Driven by its Azure cloud, Microsoft publishes results above expectations

The American software giant Microsoft published quarterly results above expectations on Wednesday, driven by the acceleration of its online computing platform Azure, which rents to companies the computing power necessary in particular for artificial intelligence (AI). The Redmond (Washington State) group, whose stock gained nearly 4% in electronic exchanges after the close, achieved a turnover of $92.3 billion between July and September, up 19% over one year, significantly above analysts' consensus. Revenues from Azure, which represents around a third of the group's turnover, jumped 48% year-on-year, compared to 42% in the previous quarter.

“We have had a very good start to the year,” said financial director Amy Hood, citing growth of 30%, to $63.9 billion, in all of its online services (Azure and subscriptions to the Office office suite). Voluntary departure offer to 60,000 employees Excluding the effect of its participation in OpenAI, which weighed down its accounts last year, net profit increased by 18%, to $36.4 billion.

These results come two days after Microsoft's offer of voluntary departures to around 60,000 employees, more than a quarter of its workforce, at a time when the group is investing massively in AI. Its equipment spending doubled year-on-year to $39.4 billion in the quarter, excluding leased data centers.

The group financed them through its activity, without new borrowing: Microsoft even repaid $4.85 billion in debt, unlike Meta which announced on Monday a raising of $35 billion in shares. The corporate order book reached $677 billion, up 73% year-on-year, but it has not increased since the end of June. At that date, excluding OpenAI, its growth was only 25% year-on-year, according to Amy Hood.

On the general public side, Windows revenues fell by 22%, a drop anticipated by the group, and those of the Xbox video game by 2%, less severe than expected.

Machine-translated from French