Microsoft Posts Banner 2nd Quarter

Microsoft Corp. said Friday that it earned $741 million in the latest quarter, sharply higher than a year ago, but the software giant warned of slower earnings growth in its next fiscal year.

The fiscal second-quarter earnings, equal to 57 cents a share, compared with net income of $575 million, or 45 cents a share, in the year-ago quarter.

The results for the quarter ended Dec. 31 beat analysts’ forecasts. Wall Street had expected Microsoft on average to report earnings equal to 51 cents a share, with estimates ranging from 47 cents to 55 cents, according to the First Call service.

Analysts earlier said results in that range would be impressive considering that Microsoft had no major new products in the quarter and was up against difficult comparisons with the year-earlier period, the first full quarter of availability for its Windows 95 operating system.

“The company performed solidly in all of our businesses, including operating systems, desktop applications, enterprise software, tools, hardware and content,” Microsoft Chief Financial Officer Mike Brown said in a statement.

Analysts said Microsoft revenue had been buoyed by strong gains in personal computer sales, especially to corporations, and by the increasing momentum of its high-end Windows NT operating system and BackOffice server software.

During the quarter, Microsoft also pre-sold 3 million copies of its updated Office programs to corporate users.

Office 97, a package of database, word-processing and spreadsheet software, went on sale Thursday in stores.

At a Glance:

Edison International reported fourth-quarter earnings of $117.1 million, or 27 cents a share, compared with $138.1 million, or 31 cents, for the year-ago quarter.

Ascend Communications Inc. said fourth-quarter net income rose to $41.1 million, or 32 cents a share, from $13.5 million, or 11 cents, in the year-earlier period.