FIBR ( win: $9 gap $12) Revs increase 179% YoY
Company's Optical Network Subsidiary, Sorrento Networks Inc., Posts Record Revenues
SAN DIEGO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 23, 2001--Sorrento Networks Corporation (Nasdaq:FIBR - news), a leading provider of metro and regional optical networking solutions, today announced financial results for its first quarter of fiscal year 2002, which ended April 30, 2001.
Revenues for the Company's two operating subsidiaries, Sorrento Networks, Inc. (``Sorrento'') and Meret Optical Communications increased 130 percent in the current fiscal quarter to $14.5 million from $6.3 million for the comparable quarter last year.
Sorrento reported fiscal 2002 first quarter revenues of $13.1 million, the highest in Sorrento's history, an increase of 179 percent over the prior year's first quarter revenues of $4.7 million and a sequential revenue growth of 19 percent over the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2001. In addition, Sorrento's gross margins in the first quarter improved to 34 percent compared with gross margins of 32 percent in the previous quarter.
The Company reported a net loss in the fiscal 2002 first quarter of $5.8 million, which is a 33 percent reduction from the $8.6 million loss reported in the preceding quarter and a 55 percent reduction from the $12.8 million loss in the comparable quarter of the last fiscal year.
These reduced losses reflect the higher revenue recorded, as well as cost controls initiated by management during the quarter. The loss per share for the first quarter of fiscal 2002 declined to $0.45 per share from $0.74 per share in the immediately preceding quarter and $1.15 per share in the comparable quarter last year.
``Our momentum continued in the first quarter and reflects many important indicators of future growth opportunities,'' said Jim Dixon, president and chief operating officer. ``The business outlook continues to be strong. Our revenues have increased for the third consecutive quarter, orders from existing customers continue to grow and prospects for significant orders from new customers is high. The GigaMux(TM) and EPC(TM) products continue to receive rave reviews from customers, and our new products, such as TeraManager(TM) and TeraMatrix(TM), are on track for deployment this year.''
Quarterly Highlights
The first quarter also marked the initial deployment and additional shipments of GigaMux with OC-192. The Company received new orders from and is seeing new activity on OC-192 with other customers.
Sorrento released TeraManager, its carrier-class network management system, for beta testing. Further details regarding commercial availability will be forthcoming at SuperComm.
Belgacom SA/NV, the incumbent telecommunications operator for Belgium, announced the first deployment of Sorrento's GigaMux optical transport system as part of a managed bandwidth solution of fibre and DWDM for its major enterprise customers.
New voice and data services were inaugurated over a previously-announced Sorrento-provisioned national backbone network for France.
Sorrento also announced a strategic partnership with WESCO Distribution, Inc. (NYSE: WCC - Parent Company), the nation's largest utility distributor, to deliver optical networking solutions to the rapidly growing utility telecom market. Discussions with several utilities have commenced.
During the quarter, Marc Thurman was appointed vice president of Operations. In his new role, Thurman is responsible for overseeing manufacturing and operations, supply chain management, and quality assurance functions at Sorrento.
The Company completed a $10 million private placement of common stock.
Other Developments
The Company also announced that its subsidiary, Sorrento, has received notice from holders of more than 50 percent of its Series A Preferred Stock requesting that Sorrento redeem the Series A Preferred Stock. This redemption right is contained in the agreements governing the original issuance of the Stock. The requested redemption can only be made from specified categories of funds, and Sorrento cannot legally redeem any of the Series A Preferred Stock at this time. The Company has engaged SG Cowen Securities Corporation to assist in structuring an agreement between Sorrento and the Series A Preferred Shareholders regarding their redemption request.
About Sorrento
Sorrento Networks, with headquarters in San Diego, is a leading supplier of end-to-end, intelligent optical networking solutions for metro and regional applications worldwide. Sorrento Networks' products support a wide range of protocols and network traffic over linear, ring and mesh topologies.
Sorrento Networks' existing customer base and market focus includes communications carriers in the telecommunications, cable TV, fixed wireless and utilities markets. The Storage Area Network (SAN) market is addressed though alliances with SAN system integrators.
Recent news releases and additional information about Sorrento Networks can be found at www.sorrentonet.com. |
