Seven Stunning Facts About Microsoft’s Profits

Each time Microsoft announces quarterly results, The VAR Guy takes a look to see how the company’s profits stack up against the competition. If you think open source and software as a service will destroy Microsoft, look at this stunning fact: It takes Microsoft only 10 hours to exceed the quarterly profits of Red Hat. Skeptical? Check out the math, and six other jaw-dropping facts about Microsoft’s profits.

First, let’s look at Microsoft’s latest quarterly profit of $4.707 billion. Using that figure, you can determine that Microsoft’s daily net income is about $52 million. That’s $52 million in pure profit every 24 hours. Do some quick math and you’ll learn it takes Microsoft only about…


•Three hours to exceed Salesforce.com’s quarterly net income of $6.5 million
•Ten hours to exceed Red Hat’s quarterly net income of $20.3 million
•Three-and-a-half days to exceed Harley Davidson’s quarterly net income of $186.1 million
•Ten days to exceed Target Stores’ quarterly net income of $483 million
•Thirty days to exceed Apple’s quarterly net income of $1.58 billion
•Thirty-three days to exceed PepsiCo’s quarterly net income of $1.7 billion
•Seventy-six days to exceed IBM’s quarterly net income of $3.95 billion