$1bn services revenue goal set by vendor

Computer Associates is aiming to build a services business of more than $1bn by the end of the year and confirmed it was still pursuing an acquisition strategy to help it achieve its goal.

But despite the ambitious plans, Charles Wang, chief executive of CA, claimed products rather than services remained the most lucrative part of the software giant's business. He insisted that CA's services operation generated between $600m and $700m in annual revenue, which will be one fifth of the total revenue by the end of the year.

The acquisition of Platinum Technology and its $200m services business earlier this year, is set to help CA reach this target.

Wang was adamant that the company would continue its bid for further services acquisitions, despite CA's failed takeover bid for Computer Sciences.

"We're looking for services companies all over the world. We still have quite a few on the drawing board," he stated.

But Wang did not expect services to become a larger part of CA's revenue than its products business. "Frankly, the margins are better with products. But it's important that we get involved in services and do it well," he said.

Wang insisted CA's approach to services was different from its main competitor, IBM. "The approach is fundamentally different. Our professional services are built around making, customising and deploying CA systems. IBM's approach is completely different. Tivoli is a wonderful systems programmers' toolkit, but it's driven by billable hours and people - that's certainly not CA.

"Because we have a system, not just a bunch of tools, our service is focused on having a system, deploying it quickly and making it successful, because once we can do that for one department or one Lan, we can easily spread it to the rest of the enterprise," he added.