Rick Sherlund Pc Quotations

There is an increasing risk that Microsoft might atrophy on the PC platform as IBM did on the mainframe platform, while robust growth shifts to hand-held and wireless devices,

We are reducing our March quarter revenue estimate due to growing evidence that PC unit growth did not likely come up to our expectations. PC growth was very sluggish from November through February, and while it reaccelerated in March, it does not appear to have occurred fast enough to offset the weakness earlier in the quarter.

We trimmed estimates last week to reflect even more sluggish PC demand, the potential for slower server growth and slower on-line advertising for MSN,

The results were above our estimates, which had been reduced during the quarter given evidence of slowing PC demand.

The stock may not yet be entirely out of the woods if the December quarter results do not show some further re-acceleration in corporate PC demand, at which point there may be a better basis for revising estimates further,

Consumer PC sales account for only about 10 percent of Microsoft's total revenues, so with corporate demand likely in line with expectations, our estimate revision is only relatively moderate,