科技英语新闻:Microsoft quarterly earnings beat estimates

SAN FRANCISCO, July 21 (Xinhua) -- Microsoft Corp. on Thursday posted strong quarterly earnings in its fourth fiscal quarter, with profit and revenue beating expectations from Wall Street analysts.

For the quarter ended June 30, the world's largest software maker reported a net income of 5.87 billion U.S. dollars, or 69 cents per share, representing increases of 30 percent and 35 percent respectively when compared with the year-ago period.

Revenue for the quarter was 17.37 billion dollars, up by 8 percent from the same period a year earlier.

Wall Street analysts had expected a profit of 58 cents per share on a revenue of 17.23 billion dollars, according to Thomson Reuters.

For the whole fiscal year, Microsoft reported a record revenue of 69.94 billion dollars, a 12 percent increase from the prior fiscal year. Net income for the year was 23.15 billion dollars, accounting for an increase of 23 percent.

Among its business sectors, Microsoft Business Division revenue grew 7 percent for the fourth quarter and 16 percent for the full year. Over 100 million licenses of office 2010 have been sold so far, said the company.

Primarily driven by growth in search revenue, the company's on- line services division revenue grew 17 percent for the fourth quarter and 15 percent for the full year. U.S. search share of Microsoft's search engine Bing increased 340 basis points year- over-year.

Microsoft said revenue of entertainment and devices division grew by 30 percent for the quarter and 45 percent for the year.

However, Windows and Windows Live revenue declined by 1 percent for the fourth quarter and decreased by 2 percent for the full year. Microsoft said estimated full-year revenue growth for the Windows division was in line with the sluggish PC market growth.