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Microsoft Profit and Loss by Business Area
An anonymous submitter writes "The Register is reporting in this article striking new evidence of what in my opinion can only be described as abuse of their monopoly position. A recent SEC filing shows that they lose money in every business area except Windows (86% profit) and Office (79% profit)." Another notes that the Financial Times has a story on the same subject - Dr. No writes "According to the Financial Times, Microsoft's Windows division has a profit margin of 85%. This is the first time this figure has been made public." The full version of Windows XP costs about $300.00. Microsoft could sell it for $45 and still make a profit. The difference between the $45 price and the $300 price is what economists call "monopoly rents".
This is basic Economics 101.
It sell for $300, and the cost to produce it is $45.
That means the profit is $255 and the gross margin is $255/$300 * 100 = 85%.
That's the whole point, though: under US law, there's nothing wrong with having a monopoly per se. That just means you're wildly successful and everyone wants your products.
There is something wrong with abusing that monopoly to shut out competition (denying people choice) or leveraging that monopoly to compete in other markets (eg, using the DirectX and Win32 API to compete in the games console market).
It also suggests that Microsoft could get hammered under various nations' anti-dumping laws, since it would appear they're selling goods at well under the cost of manufacture.
Really, the incomes of different Microsoft divisions are entirely fictional. Most of their sales come from package deals to OEMs, which they could account for in any sort of way. After all, the number one computer game for a long time was the solitaire version that came with Windows. If Microsoft wanted their entertainment division to make more money, they could charge for solitaire and include windows with it for free. Since most people get them both via an OEM, nobody sees them itemized, so MS could change the pricing around, and the only effect would be that the division split on the SEC reports would be different.
Of course, the SEC filing is not a lie, but Microsoft could choose any gross income they wanted for any given division, and it would be just as accurate, because it doesn't actually reflect any measurable difference in the world outside.
According to the field of Microeconomics no firm will be able to maintain high profit margins in the long term unless they are a monopoly (or similar things like oligopoly w/ collusion.) In a real competitive market with low costs of entry, other firms will see Microsoft with such high profits and have incentive to enter the market, undercutting Microsoft. As the result of new firms entering, prices go down to a point of "normal or zero economic profit." This is how the competitive market works.
Microsoft is able to maintain such high profit margins because of their monopoly market position. Little other market factors would allow sustained high profit in the long term.