Microsoft reports stronger numbers for its latest quarter

After the markets closed yesterday, Microsoft reported stronger numbers for its latest quarter, with all of its divisions showing some growth, with the exception of its gaming division.

Revenues for the quarter were $17.4 billion, up 6 percent compared to last year, and income grew twelve percent over the same period to reach $6.37 billion.

The software giant reported that it also paid out $461 million to settle some outstanding tax issues with the U.S. tax authorities.

"We’re driving toward exciting launches across the entire company, while delivering stronger financial results," said Steve Ballmer, chief executive officer at Microsoft.

"With the upcoming release of new Windows 8 PCs and tablets, the next version of Office, and a wide array of products and services for the enterprise and consumers, we will be delivering exceptional value to all our customers in the year ahead," added Ballmer.

As usual, the top performing division was server and tools, which saw a 14 percent rise in revenues as SQL Server sold well and revenues from Systems Center rose 20 percent, which bodes well for the new version announced on April 17.

Last quarter, Microsoft reported slowing sales in the Windows division, and blamed the effects of the Thailand flooding for slowing PC sales growth in that region. Those effects seem to have ended, with the division now reporting revenues up 4 percent on the year.

The business division saw revenues grow 9 percent to $5.8 billion, with Dynamics CRM revenue up by almost 31.5 percent on the year. The loss-making online services division (Bing) saw revenues grow only 6 percent, but still generated a loss nevertheless.

And just like last year, the worst performer was Microsoft's entertainment and services division, which had been riding high on sales of X-Box and Kinect systems. Revenues dropped 16.2 percent to $1.63 billion. The X-Box is still the top selling console in the United States, but still suffered poor sales in the post-Christmas market, along with most of the competition in that segment.