In its latest earnings report, Microsoft has revealed that its latest fiscal quarter ending on September 30th saw Xbox growth decline by 2 percent. Along with this, the company has also reported hardware revenue falling by 14 percent. In a social media post, Xbox CEO Asha Sharma has noted that the 2 percent decline is a major improvement for the company when compared to the 10 percent decline from the previous quarter.
Along with this, Sharma has also praised the performance of recent and upcoming releases like Minecraft Dungeons 2 and World of Warcraft Forever. The latter even went as far as to set records. She went on to congratulate Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 for getting critical praise and the double-digit growth seen in Xbox’s PC revenue.
On the subject of falling hardware revenue, Sharma said that the constraint is largely in the supply, and the company simply isn’t able to keep up with the demand for the console. In the meantime, Xbox is continuing its efforts to push production lines and “get more consoles into players’ hands”. The company’s refurbishment program is also seeing some expansion to help deal with the high demand.
“In Q1, XBOX revenue declined 2% YoY, compared with a 10% decline a quarter ago, while our accountability margin improved. Minecraft and WoW Forever set records, Call of Duty had its most acclaimed release in more than a decade, and our PC platform revenue grew double digits. Console sales remain constrained by supply, with more demand than consoles available. We’re working to get more consoles into players’ hands, including through our expanded refurbishment program. We’re making progress, with a lot more work ahead.”
Earlier this month, Xbox saw its COO Helen Chiang leaving the company after serving in the role for just three months. In an internal memo sent out by Sharma, the CEO praised Chiang for “her years of service”. Chiang’s departure comes after she spent 21 years at Microsoft across several of its divisions, including six years as the head of Minecraft developer Mojang.
Chiang’s appointment as COO of the division was announced as part of larger restructuring efforts following massive layoffs that impacted around 1,600 workers. At the time, Sharma spoke about wanting to eliminate redundant management layers, and said that the company was working to have only 3 layers at most between its studios and company leadership. Through this, she wants to streamline Xbox’s overall operations by also focusing on a cleaner code base, shared services, and reduced vendor spend.
“The next decade of gaming will be larger, more global, and more creative than anything we’ve seen before,” said Sharma. “This year, we’ll invest as much in Xbox as we ever have, but we’ll invest with greater focus, greater discipline, and greater clarity, all in service of making Xbox where the world plays and creates.”
Following the layoffs, Sharma had reportedly told Xbox employees during a company-wide town hall meeting that the company was beginning its return to growth after being in “freefall” for the last several months.
