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It’s been hard to tell so far looking at the major tech companies that there’s a recession going on.  Both Apple and Google reported strong quarters for the beginning of the year despite the economic situation.  There are some companies that have been losing money, but most, like Palm, were already doing poorly.  Yet now, for the first time, we can say that Microsoft has posted a year-over-year decline for the quarter ending in March.

That’s not to say Microsoft lost money, the company actually posted a profit of $2.98 billion, which translates to 33 cents per share.  Last year for the same quarter the numbers were $4.39 billion, for 47 cents per share.  It results in a revenue drop of 6 percent for Microsoft, though it also managed to cut expenses by 9 percent.  The drop in revenue could be a result of lower demand for Windows as people could be holding back on buying new computers.  Or it could be that those people are buying netbooks, which could result in less profit for Microsoft.

Despite the drop, Microsoft didn’t seem to be too concerned, with CFO Chris Lidell saying “while we would all like to think that our recovery will be soon and painless, we unfortunately believe that it will be slow and gradual.”  On the earnings conference call Microsoft also stressed that Windows 7 is still on track for a fiscal year 2010 launch.  That means anywhere from July 2009 to June 2010.  Given the recent beta tests, it wouldn’t be too surprising if there’s more demand for 7 than there has been for Vista.  There’s always the chance that the release of Jaunty Jackalope yesterday could affect that, but getting a Linux fan’s hope up too much makes for a very disappointing realization.

Read [Reuters]