F5 joins $1bn club and adds 480 staff

But the Americas region continues to generate the bulk of application delivery controller silverback's sales

F5 Networks has joined the $1bn club after its annual revenue leapt by almost a third – although EMEA still represents just a fifth of its business.

The NASDAQ-listed application delivery networking specialist saw sales for its fiscal 2011 rise 31 per cent to $1.15bn (£718m) as it surfed rising demand for datacentre consolidation technology.

Headcount rose by 24 per cent to about 2,500 as F5 added 480 employees during the year.

Q4 revenue hit $314.6m, up 24 per cent year on year and eight per cent sequentially. Sales generated from its core application delivery networking business rose from $282.5m to $307.3m sequentially, with ARX revenue falling from $8.3m to $7.3m.

On a geographic basis, North America was the star of the quarter, driven by some large ADC project wins and strong service provider sales.

The Americas grew 25 per cent year on year in Q4, representing 60 per cent of revenue, with EMEA growing at a more muted 14 per cent to account for just 20 per cent of sales.

By vertical, telco generated 26 per cent of sales in Q4, ahead of technology and financial (on 19 per cent each). From a channel perspective, distributors Avnet and Ingram generated about 30 per cent of sales during the quarter.

F5 said sales of its VIPRION 2400 mid-range chassis were ahead of expectations in the first full quarter of general availability.

In an earnings call, a transcript of which can be found here, F5 said it expects to see sequential revenue growth throughout its fiscal 2012.

F5 president and chief executive John McAdam argued that market trends have put the vendor in an enviable position.

"I have asserted many times in the past that F5 enjoys the position of being in the sweet spot of business and industry trends," he said.

"Datacentre consolidation using virtualisation technologies, cloud computing architectures, and the continued explosive growth of mobile applications and data are all industry trends which continue to be significant growth drivers for F5 solutions."

McAdam added: "We expect to see healthy growth from our core ADC market solutions as well as incremental opportunities as we continue our success in expanding market areas such as service providers and security."