During Microsoft's Financial Analyst Briefing 2017 in Seattle, Chief Financial Officer Amy Hood talked about the company's gaming business, starting by mentioning that it's a "critical" asset for the future of Microsoft.

Hood showcased the following graph showing a relation between the Xbox Live monthly active users and those extending their engagement beyond their console.

Hood also explained that the overall market formed by consoles, games and the services related to them is already a 110 billion dollars market, and it's growing double digits.

For Microsoft it's a multiple billion dollars business that's profitable and growing profitably, and provides a foundation to further business models like subscriptions, broadcasting and more.

According to Hood, this opens up possibilities far beyond the overall 110 billion dollar market that Microsoft is "already able to compete very effectively in."