Corporate software makers SAP and Sybase are teaming up to make it easier for business users to access SAP's software on mobile devices such as Apple's iPhone.
SAP, which is the world's biggest maker of business management software, is already working with Research In Motion to develop applications for the BlackBerry. But now SAP says it will extend its software to other devices like the iPhone.
Sybase, which provides database software to large companies, already sells programs that let users access corporate applications and information on their mobile devices. But now it says it will work closely with SAP to customize the software.
"It's true we can already get you to SAP on mobile devices," John Chen, chairman, CEO and president of Sybase, said during a press conference in New York City. "But it doesn't work very well. It is very clunky. We need to get with the SAP engineers to make sure that the experience will be a rewarding one for customers."
Initially, the companies plan to focus development efforts on the iPhone, RIM's BlackBerry, and phones running Microsoft Windows Mobile. But eventually they will provide support for other mobile platforms.
Bill McDermott, president of Global Field Operations for SAP and a member of the SAP executive board, said during the press conference that SAP sees big opportunity for taking its business applications mobile throughout the world. The goal is to help companies make their workforce more productive while away from the office. He said many companies have already started coming up with their own solutions. But the work with Sybase will allow SAP to offer a solution that is easy to implement.
"The big breakthrough here is that we are offering this solution out-of-the-box," he said. "We are handling all the integration for you."
Smartphones are the fastest growing segment of the mobile phone market. And devices, such as the iPhone, have made consumers aware of how applications and software can be used on a mobile device. Apple has also made it easy to purchase and download applications through its App Store. Other companies such as RIM, Microsoft, Google, and Nokia, have followed Apple's lead and are launching their own application stores.
It's little surprise that corporate applications would be bubbling to the top of the list of applications users are interested in, especially as people's work life and home life become more intertwined.
Corrected at 3:45 p.m. PST: An earlier version of this story incorrectly reported that Adobe announced it will miss both its revenue and profit forecasts for the first quarter. The company said it will miss its previous revenue forecast.
Faced with growing weakness in it business, Adobe Systems announced Wednesday it will miss its previous revenue forecast. But, the software maker said it expects to meet its profit forecast thanks to cost-cutting measures.
On Wednesday, Adobe shares were up nearly 9 percent in after-hours trading to $17.75. During the regular trading session, Adobe closed up 2 percent to end the day at $16.32 a share.
Adobe, which will report its first-quarter results on March 17, said it anticipates posting revenue of $783 million to $786 million in the quarter, compared with its previous forecast of $800 million to $850 million.
"Despite worsening market conditions, we were able to manage expenses to deliver earnings and margin results within the target ranges we provided at the outset of the quarter," Shantanu Nagayen, Adobe chief executive, said in a statement.
During the quarter, Adobe expects to release an operating profit of 30 cents a share, based on a GAAP accounting basis. That performance is on the low end of its previous forecast of 30 cents to 35 cents a share.
Although a number of companies are shying away from offering a forecast for the coming quarter, Adobe stepped up to the plate to deliver its forecast.
Adobe expects to see a further deterioration in its revenue to $675 million to $725 million in the second quarter, the company noted.
Microsoft said Monday it is expanding online services to businesses beyond the U.S. borders.
Microsoft, which has long discussed , began offering hosted software services to U.S.-based companies of all sizes last fall.
The software giant will begin selling its Business Productivity Online Suite, which includes Exchange Online, SharePoint Online, and Microsoft Office Live Meeting, in 18 additional countries beginning April 1.
The hosted service will be offered in Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom, in addition to the United States.
Pricing for the Business Productivity Online Service will be about $16 per month per user.
The company will also release Microsoft Office Communications Online on April 1.
Have desktop, will travel.
VMware unveiled Tuesday its open source virtual desktop client VMware View Open Client, designed to provide users with constant access to their personal desktop on almost any device.
VMware View Open Client aims to provide organizations with the ability to host user desktops within their respective datacenters and allow their users to access their personal desktops from a variety of devices at any given time.
Jocelyn Goldfein, general manager of VMware's Desktop business unit, said in a statement:
Now we are sharing our source code in VMware view Open Client so vendors can easily optimize devices to create the best virtual desktop solutions. As a result, IT is able to reduce the total cost of providing desktop environments by allowing low-end or less-expensive devices that provide the same feature set as higher-end devices.
The VMware View Open Client is offered up through the GNU Lesser General Public License version 2.1.
Correction: Sybase reported a 13 percent increase in license revenue, based on constant currency.
Update at 7:49 a.m. PST, with comments from the conference call.
Sybase posted fourth-quarter results on Wednesday that sailed past Wall Street's earnings expectations.
With earnings driven by strong growth in its core database business, company shares jumped 7.8 percent to $27.87 in early-morning trading.
Revenues during the quarter rose to $305.1 million, up 3 percent over the same time a year ago. Wall Street was expecting the enterprise software company to make $300.3 million, according to Thomson Reuters.
Sybase reported net income of $47.3 million, or 59 cents a share, compared with net income of $73.5 million, or 81 cents a share, a year earlier.
When excluding one-time charges and special items, the company posted earnings of 78 cents a share, soundly beating Wall Street's expectations of 61 cents a share, according to Thomson Reuters.
"They really blew it out this quarter, " said Terry Tillman, an analyst at Raymond James & Associates. "The theme for them is, they have the right kind of products in this type of market. Their database had one of the strongest product cycles in a decade."
Sybase posted a 38 percent increase in database sales, as customers continued to spend on such enterprise software as their data capacity needs continued to grow, despite recessionary times, noted Tillman.
He also noted that customers have been increasingly responding well to efforts Sybase has made in retooling its database, which began in late 2005. The company's Advanced Server Enterprise 15, otherwise known as ASE 15, has gained traction, and Sybase has taken advantage of its database with additional features to sit on top of the software, such as analytics.
Tillman noted that business intelligence software is performing well in this recessionary climate, as customers are particularly eager to gain insight into their own businesses.
John Chen, Sybase CEO, said during the conference call: "Clearly, we are taking share from our (database) competitors with these results."
During the quarter, Sybase reported that new licenses grew 8 percent to $122.1 million, compared with a year ago, when accounting for changes in currency. Based on constant currency, that figure rose 13 percent for the quarter. Investors tend to keep a keen eye on new license revenue because it serves as an indicator for future business in other parts of Sybase, from tie-on products and services to maintenance and support.
Sybase also provided guidance for how it expects to perform throughout 2009, a move that many companies are shying away from in these tumultuous economic times, as customers' orders are becoming increasingly difficult to predict.
The company expects to report revenues of $1.14 billion and earnings, excluding charges and special items, of $2.16 to $2.21 a share for 2009. The revenue forecast is slightly below Wall Street's expectations of $1.16 billion but higher than analysts' predictions of $2.14 a share.
"Customers are still buying and spending, but they're highly selective," Chen said. "While they are less willing to spend on professional services, they are still willing to spend on mission critical applications."
Some of those critical enterprise software applications include security software, real-time reporting, and risk management business intelligence software.
Chen noted, however, that sales cycles have been a little bit lengthened.
VMware reported Monday a 25 percent jump in fourth-quarter revenues and an increase in its quarterly net profit, despite recessionary times gripping the economy.
The virtualization software maker generated fourth-quarter revenues of $515 million, up by double digits over the same time a year ago. That performance beat analysts expectations of $512.3 million, according to Thomson Reuters.
VMware posted fourth-quarter net profits of $111 million, or 29 cents a share, compared with profits of $78 million, or 19 cents a share, a year earlier. Wall Street was expecting earnings of 26 cents a share, according to Thomson Reuters.
"VMware delivered a solid fourth quarter to cap off a successful 2008. We have been executing well in a difficult economy," Paul Maritz, VMware CEO, said in a statement.
But despite beating Wall Street's expectations and posting growth, VMware fell 3.17 percent to $21.40 a share in after-hours trading.
Investors may have been spooked by VMware's warning that the dire global economic conditions make it difficult to predict the company's performance for all of this year, resulting in the company withholding its financial guidance for 2009.
VMware was only willing to provide a forecast for the first quarter of revenues of approximately $475 million.
Update at 9:15 a.m. PST: Prices of companies' shares and market activity updated.
Update at 8:55 a.m. PST: Research from eBay analysts added.
Correction at 6:33 a.m. PST: Microsoft's year-over-year revenue rose 2 percent.
Bellwether tech stocks Microsoft and eBay pulled down the broader market Thursday, after they both reported quarterly earnings that apparently gave investors an unpleasant jolt.
Their results smothered hopes for a turnaround following Apple's impressive quarterly results and those of IBM.
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By 9:15 a.m. PST, Microsoft shares had fallen 10 percent to $17.40. Earlier in the day, the company reported fiscal second-quarter earnings that missed analysts' expectations.
eBay shares, meanwhile, were down 12.5 percent to $11.62. After market close Wednesday, the company reported weaker-than-expected fourth-quarter revenue and lowered its outlook for the current quarter.
Both bellwether tech stocks were among the most actively traded on Nasdaq, which was down 3.75 percent to 1,450. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 2.9 percent to 7,989.
Apple, by contrast, was one of the few most actively traded stocks on Nasdaq that was in the black, up 5.9 percent to $87.70.
Microsoft plans to cut 5,000 jobs over the next 18 months, starting by immediately slicing 1,400. Revenue for the quarter rose 2 percent year over year to $16.6 billion--$500 million lower than Wall Street expectations, according to Thomson Reuters. However, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said in an e-mail to employees Thursday that revenue was $900 million lower than expected.
Net income fell 11 percent to $4.17 billion, or 47 cents a share, in the quarter, compared with a year ago. Analysts were expecting Microsoft to generate earnings of 49 cents a share, according to Thomson Reuters.
Microsoft has a reputation of offering conservative earnings estimates to Wall Street and of rarely missing its numbers. So Thursday's announcement was particularly rare.
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Yahoo Finance)
Microsoft further added to the uncertainty of the market by stating: "Due to the volatility of market conditions, going forward, Microsoft is no longer able to offer quantitative revenue and (earnings per share) guidance for the balance of this fiscal year."
The company's fiscal second quarter ended December 31, after a particularly bad holiday-shopping season.
Microsoft was not alone in its suffering. eBay posted a 7 percent decline in fourth-quarter revenue, and analysts warned investors that the situation may not improve for the e-commerce giant in the near-term.
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Yahoo Finance)
Ben Schachter, a UBS Securities analyst, said in a research note Thursday:
We believe eBay will get cheaper yet again. Last night's results were weak across the board and we see no bottom to fundamentals in the near-term....For years we've been saying that until eBay's core business growth stabilizes or re-accelerates, we'd find it hard to recommend shares. Now, we are slightly changing our position to state that, given the valuation, we don't need to see the core stabilize, but we need some visibility as to when that might happen. Unfortunately, that is still unclear. That said, we don't see meaningful downside to the stock as the company should be able to manage costs reasonably well in 2009 to mitigate the impact to margins.
Schachter maintains a "neutral" rating on the stock.
Jeffrey Lindsay, an analyst with Sanford C. Bernstein, stated in a research note that eBay's lowered outlook for the current quarter is the "real story."
eBay dropped its first-quarter guidance to 32 cents to 34 cents a share, which translates into approximately a 21 percent decline from its performance a year ago.
Oracle has sliced approximately 500 positions from its sales and consulting staff businesses in North America, according to a report in The Wall Street Journal.
The positions, which would account for less than 2 percent of Oracle's North American workforce as of November, were cut on Friday, according to the Journal.
Oracle's reported layoffs come at a time when a number of companies across all industry sectors are slashing their workforce by double digits as the economy languishes in a recession.
And while other companies are making staff cuts amid steep declines in their revenues and earnings, Oracle's last quarterly report in November posted a 6 percent increase in second-quarter revenues and a modest 1 percent decline in net profits.
Oracle declined comment on the reported layoffs.
Oracle reported Thursday a 6 percent rise in fiscal second-quarter revenue over last year, fueled by growth in software sales and its support and maintenance business.
Net income for the quarter, however, declined 1 percent to $1.3 billion, or 25 cents a share, for the period ending November 30, compared with the previous year. Excluding special items, Oracle posted non-GAAP net income of $1.7 billion, or 34 cents a share. That was below Oracle's September forecast of 35 cents to 36 cents a share.
Oracle was up less than 1 percent in after-hours trading to $16.70 a share. Investors may have seen some encouragement in its growth in software sales.
The company, which had previously issued a forecast of a 2 percent to 12 percent rise in new software sales, posted an 8 percent increase to $4.5 billion in the quarter.
Another growth area running counter to the downturn in the economy included its steady-as-she-goes support and maintenance revenue, which rose 14 percent to $2.9 billion.
But new software license revenue, a metric that investors tend to keep a close eye on as a means to gauge future growth for the company, fell 3 percent to $1.6 billion. Oracle's services revenue also fell, slipping 2 percent to $1.1 billion.
Update at 11:01 a.m. PST, with historical information on the alliance.
Salesforce.com and Google announced on Monday an expanded alliance, aiming to offer a set of developer tools and service around cloud computing applications.
Force.com for Google App Engine is designed to enable developers to create applications in the cloud. Here's how it aims to work:
Force.com for Google App Engine is a Python library and test harness that lets you access the Force.com Web services API from within Google App Engine applications. Once it is installed in your Google App Engine application, that application can start to (seamlessly) make callouts to the Force.com Web services API. This API lets you query and manipulate data in your Force.com environment - effectively letting you tap into the Force.com platform from within the application.
Marc Benioff, Salesforce.com CEO, noted in a statement that Salesforce and Google are on the same page when it comes to cloud computing and an open environment.
"We have an open vision for cloud computing," Benioff said. "Developers now can take advantage of the easy to use and rapidly scalable cloud computing infrastructure from Google and Salesforce.com to build and deliver powerful business applications."
This arrangement is the latest expansion of a deal Salesforce and Google struck in April, which called for linking Salesforce's customer relationship management software with Google Apps.
And in June, the companies expanded that initial deal with Salesforce creating the Force.com Toolkit for Google Data APIs, allowing developers to connect to data in Google Apps via the Force.com development platform.
