A strengthening dollar deflated Oracle Corp.’s financial results in the third quarter, much as it did in the second quarter and likely will in the upcoming, fourth quarter, the company said Wednesday.
Nevertheless, neither the currency exchange woes nor the global recession dampened company executives’ spirits on a conference call with analysts yesterday, as they pointed to sales and market share gains, as well as record operating margins for the quarter, ended Feb. 28, 2009, for the ERP applications, middleware, and database company.
Total revenue was up 2% to $5.5 billion, from $5.3 billion in the year-earlier quarter. Net income of $1.3 billion was down 1% from a year earlier. Diluted earnings per share of $0.26 were flat year over year.
New software licenses accounted for $1.5 billion, down 6% from $1.6 billion a year earlier, while total software license updates and product support rose 11% to $2.9 billion. On the services side, consulting kicked in $758 million, down 10% from a year earlier, and on-demand sales — which Oracle classifies as services — rose 10% to $191 million in the quarter.