EMC Will Seek to Restore Investor Confidence at Analyst Meeting
By John Stebbins
quote.bloomberg.com
Hopkinton, Massachusetts, June 5 (Bloomberg) -- EMC Corp., whose stock has dropped 93 percent from a record high in 2000, will try to restore investor confidence at an analyst meeting tomorrow by outlining its strategy to return to profitability.
Analysts and investors said Chief Executive Joseph Tucci will use the meeting in New York to emphasize that EMC has made progress in improving sales and developing software products, which can be more than twice as profitable as hardware.
EMC on April 18 reported a first-quarter net loss of $76.9 million, or 3 cents a share, on a 44 percent drop in sales. It was the third straight quarterly loss for the company, which is being squeezed by price cuts at rivals Hitachi Data Systems and International Business Machines Corp. The company has been forced to cut its own prices, eating into profitability.
``People are expecting the minimal out of EMC right now,'' said Steve Roth, an analyst at John Hancock Technology Funds, which owns about 800,000 EMC shares and has $700 million under management. ``With the decline, all that's left is a turnaround story.'' |
