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Technology Stocks : Citrix Systems (CTXS) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Redman who wrote (6099)	1/27/1999 11:34:00 PM
From: David Lawrence	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 9068

INTERVIEW - Citrix Systems (NASDAQ:CTXS) on sales By Michael Connor FORT LAUDERDALE, Jan 27 (Reuters) - Fast-growing Citrix Systems Inc. expects strong sales increases outside North America to continue as the business software group partly owned by Microsoft Corp. rolls out new types of software and fresh versions of existing products, the chairman of Citrix said Wednesday. "Sixty percent of our sales could be international, but when is the question," company chairman and founder Ed Iacobucci said in an interview. "We have lots of places to go. We're very little in southern Europe, the East bloc countries, Latin America and Japan." A specialist in software and services linking computers for businesses, government agencies and other institutions, Citrix last year got 40 percent of its 1998 revenues of $248.6 million outside North America. Sales in 1998 were up 101 percent from 1997, largely on the popularity of Citrix software allowing big computer users to cut costs by extending the working lives of outdated computers. Citrix has more than 100,000 server computers worldwide using its two most popular products, WinFrame and MetaFrame, President Mark Templeton said. Typically, Citrix software replaces functions on a personal computer by linking cheaper, much less powerful individual machines to a central, or server, computer which holds databases, Internet connections and other functions now usually kept on each personal computer. Such centralization is cheaper and more reliable, Citrix executives said. Iacobucci, a celebrated industry figure who played a key role in developing IBM's failed OS/2 software meant to compete with Microsoft dominant operating system, said Citrix was finding it easier to convince Europeans than Americans to adopt Citrix's technology for business computing because non-Americans in general had fewer emotional attachment to personal computers. "Outside the U.S., the computer is a tool," he said. "Here it replaced the car and all day long we talk about Mips and hard drives." Citrix, based in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., doubled its workforce to 610 people during 1998. Many of the new jobs were outside North America and many of the new hires planned for 1999 will also be outside the United States, Templeton said. The company is also aggressively licensing its Independent Computing Architecture software to electronics manufacturers such as Motorola for devices in development such as a wireless phone able to tap directly into a company's computers. Citrix on Wednesday announced ICA licensing deals with nine other companies. Iacobucci declined to discuss details of software to be introduced in 1999, other than to say Citrix wanted to extend its reach deeper into organizations than it does with its MetaFrame and WinFrame products. The company's goal is to sell software and services for all parts of an organization using its server-based technology, he said. When asked, Iacobucci described Citrix's ties to Microsoft as quite good. Microsoft owns about 7 percent of Citrix, whose main products rely of Microsoft technology. In 1997, news that Microsoft said it might develop its own versions of Citrix software and refuse Citrix permission to use Microsoft technology rocked the company's stock. But the two reached a five-year, $175 million pact that is still in place. "We add value to their platform," Iacobucci said. "I think they view us as an important part of their structure in the market." 305-374-5013)) Copyright 1999, Reuters News Service