Microsoft Expects Strong Xbox Engagement in The Holiday Quarter After Record Summer

Microsoft hosted its quarterly financial conference call for investors and analysts and chief executive officer Satya Nadella and chief financial officer Amy Hood talked about the Xbox business.

Nadella boasted record monetization and engagement during the past quarter (between July and September) compared to past first-quarter data.

He also mentioned that Microsoft’s gaming ecosystem continues to attract new gamers and retain those it gained during the past year and a half.

“We continue to attract new gamers and retain those we have gained over the past year and a half. We saw record first-quarter monetization and engagement.

This Holiday season we’ll bring our greatest lineup of content and exclusive games ever with three new AAA titles including Halo Infinite available via Game Pass subscription service which continues to offer the best value in gaming.

We’re also bringing Xcloud gaming to consoles for the first time, enabling Xbox users to discover the stream and stream more than a hundred games with just a click.

Cloud gaming is now available in 25 countries including as of this quarter Australia, Brasil, Mexico, and Japan. We’re expanding our opportunity with independent creators as well as top studios. Updates to Azure Play Fab make it easy for developers to integrate the creative marketplace in games they build.

Leading publishers from Bungie to Krafton are all relying on our cloud to scale and upgrade their games.”

Hood then mentioned that Microsoft was able to ship more Xbox Series X and S than expected during the past quarter.

She also spelled expectations for the current quarter (between October and December). Despite a high prior year comparable that included the Xbox Series X|S launch, Microsoft still expects revenue growth year-on-year for the overall gaming business in the high single digits (6-9%).

Hood also cautioned that console sales will continue to be impacted by supply constraints. Yet, Microsoft expects Xbox content and services revenue to grow in the mid-teens (around 15%) year-on-year thanks to strong engagement on the Xbox platform since the Holiday quarter will include several AAA launches.

If you’re interested in Microsoft’s financial performance (especially in regards to the Xbox business) you can check out our dedicated article from earlier today.