Microsoft continues its march towards becoming one of the most valuable companies in the world, riding primarily on the pandemic-propelled growth of its cloud computing services.
In its Q1 2021 revenue, the company narrowly beat analysts expectations as it rose nineteen percent to $41.7 billion, with its Azure cloud computing platform contributing significantly.
“Over a year into the pandemic, digital adoption curves aren’t slowing down. They’re accelerating, and it’s just the beginning,” remarked chief executive Satya Nadella in a statement.
This is the tech giant’s second straight quarter where it has reported revenues of over $40 billion, with Q4 2020 bringing home $43.1 billion.
Switch to the cloud
Overall, the increased attention on cloud-based services brought home over $17.7 billion, a year-on-year increase of 33%.
A breakdown of its financials revealed revenue, in what it labels as the Intelligent Cloud division, rose 23% to $15.1bn.
The division’s highlight was a 26% increase in server products and cloud services revenue, driven primarily by growth in its Azure cloud service, which clocked an increase of 50%.
The switch to the cloud has also increased sales for various other products and services. For instance, Office 365 Commercial revenue recorded a growth of 22%.
The pandemic also forced people to hunt for new opportunities, which led Microsoft’s professional social network LinkedIn increasing its revenue by 25%.
In addition to buoying its cloud service, the pandemic also bolstered the revenue of Microsoft’s personal computing divisions as people working and studying from home bought new computers and gaming consoles.