UPDATE: Oracle Q3 Profit Meets Views

reported in-line earnings for the fiscal third quarter on Tuesday. The Redwood City, California-based company posted quarterly net income of $2.5 billion, or $0.56 per share, compared to $2.6 billion, or $0.56 per share, in the year-ago quarter. Non-GAAP earnings came in at $0.68 per share in the latest quarter. Its total revenue came in unchanged at $9.3 billion in the quarter, while revenue climbed 6% as measured in constant currency. However, analysts were expecting earnings of $0.68 per share on revenue of $9.46 billion. Software and cloud revenue rose 1% to $7.2 billion, while cloud software-as-a-service and platform-as-a-service rose 30% to $372 million. Hardware systems revenue slipped 2% to $1.3 billion in the quarter. GAAP operating income dropped 5% to $3.4 billion in the quarter, while the GAAP operating margin came in at 36%. "In Q3, we sold nearly $200 million of new SaaS and PaaS business as measured in annual recurring revenue," said Oracle CEO, Mark Hurd. "In Q4, we expect to sell over $300 million of new SaaS and PaaS annual recurring revenue. That means we have a real chance to sell more SaaS and PaaS new business this coming quarter than any other cloud services provider. I think our hyper-growth in the cloud comes as a big surprise to a lot of people." Oracle shares rose 0.68% to $43.16 in after-hours trading.