Microsoft News: slow and difficult recovery

The start of 2009 has not been a great year for a number of companies, one such company is Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT). We are used to this giant of a company making huge profits, but its first year-over-year quarterly sales for 2009 are not good, and they expect a slow and difficult recovery.

We are used to seeing Microsoft optimistic, but they are like a wounded tiger running from the hunter as the recession takes a hold. Other companies in the computers industry are also feeling the strain and reporting a poor Q1.

Business Week reports that chipmaker Intel (NASDAQ:INTC) has said that the PC market has bottomed, IBM (NYSE:IBM) have given its investors some hope by saying that the economy looks set to turn itself around.

Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) seems to be beating the trend, as its first quarter profits are up, but it is not from its sales of the Mac. These high sales are from some of its smaller devices, the iPod Touch and the ever-popular iPhone, which has seen sales increase by 123 percent over the previous year.