微軟公司

Microsoft

????2012年《財富》500強排名：第35位

????2012年利潤（單位：百萬美元）：16,978

????沒有哪一家公司愿意看到財年最后一個季度出現首次季虧。然而，在aQuantive網絡廣告業務上下錯的賭注迫使微軟不得不在去年6月份的第四財季財報中公布減值62億美元。自那以后，這個軟件巨頭一直在試圖完成自我救贖。去年秋季，微軟發布了Windows 8操作系統，盡管個人計算機市場萎靡不振，但上個季度公司銷售額躍升23%。雖然微軟的智能手機和平板電腦產品尚未對競爭對手造成重創，但受Xbox熱銷和云計算業務開拓的提振，微軟正恢復增長，不斷向分析師預期的水平邁進。——T.Z.

????Fortune 500 rank: 35

????2012 profit (millions): 16,978

????Reporting your first quarterly loss ever is not the way a company wants to end its fiscal year. But a bad bet on online ad unit aQuantive forced Microsoft to report a $6.2 billion writedown in its fourth-quarter results last June. The software giant has redeemed itself since then. Microsoft released Windows 8 last fall, and despite a dying PC market, sales jumped 23% last quarter. The company's smartphone and tablet offerings have yet to make a dent against their rivals, but with boosts from the Xbox and a move to cloud computing, Microsoft is growing again and meeting expectations.—T.Z.