Amy Hood, chief financial officer, said during a conference call with analysts following the earnings announcement that Microsoft should obtain more benefits in the coming year after investing in cloud infrastructure.
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Nadella, well into his third year at the helm, has been reorienting Microsoft’s business around cloud and productivity services to fuel growth as traditional software sales shrink.
Satya Nadella, CEO of Microsoft, added: “This past year was pivotal in both our own transformation and in partnering with our customers who are navigating their own digital transformations”.
Nadella has poured billions of dollars into building new data centers around the world, hoping to position Microsoft as the leading alternative to Amazon in selling online computing power housed in remote centers or “clouds” to internet startups and big corporations, as well as consumers. Microsoft’s (MSFT) fiscal fourth-quarter report suggests the company is backing up its talk, at least as far as its cash-cow Office franchise goes.
Windows OEM non-Pro revenue grew 27 percent, and Windows OEM Pro revenue grew just 2 percent. In the current period, Microsoft forecast unit sales of US$6.1 billion to US$6.3 billion.
Microsoft’s decision to roll back the phone business – along with a continuing decline in sales of personal computers that run its Windows operating system – led the company to post its first decline in annual revenue since 2009. – Microsoft today announced revenue of $22.6 billion for its fourth fiscal quarter of 2016 which ended on Jun. 30. With this new posting, the run rate has now reached $12.1 billion.
Microsoft’s retreat from the smartphone market hurt its device sales significantly. More than 40 percent of search revenue in June was driven by Windows 10 devices, Microsoft said.
Excluding the impact of revenue deferrals and restructuring charges, adjusted earnings rose to 69 cents from 62 cents a year earlier. Quarterly revenues, however, were actually up slightly from last year’s $22.18 billion, despite a 4.5 percent drop in PC shipments.
This figure also shows a marked growth as compared to the last quarter, where it accounted for $6.3 billion in revenue.
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The purchase will give Microsoft access to the details of 433 million LinkedIn users, which Microsoft could combine with its Office 365 cloud service to offer its business clients more insight into their customers.
