HP results gain on laptop, blade sales
Hewlett-Packard's revenue and profit grow in its third quarter
By Stephen Lawson, San Francisco | Wednesday, 20 August, 2008
Hewlett-Packard's revenue and profit grew in its fiscal third quarter, largely on the strength of sales outside the Americas, with laptop and blade-server sales among the high points.
Revenue rose 10% to US$28 billion in the quarter, which ended July 31, compared with the same quarter last year. The company's Personal Systems Group led with $10.3 billion, a 15% increase from a year earlier. While laptop revenue grew 26%, desktop sales rose just 6%. Another bright point for HP was the company's ESS (Enterprise Storage and Servers) division, where ESS blade revenue grew 66% and storage rose 16%.
As the US struggles with an economic downturn, HP's sales growth was strongest in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, followed by the Asia-Pacific region. Revenue rose most rapidly in the key BRIC developing markets — Brazil, Russia, China and India — up 24% from a year earlier.
The company's profit rose 20% to $2.5 billion, or $0.80 per share. Not counting certain one-time items, the profit increased 20% to $2.7 billion, or $0.86 per share. That figure beat the consensus estimate of analysts polled by Thomson Financial, who had expected $0.83 per share. Revenue beat the analysts' expectations by less than $1 billion.
For the current quarter, HP forecast revenue between $30.2 billion and $30.3 billion.