bemidji state university

The applications and database giant reported net income of $1.33 billion, or 26 cents a share, on revenue of $5.45 billion, up slightly from the $5.35 billion a year ago (statement). The company said it was hit with currency fluctuations that shaved 5 cents a share off of its third-quarter earnings. Oracle added that non-GAAP earnings were 35 cents a share compared to Wall Street estimates of 32 cents a share. bemidji state university



Software revenue in the third quarter was up 5 percent to $4.4 billion, but new software license sales were down 6 percent to $1.5 billion. Analysts were expecting a sharper decline of about 12 percent. Software license updates and support revenue was up 11 percent to $2.9 billion.

Meanwhile, Oracle declared a dividend of 5 cents a share payable each quarter. The move to declare a dividend is an interesting one. For starters, Oracle's dividend may provide a downside buffer on its stock since it may attract investors that focus on quarterly payouts (even though Oracle's dividend isn't that large).

Oracle execs said that the third-quarter results were solid considering the currency fluctuations and economy.

"We're pleased with the quarter and delivered the highest third quarter operating margins in our history," said Safra Katz, Oracle's co-president, on a conference call with analysts. She said Oracle is clearly gaining share, but continued to cite currency headwinds as a problem--the dollar has strengthened vs. foreign currencies in recent months and that effectively lowers the company's growth. Katz added that currency fluctuations will cut about 7 cents a share from Oracle's fourth-quarter earnings. bemidji state university

The guidance was a little lighter than expected. Oracle expects non-GAAP earnings in the fourth quarter to be 42 cents a share to 46 cents a share assuming current rates for the U.S. dollar. In constant currency fourth-quarter earnings will translate to 49 cents a share to 53 cents a share. Based on GAAP, Oracle's earnings will be 34 cents a share to 38 cents a share. Wall Street was expecting earnings of 46 cents a share.

Total revenue for the fourth quarter is expected to be in a range from down 3 percent to up 2 percent. New software licenses are expected to be down 17 percent to 27 percent.

As far as topics go, executives focused on middleware (BEA contributed $140 million in third quarter sales) and the Exadata database machine venture with HP.

Looking forward, CEO Larry Ellison said the company is looking to grow via innovation and acquisition. He said Oracle's Fusion middleware business is a combination of the two and the company's fastest growing unit. Ellison also focused on the Exadata database machine business, announced at Oracle OpenWorld, and touted it against Teradata's offerings.

The Exadata pipeline is "the largest build I've ever seen," President Charles Phillips said. "This is internally developed technology and why we spend $3 billion a year on research and development."

Ellison also took his usual shot at SAP. When asked why Oracle's applications business held up better than SAP's, executives said SAP is more reliant on big mega deals. bemidji state university

"We have a much broader portfolio than SAP. We're also more modern. I think we're going to be able to take market share from them for years to come," said Ellison adding that "all of our applications are on-demand or cloud ready."