Just two months after revealing that it had sold over 60 million copies of its new Windows 7 operating system in its first quarter of availability, Microsoft this week announced that it has now sold over 90 million copies. Windows 7 continues to be the fast selling OS release in PC history, and despite claims that the world is moving on, this is a product line that continues to drive incredible financial results for the software giant.
"We're humbled and excited that people are responding so positively to Windows 7," a Microsoft blog post reads. "Our customers have made it the fastest selling operating system in history."
The "over 90 million copies sold to date" figure arrived courtesy of Microsoft Chief Financial Officer Peter Klein, who shared the number during a presentation at the Morgan Stanley Technology Media & Telecom Conference yesterday. Klein had some other interesting information to share around other products as well, but the Windows 7 figure was, perhaps, the most interesting, though he appears to have glossed over it somewhat.
The strong performance of Windows 7 isn't all that surprising, given that Microsoft's PC maker partners sell about 300 million devices a year, and Windows is installed on over 95 percent of them. (Even the much maligned Windows Vista, supposedly a flop, sold several hundred million copies and generated billions in revenues for Microsoft.) But Windows 7 has been on the market for a short time: The unit sales are the result of just four months on the market plus a short pre-sale period from mid-2009.
Windows remains Microsoft's most successful product from a financial perspective as well. In the most recent quarter, Microsoft reported record revenues of $19 billion, with operating income of $8.51 billion, up 43 percent year-over-year. The company credited "exceptional demand" for Windows 7 for the results, noting that it was "the fastest selling operating system in history." Windows accounted for almost $7 billion of Microsoft's revenues in the quarter, and $5.4 billion of its operating profits.
So much for a dying business.