Salesforce.com shines; Microsoft tweaks SQL services

By Barbara Darrow, Senior News Director 26 Feb 2009 | SearchITChannel.com

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Salesforce.com shines in bleak season

Salesforce.com's fourth-quarter profits, ending Jan. 31, 2009, jumped a whopping 86% to $13.8 million (11 cents per share) from $7.4 million (6 cents per share). Revenue rose 34% to $289.6 million from $216.9 million for the year-ago period. This all came as particularly good news to analysts who were shaken by the departure of company president Steven Cakebread earlier this month.

But company forecasts are sober; it expects to earn 10 cents to 11 cents per share for the first quarter, which is roughly in line with expectations. For the current full fiscal year, however, the company expects net income to come in at between 54 cents to 55 cents per share. Salesforce.com lowered its revenue expectations to between $1.3 billion and $1.33 billion from an earlier projection of between $1.35 billion and $1.36 billion.

Microsoft tweaks SQL-Server-in-the-cloud plan

Microsoft plans to build a full cloud-based version of SQL Server, moving beyond its previously announced SQL Server Data Services vision, according to The Register. Mark Hindsbro, general manager of developer and platform evangelism for Microsoft, told the publication that Microsoft will add as many SQL Server features to its Azure Services Platform as possible. Hindsbro said the move was made in response to partner input. Azure is the foundation for Microsoft's cloud computing infrastructure.

AMD 'YouTubes' six-core Opteron

AMD highlighted its upcoming six-core 45-nanometer AMD Opteron processor, aka Istanbul, in live demonstrations on YouTube this week. The x86 six-core processor is designed for systems with two and four or more sockets and is due in the second half of this year, according to SearchDataCenter.com.

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