H.P. Reports Lower First-Quarter Revenue and Profit SAN FRANCISCO - Hewlett-Packard reported Wednesday that net income fell 44 percent in the first fiscal quarter to $1.5 billion, or 73 cents a share, from $3 billion, or $1.17 a share, a year ago. The company said revenue fell 7 percent, to $30 billion, from $32.3 billion a year earlier. Analysts surveyed by Thompson Reuters had expected H.P. to make 87 cents a share, according to nonstandard accounting measures, on revenue of $30.71 billion. So H.P. exceeded their expectations because the per-share earnings according to those accounting standards were 92 cents a share. This was the first full quarter in charge for Meg Whitman, the former head of eBay who succeeded Léo Apotheker as H.P."s chief executive last September. Chosen in part for her communications skills, she took an upbeat tone about the earnings. "We delivered on our Q1 outlook and remained focused on the fundamentals to drive long-term sustainable returns," she said in a statement. We are taking the necessary steps to improve execution, increase effectiveness and capitalize on emerging opportunities. Revenue was down in its largest divisions and in all regions. H.P."s personal computers business, the world's biggest, fell by 15 percent, to $8.9 billion. Printing and Imaging, another mainstay, was down 7 percent, to $6.3 billion. The computer server and data storage business, which H.P. has tried to build, declined 10 percent, to $5 billion. Services rose only 1 percent, to $8.6 billion. But the company said revenue in its business software division grew 30 percent. H.P."s earnings report followed Wednesday's announcement by Dell Computer, H.P."s main worldwide competitor for PC sales, that its net income for its fourth quarter fell 18 percent, to $764 million, or 43 cents a share, despite focusing on higher-margin business. Revenue rose 2 percent, to $16 billion. Dell also projected sales would fall by about 7 percent in the current quarter. Brian T. Gladden, Dell's chief financial officer, said profit margins for the quarter were hurt by a combination of weakness in public spending in the United States, discounting of the leftover inventory of its previous generation phones and the lingering impact of the Thailand flood on the production of hard drives for PCs. Dell's large-enterprise business held up well, increasing sales 5 percent in the quarter.