Q2 revenues at computing giant HP grew 13pc year on year to US$25.5bn, driven in particular by strong sales of notebook computers, which increased 45pc on the year.
The record quarter – resulting in an extra US$3bn of revenues – saw the company derive an operating profit of US$2.1bn and a cash flow from operations of US$4.2bn.
During the quarter, the Americas grew 11pc to US$10.7bn, Europe, Middle East and Africa grew 14pc to US$10.3bn and Asia Pacific revenues grew 16pc to US$4.5bn.
“This was a strong performance for HP,” said Mark Hurd, HP chairman and chief executive officer. “We generated US$3bn of revenue growth, continued to expand earnings and achieved record cash flow from operations.
“While we still have considerable work ahead of us, I am confident we can continue to execute with discipline and deliver strong financial returns,” Hurd said.
The performance of HP’s Personal Systems Group (PSG) tells very much the story of the computer industry today with notebook sales up 45pc while desktop sales languished at 9pc.
Overall, revenues at PSG were up 24pc to US$8.7bn. Revenues at HP’s Imaging and Printing Group were up 6pc to US$7.2bn and at HP’s Enterprise Storage and Servers business sales were up 8pc to US$4.6bn.
HP’s Services business increased revenue by 7pc to US$4.1bn and HP’s Software division saw a 58pc jump in Q2 revenues to US$523bn.
Looking forward to the third quarter the company said the outlook was for revenues in the range of US$23.7bn to US$23.9bn. For the full year 2007 HP is predicting revenues of between US$100.5bn and US$100.9bn.
By John Kennedy
