chief financial officer with Microsoft, said that growth in the firm’s core businesses was “healthy” during the quarter, driven by strong performance in server and tools as well as the success of its Windows Client products. “The quarter also marked the beginning of an important product cycle for Microsoft with the launches of Xbox 360, SQL Server 2005, Visual Studio 2005 and Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0, all of which were extremely successful and well received by our customers,” he said.
Server and tools revenue grew 14pc over the prior year on strength across the product line. The growth of Microsoft’s SQL Server database product in particular was robust with more than 20pc increase in revenue year on year.
Microsoft chief operating officer Kevin Turner said: “Demand for our desktop and server products from enterprise customers was particularly strong this quarter with significant sales and customer momentum from our recently launched server products.”
By Gordon Smith
