Dell Q3 2013 Earnings Show Deep Year-Over-Year Dip

It's time for Dell to let it be known what their fiscal results are for their third quarter of 2013, and it's not looking very fantastic. With comparisons galore to the same period of time last year, Dell is anywhere in-between doing slightly worse and getting cut in half – and it all starts with a number that, if you didn't know better, would look positively fantastic: $13.7 billion in revenue.

This number comes in with a net income for Dell dropping 47% year-over-year. Again that's nearly half of what it was last year at this same report at the same time of year. The second quarter of the company's fiscal 2013 had them showing $14.5 billion, while a year ago in Q3 the computer manufacturer reported a cool $15.5 billion. Net income for Dell this Q3 2013 was in at $475 million while back on year ago they brought in $893 million – that's the 47% downturn.

The consumer devision for Dell reported a total loss of $65 million for this fiscal Q3 2013, with revenue dropping by 9 percent in the USA and well above 10 percent for Asia and across Europe. The Enterprise Solutions division of Dell had a continued revenue growth of three percent – that being year-over-year in this case. You'll find that operating income (GAAP) here in this most recent reporting period went down 48% as well, while non-GAAP operating income went down just 31%, both of these numbers being year-over-year.

Brian Gladden, Dell CFO has made it clear that they're feeling good about the enterprise business they're growing in. "In a difficult global IT spending environment we saw solid proof points that demonstrate progress in our strategy," he noted, "we're also encouraged by early interest in our new Windows 8 touch portfolio and the opportunities it creates for our commercial and consumer businesses."

Now we've got to see if Dell can pull out a win with a combination of Windows 8 and enterprise business across the board. With cash flow from operations this quarter racking up $1.3 billion and working with $14.2 billion in cash and investments, we won't see the company going away for a very, very long time. Have a peek at our Dell tag portal for more on the big D.