NEW YORK, Nov 8 (Reuters) - Software maker Interwoven Inc.'s (NasdaqNM:IWOV - news) chief financial officer said on
Thursday he believed business has rebounded since the fall off in the days following the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States and
the company has no immediate plans to scale back its operations.
``The deals coming in look pretty similar to most quarters,'' CFO David Allen said, speaking at Merrill Lynch's annual Software and Internet conference in
Monterey, Calif., which was broadcast over the Internet.
``It's actually a very healthy environment. There's a lot of activity out there. I'm seeing a lot more of our individuals back on planes as I did see in early September.''
Interwoven makes software that organizes, manages, saves, indexes and distributes documents, pictures and other content that companies put on the Internet or their
internal intranets.
Despite the upbeat look on the environment, Allen said customers are still very bottom-line sensitive, wanting twice the product for the same price. He said the
company was not changing its outlook for the fourth quarter of revenues in the range of $43 million to $45 million, and he expected Interwoven to continue to spend
$4 million to $5 million a month of its $225 million cash for ``the next couple of quarters.''
Allen said the need for Interwoven's products is catching on in large companies, where most first deals start with just a customer's department but then is adopted
throughout an enterprise.
``We have far more $1 million-plus opportunities in our pipeline than we did a year ago,'' Allen said.
WHO'S NUMBER ONE?
Additionally, Allen said he believed that despite revived content management focus from companies such as BroadVision Inc.(NasdaqNM:BVSN - news), he
believed his company's No. 1 market position is not threatened.
Bill Daniels, senior vice president and general manager of strategy and technology of Vignette Corp. (NasdaqNM:VIGN - news), whom Allen said was No. 2 in the
marketplace, said he took exception at Interwoven's posture as market leader.
``We've got twice the customers and twice the license revenues, for him to stand up at any forum and claim to be a market leader means he doesn't understand how
to do division,'' Daniels said.
In the third quarter, Interwoven booked $20.7 million in software license fees compared with Vignette's $40.3 million.
Vignette's new V6 platform adds personalization of content as well as content integration and analysis to its suite and its application portal.
Still, Merrill Lynch analyst Scott Phillips said he does not think Interwoven's market position is threatened.
``We believe the market opportunity for content management software remains attractive,'' Phillips said in a research note issued after the presentation.
``We note that both Vignette and BroadVision have refocused their market message towards content management and away from e-commerce applications. We do
not think this significantly impacts the current competitive landscape.'' |
