Microsoft Delivers Another Blockbuster Quarter
- Paul Thurrott
- Jan 26, 2021
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Today, Microsoft reported a net income of $15.5 billion on revenues of $43.1 billion for the quarter ending December 31, 2020.
“What we have witnessed over the past year is the dawn of a second wave of digital transformation sweeping every company and every industry,” Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said in a canned statement. “Building their own digital capability is the new currency driving every organization’s resilience and growth. Microsoft is powering this shift with the world’s largest and most comprehensive cloud platform.”
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More Personal Computing—basically Windows, Surface, and Xbox—only was somewhat surprisingly Microsoft’s biggest business in the quarter, with $15.1 billion in revenues. The big winner here was Xbox, which delivered 51 percent gaming revenue growth with Microsoft delivering a new console generation in the quarter. Xbox content and services revenue also grew 40 percent in the quarter, and Xbox hardware revenue, as expected, was up big, by 86 percent.
Meanwhile, Surface eked past the $2 billion in revenues mark for the first time, but with just 3 percent growth year-over-year. Windows Home revenues were up 24 percent, but Windows Pro revenues declined by 9 percent and Windows revenues from PC makers only grew 1 percent despite all the pandemic-related buying.
Intelligent Cloud—Azure, Server, and Enterprise Mobility—was Microsoft’s second-biggest business, with $14.6 billion in revenues. Azure revenue was up a very healthy 50 percent, while Server revenue grew 4 percent and Enterprise Mobility saw its installed base jump by 29 percent to 163 million seats.
Productivity and Business Services—Microsoft/Office 365, LinkedIn, and Dynamics—was Microsoft’s third-largest business, with $13.4 billion in revenues. Office did well with both commercial and consumer customers: Office commercial revenues grew 21 percent in the quarter, while Office consumer revenues jumped 7 percent. Microsoft 365 consumer subscribers grew 28 percent to 47.5 million in the quarter.
“Accelerating demand for our differentiated offerings drove commercial cloud revenue to $16.7 billion, up 34 percent year over year,” Microsoft CFO Amy Hood is quoted as saying of the quarter. “We continue to benefit from our investments in strategic, high-growth areas.”
Conversation 5 comments
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<blockquote><em><a href="#610160">In reply to ghostrider:</a></em></blockquote><p>My company benefited from the pandemic because of the industry we are in. Huge sales yoy on a daily basis. </p><p><br></p><p>in 2020 we bought more computer hardware than ever before. Laptops, monitors, webcams, docking stations, etc, etc. We accelerated our Office 365 migration as well. </p><p><br></p><p>Those purchases have slowed down since basically everyone that needs two setups have it and we are planning to come back into the office. </p>
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<blockquote><em><a href="#610165">In reply to spiderman2:</a></em></blockquote><p>If there was not a pandemic I wonder if Windows/surface revenues (1%/3%) would have been negative??</p><p><br></p><p> Xbox was going to go up, pandemic or not, either the release of a new console and Game pass being so popular. </p>