Microsoft has started the New Year with profits of $6.3bn (up 8 per cent on the year) driven largely by increasing revenues from its cloud business.
“Businesses everywhere are using the Microsoft Cloud as their digital platform to drive their ambitious transformation agendas,” said CEO Satya Nadella in a statement. “Businesses are also piloting Windows 10, which will drive deployments beyond 200 million active devices.”
The 8 per cent non-GAAP profit rise on last year’s results has left investors pleased, with shares up a similar 8 per cent on the news. The company reported earnings per share of $0.78 and has handed out $6.5bn to investors in share repurchases and dividends.
Azure’s revenue bounced up 140 per cent and server products and cloud services is up 10 per cent. Elsewhere, Office 365 got another 20.6 million subscribers compared to 3 million a year ago, and Dynamics CRM Online revenue is up 11 per cent in constant currency.
