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Personal computer maker Hewlett-Packard has reported a 16 percent decline in net profit for the first quarter, as its sales were hurt by lower demand for PCs.

The world's largest PC maker's net profit for the quarter ended on 31 January fell to $1.2bn (£785m, €908m) or $0.63 per share from $1.5bn or $0.73 per share in the prior-year quarter.

Quarterly sales declined by 6 percent to $28.4bn. All segments, with the exception of financial services, reported declines in revenue, led by personal systems division that saw revenue falling 8 percent in the first quarter.

The PC market has been suffering from lower demand with increasing popularity for tablets and smartphones among consumers. Earlier, HP's rival Dell reported a 31 percent decline in quarterly profit, on an 11percent drop in revenue.

Amid declining revenues, HP said it will cut 27,000 jobs by the end of 2014 to reduce costs up to $3.5bn per year.

"While there's still a lot of work to do to generate the kind of growth we want to see, our turnaround is starting to gain traction as a result of the actions we took in 2012 to lay the foundation for HP's future," chief executive Meg Whitman said in a statement.

During the quarter, the company returned $511m in cash to shareholders through dividends and share buybacks, and improved its net debt position by more than $1bn.

Looking ahead, HP expects to report earnings per share in the range of $0.80 to $0.82 in the second quarter, above the average analysts' forecast of $0.77.

"We'll be bringing a number of new programs and disruptive innovations to market in the coming quarters, and we expect the benefits from our restructuring will accelerate through fiscal 2013," Whitman said.

Following the results, HP shares rose more than 6 percent in after- hours trade.