INSTANT VIEW: Dell quarterly profit beats expectations

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Dell Inc, the No. 2 maker of personal computers, posted a higher-than-expected quarterly profit as it cut costs to offset a drop in revenue, sending shares up 6 percent.

COMMENTARY

BILL KREHER, TECHNOLOGY ANALYST, EDWARD JONES

"The company was able to report above expectations as cost-cutting efforts offset revenue growth. It was certainly a surprise and what this shows is that cost-cutting initiatives are beginning to take effect."

"The slowdown in PC demand affected laptop sales and thus revenue, but despite the difficult environment, the company's strategic plans are paying off. It shows that best-of-breed companies will be able to still grow through cost-cutting."

SHANNON CROSS, ANALYST, CROSS RESEARCH

"It's all cost-reduction, and it seems like they walked away from selling lower-margin products. For Dell, it seems to be a balancing act of revenue versus profit, and I guess it was profit this quarter."

"Gross margin was very strong. Our revenue estimate was $15.3 billion, which is lower than what the Street was expecting. But it was probably weakness in PC (that drove down revenue) globally, although they did talk about strength in emerging markets and consumer."

"It's going to be a challenge for companies (like Dell) to cut costs as fast as sales have fallen off... It's kind of a race of cutting and trying to better position cost structure against lower revenue."

(Reporting by Anupreeta Das in San Francisco, compiled by Tiffany Wu)