Board, I have now listened to the CC and I recommend that all interested folks do. I thought it was encouraging. It certainly strengthend my conviction that RATL is worth holding. Some hilights, IMO:
- Cash-flow stronger than expected (at around $15m, if I heard correctly), resulting in better than planned Cash & Cash equivalents of $289m;
- 74 sales days outstanding, in line with RATL's goals;
- New bookings stronger than expected;
- Levy "very comfortable" with consensus estimates of EPS 0.54 for FY 99 (ending in 03/99) and $365m in revenues (maybe 375m, I may have mis-heard the figure);
- Introduction of a couple of new products/upgrades like ClearCase 3.2 and ClearQuest 1.0 (a new product, as I understood) that did "very well" in the initial introduction period;
- Levy stressed their cooperation with MSFT. I got the impression he really is positively convinced of it;
- The NT platform products continue to sell very well;
- An endless list of Blue Chip customers in all sorts of industries: Citicorp, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Airbus, United Airlines, AT&T... you name it;
- Levy stressed the importance of continuing to drive hard: "continued hard work needed, but quite confident..." and "well positioned to meet expectations in the future..." and finally, "... the company will be a lot larger in two to three years than it presently is".
Like the other RATLer here, I noted that the analysts made compliments for the good performance.
All in all, RATL looking good and rather getting better, IMO.
regards,
Thomas |
