Sept 9 (Askume) – Oracle (ORCL.N) on Monday reported quarterly results that beat expectations and forecast second-quarter revenue growth driven by increased demand for its cloud products, sending its shares up more than 9% after hours.
The Texas-based company’s entry into the cloud computing market looks promising and it has started to close the gap with market leaders Microsoft (MSFT.O) and Amazon Web Services (AMZN.O) .
Oracle’s cloud infrastructure remains strong and demand for cloud computing is expected to grow, especially in artificial intelligence applications.
Gil Luria, senior software analyst at DA Davidson, said: “Oracle reported a good quarter, with solid currency growth of 8% and slightly better-than-expected earnings. The company benefited from a strong cloud business and that business continues to grow. Investment is also strong.
The company also announced a partnership with AWS, Oracle Database@AWS , which will give customers access to Oracle Autonomous Database and Oracle Exadata Database service within AWS, as well as the general availability of Oracle Database@Google Cloud.
Rebecca Weightman, chief executive of research firm Valloir, said that through the partnership, Oracle is “expanding its large database opportunities on Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud and AWS, making it easier for customers to connect data across the cloud and applications” – and creating new revenue opportunities.
In the first quarter, Oracle’s cloud services revenue grew 21% to $5.6 billion.
Revenue in the quarter ended Aug. 31 was $13.31 billion, while analysts had expected $13.23 billion, according to LSEG.
Excluding items, the company earned $1.39 per share, above estimates of $1.32.
Remaining performance obligations (RPO), the most commonly used measure of booking revenue, grew 53% in the quarter to $99 billion.
Oracle forecast second-quarter revenue growth of 8% to 10%, higher than analysts’ average expectation of 8.72%.
