Software giant Oracle revealed yesterday that the mounting strength of the dollar against foreign currencies undermined the value of its overseas earnings for the financial quarter ending in November.

That effect saw profits fall by 0.5% to $1.3 billion – the first profit fall at the company for three years. The company said that had exchange rates for the period matched those of six months ago, profit would have risen by 10% year on year.

Revenues at the company were up 6% to $5.6 billion, testimony to the applications, database and middleware vendor’s resilience.

More worrying for the IT industry, however, was Oracle’s outlook. New license sales were down 3% to $1.6 billion during the quarter – and indication of where things are heading. The company said that in the coming quarter, its new software sales figure could fall as much as 10%.

Nevertheless, the results were welcomed by investors, and Oracle’s share price rose 3% on their announcement. Considering the catastrophic financial performances that businesses across all industries have been turning out in recent weeks, Oracle looks decidedly stable.

“We feel just extremely good about our results," Safra Catz, Oracle’s co-president, told analysts in a Thursday conference call.

Further reading

Oracle lays out middleware roadmap
Customer concerns over the software giant’s priorities remain

"The cost of business software and support is set to skyrocket"
As two software giants prepare to increase their fees, are IT organisations about to be hit by a steep rise in the cost of buying and maintaining business software?

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