Microsoft Corp soared to record revenue in the final quarter of last year, confounding Wall Street forecasts on the back of strong demand for Xbox consoles, Surface tablets and Internet “cloud” services.
The US-based technology titan reported net income of US$6.56 billion on revenue that hit a record high of US$24.52 billion in the quarter that ended on Dec. 31.
“Our commercial segment continues to outpace the overall market, and our devices and consumer segment had a great holiday quarter,” outgoing Microsoft chief executive Steve Ballmer said.
Microsoft shares climbed more than 3 percent to US$37.37 in after-market trading on the NASDAQ following release of the earnings figures.
“We delivered record revenue as demand for our business offerings remains high, and we made strong progress in our devices and consumer segment,” Microsoft chief financial officer Amy Hood said in the earnings release.
Sales of Surface tablets more than doubled from the previous quarter to hit US$893 million, while the firm sold 7.4 million Xbox consoles, with 3.9 million of those being the new-generation Xbox One.
Bing’s share of the Internet search market grew to 18.2 percent, while its share of the online search ad market grew about a third, Microsoft said.
Meanwhile, money made from selling Windows software to computer makers slid by 3 percent due to continued soft demand for personal computers, the firm said.
Microsoft built its empire on packaged computer software, but has been under pressure to adapt to lifestyles revolving around mobile devices and programs offered as services hosted in the “cloud.”
Microsoft reported that cloud services to businesses and consumers posted strong growth.
“They’ve got this new strategy they have been talking about for a while now, devices plus services, and both grew very healthily,” Forrester Research analyst Ted Schadler said. “This might have been a tipping-point quarter, at least in terms of that strategy.”
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last