Vendor giants post mixed numbers

A slew of large vendors have released quarterly numbers in the last 24 hours, fuelling large gains or dips in their respective share prices.

Microsoft was among those to have found itself out of favour with Wall Street as it unveiled a 17 per cent year-on-year decline in revenues to $13.1bn (£8bn) for its quarter to 30 June.

Chief financial officer Chris Liddel admitted that Microsoft’s business continues to be buffeted by the weak global PC and server market. The software giant’s net profit fell by over a quarter (26 per cent) to $3.05bn on an annual comparison.

Microsoft’s share price sank seven per cent in after-hours trading but WAN optimisation vendor Riverbed was an even bigger loser, its failure to meet analyst expectations triggering an 18 per cent share price fall. Although Riverbed’s quarterly revenue rose 12 per cent to $91m year on year, analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters were expecting a much larger $93.6m haul.

Riverbed’s losses narrowed to $290,000 down from $869,000 a year earlier.

Staying in the networking space, Juniper Networks also got a frosty reception as it reported net profits of $14.8m – a small fraction of the $120.4m banked a year earlier. Revenues for the three months to 30 June fell 11 per cent to $786.4m, sparking a 6.4 per share price drop last night.

CA was among those in Wall Street’s good books, its share price spiking five per cent following a fiscal first-quarter results statement that beat expectations.

The management software specialist unveiled quarterly revenue of $1.05bn – down three per cent in dollar terms but up four per cent in local currencies. Net profits were virtually flat at $195m.

CA chief executive John Swainson said the onset of new technologies such as virtualisation and cloud computing were presenting new opportunities for the vendor.