By Graham K. Rogers

Xerox Corporation has announced its 2012 First Quarter earnings with revenue up slightly at $5.5 billion. The company's press release adds that revenue from the company's services business was up 10 percent, and revenue from its technology business was down 5 percent in constant currency. Growth in services was driven by a 13 percent increase in business process outsourcing and 7 percent growth in document outsourcing.

Technology revenue, which represents the sale of document systems, supplies, technical service and financing of products, was impacted by the weak macro environment as well as clients' increasing shift to Xerox managed print services. Installs of Xerox products were up 7 percent in the first quarter.

Xerox expects second-quarter 2012 GAAP earnings of 21 cents to 24 cents per share. Second-quarter adjusted EPS is expected to be 25 cents to 28 cents per share including 1 cent to 2 cents of restructuring.

Xerox expects that its earnings for the full year per share will be 97 cents to $1.03. In addition, including restructuring, Xerox continues to expect full-year adjusted earnings per share of $1.12 to $1.18. Xerox expects full-year operating cash flow of $2 billion to $2.3 billion, and plans to repurchase $900 million to $1.1 billion in Xerox stock during the year.

Graham K. Rogers teaches at the Faculty of Engineering, Mahidol University in Thailand. He wrote in the Bangkok Post, Database supplement on IT subjects. For the last seven years of Database he wrote a column on Apple and Macs.