Microsoft's Revenues Up Except for Games Division

Gamasutra reports on Microsoft's announcement that their revenues are up, but the games division has seen a sharp decrease in profitability. From the article: "Microsoft's Home and Entertainment division, which overall includes the Microsoft Xbox video game console system, PC games, the Home Products Division, and TV platform products for the interactive television industry, saw revenue of $1.56 billion in the 3 months to the end of December and a significant loss of $293 million, compared to $1.37 billion revenues and a small profit of $55 million in the same period last year."

Comments

I like xbox

[trolleymusic]

It's sorta funny, the only Microsoft product I like is xbox and that seems to be the one they're always having financial trouble with.

I'm now a happy apple user, I don't have to deal with windows anymore, but I still have to use the horrible MS Office for Mac so that my windows-based colleagues and I can exchange work.

Unline the other MS products I've used, i've always found the xbox experience to be easy and user-friendly.

Misleading headline

[ThisIsForReal]

...except for game division?

FTA: Microsoft's Home and Entertainment division, which overall includes the Microsoft Xbox video game console system, PC games, the Home Products Division, and TV platform products for the interactive television industry, saw revenue of $1.56 billion in the 3 months to the end of December and a significant loss of $293 million, compared to $1.37 billion revenues and a small profit of $55 million in the same period last year.

Grrr, the headline made it sound like revenue for the game division was down, but it was up, too. Please keep the headlines accurate for those of us who don't want to read the synopsis, let alone the actual article!

Re:Misleading headline

[MBraynard]

Actually the headline was accurate this time. The division of Microsoft that includes its games lost almost $300M in the last quarter.

Actually, the headline is inaccurate. The games division revenue IS up. And the amount of money 'lost' is irrelevant to revenue.

REAL journalists make these mistakes regularly - Slashdot makes these mistakes contantly as it is run by individuals who are ignorant of all matters not related to hentia and linux.

In other words, the XBox 360 plant was expensive.

[Thag]

I'm guessing that's what we're seeing: the startup costs for the Xbox 360 and its launch publicity. So even though revenues were up, the increased operations costs turned it into a net loss, for now at least.

I would expect the 360 to be profitable for them in the long run, though.

Jon Acheson

In other words..

[Mr_Tulip]

TO put it more simply, Microsoft's total income from games, XBOX and, Home PC is higher by around $190 million, and profit is down by about $230 million from last year. That's only around a $40 million net difference from last year, and I expect a lot of that is the cost of launching a new console.

Re:In other words..

[Anonymous Coward]

TO put it more simply, Microsoft's total income from games, XBOX and, Home PC is higher by around $190 million, and profit is down by about $230 million from last year. That's only around a $40 million net difference from last year, and I expect a lot of that is the cost of launching a new console.

You must be using the new math. Revenue has increased by about $190M, while profit is down around $230M. You can't subtract these numbers. Indeed, if you add them, you see that their expenses increased by $420M.

Small?

[suricatta]

"...a small profit of $55 million..."

Maybe I'll go work for the Microsoft Games Division and ask for a small salary :)

Re:XBOX 360

[Keeper]

Incorrect.

Revenue == total money in (money made from selling stuff)
Expenses == total money out (money spent building stuff)
Net income == revenue - expenses