Sales of new software licenses at Oracle accelerated in the latest quarter,easing concerns about customers defecting to less expensive alternatives on the Internet.The improvement announced Tuesday follows through on the business software maker’s promise to rebound from a disappointing performance at the end of last year.Oracle said it expanded its sales staff and did a better job of closing deals.
“All we really needed to do was focus on execution,and that we did,”Safra Catz,Oracle’s president and chief financial officer,told analysts in a conference call.The growth is also a reflection of an improving economy.Oracle’s fiscal third quarter covers December through February, which coincided with the biggest three-month hiring spurt in the U.S.during the past two years.The trend could signal that companies aren’t as worried about the threat of another recession,encouraging them to increase spending in other areas such as new software.
The positive vibes from the latest quarter subsided slightly after Oracle provided a forecast that raised the possibility of a revenue decline in the current quarter,which ends in May,compared with a year ago. The current three-month stretch is typically Oracle’s busiest period.Oracle Corp. earned $2.5 billion,or 49 cents per share,during the most recent quarter,an 18 percent increase from net income of $2.1 billion,or 41 cents per share,at the same time last year.
However, others say it’s Oracle too early to tell whether such concerns are valid.The company stunned analysts late Tuesday when it reported that the passfine $8.8 billion in sales for the quarter ending Nov. 30 grew by only 2 percent, way off the target of 5 to 9 percent 1Z0-543 exam growth, which was projected based on Oracle’s guidance and analyst estimates.
