Microsoft Is Up in the Clouds

Microsoft reported strong results for the fourth quarter of its fiscal year 2019, beating analyst expectations across the board. Revenue was up 12 percent to $33.7 billion and net income jumped 49 percent to $13.2 billion, as the company continues to capitalize on its very successful cloud business.

Commercial cloud revenue reached $11.0 billion for the three months ending June 30, putting the poster child of Microsoft’s strategic transformation on an annualized revenue run rate of $44 billion. In Q1 2018, the commercial cloud segment had passed an annual revenue run rate of $20 billion for the first time, reaching that milestone ahead of the ambitious timeline Microsoft’s CEO Satya Nadella had set in the spring of 2015.

As the following chart shows, Microsoft’s commercial cloud business, consisting of Office 365 commercial, Azure, Dynamics 365 and other cloud properties, has seen blockbuster growth over the past few years. It now accounts for roughly one third of Microsoft’s revenue. Not bad for a business that didn’t exist a couple of years ago.