Sun Microsystems posts Q3 profit

Sun is continuing its profitable ways, reporting net income of $67 million, or $0.02 a share, on $3.29 billion in revenue in quarterly financial results released Tuesday.

Sun's earnings in its fiscal third quarter, which ended April 1, compared to a net loss of $217 million, or $0.06 share, on revenue of $3.18 billion in the same quarter of 2006.

Thomson Financial did not issue an analyst forecast for Sun this quarter, said a spokesman, citing the lack of a consensus among the Sun analysts.

This is the second consecutive quarter that the computer server and storage device maker and owner of the Solaris 10 OS posted a profit after five consecutive quarterly losses.

The net income is a GAAP (generally accepted accounting principles) figure, which means it includes charges against earnings, including the following: $50 million of stock-based compensation charges; $35 million of restructuring and related impairment of assets charges; $75 million of purchase price accounting adjustments and other intangible charges related to acquisitions in fiscal 2006; and $54 million of settlement income, among other items. The net impact of these six items reduced earnings per share on a diluted basis by approximately $0.02.

Sun puts its gross margin as a percentage of revenue at 44.5 percent, an increase of 1.5 percent from the year ago quarter.