Microsoft significantly exceeded earnings expectations for the June quarter and disclosed its standalone annual Azure revenue for the first time — providing new clarity into how it stacks up against Amazon and Google in the cloud.
The company reported revenue of $76.4 billion for its fourth fiscal quarter, up 18%, well ahead of the $73.84 billion expected by Wall Street in advance of the report. Profits were $27.2 billion, up 24%, translating into earnings of $3.65 per share, vs. the $3.38 estimated by analysts in advance.
In a new disclosure, the company said revenue from its Microsoft Azure cloud platform surpassed $75 billion for the fiscal year, up 34% from the prior year, driven not just by AI demand but due to “growth across all workloads,” according to a statement from Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella in the company’s earnings release.
In the past, Microsoft has bundled Azure revenue in with other cloud services and products for purposes of financial reporting, reporting a percentage growth rate but making it difficult to determine actual revenue.
By comparison, Google Cloud’s annual revenue run rate has surpassed $50 billion, according to results released last week by its parent company Alphabet.
Amazon, which reports earnings Thursday for the June quarter, reported an annual run rate of more than $111 billion for its AWS cloud business as of the March quarter.
Microsoft’s stock rose more than 6% in after-hours trading.
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