The server software developer who had a very good decade so far, said Tuesday after market trading that it lost $201 million, or 27 cents per share, in fiscal quarter ended March 29. the loss is significantly wider that a year ago when Sun Microsystems lost $34 million, or 4 cents per share. 

 

Sun's revenue for the third quarter was $2.6 billion, down 20 percent from the $3.3 billion it reported during the same quarter last year. The only good news for the company were a positive cash flow from operations during the quarter of $178 million and a 4 percent increase in billing across its software. 

 

However, what is most worrying for Sun Microsystems is that its sales of high end systems fell about a third during the third quarter. Sales of systems based on X86 architecture also fell 20 percent. 

 

Last week, Oracle said it wants to purchase Sun Microsystems for $7.4 billion. IBM also tried to buy the struggling firm but without success. However, the latest financial results from Sun Microsystems seem to indicate that Oracle is actually getting less from Sun that it initially bargained for.