Microsoft Q3 results see Surface continue climb, WP fall

Microsoft has revealed its financial results for the third quarter of its 2016 fiscal year. And it’s more of the same for the Redmond company.

The tech firm recorded revenue of US$20.5-billion for the quarter ending 31 March 2016, with operating income and net income standing at US$5.3-billion and US$3.8-billion respectively.

While its cloud revenue grew three percent to US$6.1-billion, its personal computing segments saw more modest growth of 1%.

“Windows OEM revenue declined two percent in constant currency, outperforming the PC market, driven by higher consumer premium device mix,” the company revealed in its earnings report.

Surface, mobile and Xbox?

Its Surface lineup continues to perform well, seeing an increase of 61% thanks to devices like the Surface Pro 4 and Surface Book.

In fact, aside from the company’s US$900-million write-down related to woeful Surface RT sales in 2013, the Surface line has shown impressive growth with each quarter.

Unfortunately, the same can’t be said for the phone division, which recorded a 46% decline.

Microsoft has been pushing a unified strategy for its Windows devices, launching Windows 10 last year and slowly pushing out the Windows 10 Mobile update to users. The latter brings some desktop-style functionality to mobile users as well as a universal apps system.

While this is no doubt a long-term strategy for Microsoft, it doesn’t appear to be paying off just yet, as the mobile platform’s marketshare continues to dwindle.

The firm is slowly improving Windows 10 Mobile though, recently introducing a beefy update that tweaks notifications, introduces new Cortana features and adds lockscreen media controls.

The company did reveal some growth on the Xbox side of things, recording a 26% year-on-year rise in Xbox Live users, to 46 million.

Microsoft hasn’t revealed the latest sales figures for its Xbox One console, but a statement by EA leads to a figure of fewer than 20 million units sold.