Business

Google grows while IBM, Microsoft shrink

Internet search and advertising behemoth Google’s better-than-expected second quarter results were in direct contrast with results from IBM. Google reported second quarter revenue growth of 22% and saw one of its biggest quarterly jumps in head count in the quarter, adding 2,240 new employees in the quarter. Chief Financial Officer Patrick Pichette told analysts on a call that the hires were mostly in engineering and research.

At the same time, IBM said its second quarter revenue fell 2% with an overall 11% decline in hardware systems revenue. However that was an improvement from the first quarter, when revenue in hardware fell 23%, in part due to a big decline in mainframe system sales. In recent quarters, IBM has seen hardware sales slow in China due to a new economic reform plan and a move by some Chinese banks and other corporations to adopt technology offerings from Chinese companies.

And while Microsoft Corp. was once the young software company to be afraid of, it announced earlier on Thursday that it was laying off an unprecedented 18,000 employees, many of them in the Nokia handset business acquired by Microsoft in April. Microsoft has been struggling to make a bigger dent in the mobile business, where Google’s Android operating system is now dominant. Its new CEO Satya Nadella said in an internal email that the company will focus even more on its Windows Phone operating system for mobile devices.

“We really are living in a multi-screen world,” Pichette told analysts on a call.

IBM too is now looking to get more involved in the mobile business, at least on the corporate end. On Tuesday it announced a deal with Apple Inc. where it will develop apps for Apple devices designed for specific industries.

For tech investors, it is indeed a brave new world.