Can Anyone Spare A Dime??

Microsoft’s Profits Drop

The experts believe that the main reason is that Microsoft is going to release a new version of Office and so punters aren’t interested in buying. According to the recent financial report, Windows 8 was revealed to have had a solid but unspectacular start. Although for some it would be tempting to write Microsoft off as a kind of the 1990s when it could release a new version of Windows and start coining it in, the reality appears a bit more complex.

In fact, the world has been in a long running recession and when Microsoft’s biggest customers in the corporate sector looked at Windows 8’s spec, they just saw nothing that could add value to what they already had. First of all, companies don’t like people putting their greasy paws on computer screens, and secondly, they generally want to defer increasing their hardware bill until the economy picks up.

Talking figures, Microsoft’s profit fell to $6.4 billion in the fiscal second quarter from $6.6 billion previous year. Overall sales increased 3% to $21.5 billion, which corresponded with Wall Street’s expectations. In the meantime, the main factor weighing on Microsoft was a 10% hit in Office sales, which considered the loss of deferred revenue relating to discounted upgrades to the new version of the software.

The industry experts admit that this was just a pause before a product launch, which is absolutely normal. Windows sales gained 24% to $5.9 billion, slightly ahead of the experts’ average expectations, which had been lowered within the last months.

The software giant announced that it has sold over 60 million Windows 8 licenses since its launch three months ago. This figure is in line with Windows 7 sales 3 years ago, so taking into account the state of the economy it isn’t that bad.