Microsoft’s fourth-quarter revenues of $19.9 billion were up 10 per cent compared to the same period in 2012, but short of analysts’ estimates, reports said on Thursday.
But Microsoft Chief financial officer Amy Hood noted the competition from mobile devices which has eaten into Microsoft performance. Consumer PC shipments were down 20 per cent in the quarter.
Net income was $ 5 billion, compared to losses of $ 492 million a year earlier that included a $ 6.2 billion writedown in connection with Microsoft’s 2007 acquisition of AQuantive, Bloomberg news reported.
“We know we have to do better, particularly on mobile devices and so that’s a big reason we made the strategic and organisational changes we made last week,” Hood was quoted as saying by Bloomberg.
Surface, the first computer to be produced by the software corporation in a bid to head off the mobile boom, is not selling well. Hood said it would take “a long time” for Microsoft’s position in tablets to make up for the shrinking consumer PC market.