Ellison Cites Sun Buy As Driver Of Oracle Q2 Growth

By Jack McCarthy, CRN 6:16 PM EST Tue. Dec. 18, 2012

Oracle appeared to fire on all cylinders in its quarterly performance reported Tuesday, showing growth in every segment.

For the second fiscal quarter of 2013 ending Nov. 30, Oracle reported earnings growth of 18 percent to $2.6 billion, with revenue increasing 3 percent to $9.1 billion.

Oracle earned 53 cents per share, up 24 percent from the year-ago period and above analysts' expectations of 48 cents per share.

[Related: Ellison Looks Back As Oracle Turns 30]

Revenues increased across all of Redwood City, Calif.-based Oracle's sectors. New software licenses and cloud software subscriptions revenue rose to $2.4 billion, up 17 percent. Software license updates and product support revenue grew 7 percent to $4.3 billion.

CEO Larry Ellison pointed to the 2010 acquisition of Sun Microsystems as a key growth driver.

"Our $7.4 billion purchase of Sun is turning out to be the most profitable investment ever made," he said. Sun-related products such as SPARC Supercluster and Exadata database are driving revenue in the hardware business, he said.

Safra Catz, Oracle president and CFO, said the revenue growth for the quarter reflected the broad choice of Oracle products available to customers. "No one else has everything we have, and, as a result, when customers come to us they buy many things."

PUBLISHED DEC. 18, 2012