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Technology Stocks : STARTEK, INC. (SRT) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: jr who wrote (7)	4/17/1999 8:37:00 PM
From: edde	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 16

Business Week,s Article: How would you like to find an inexpensive Internet play whose earnings in 1998 grew an impressive 45% and revenues 58%, and whose clients include Microsoft (MSFT), America Online (AOL), AT&T (T), and Hewlett-Packard (HWP)? Some pros think they have found such a gem in StarTek (SRT)--not to be confused with Star Trek, the TV series. StarTek provides clients with one-stop, fully integrated outsourcing, providing clients with services from support for their E-commerce and Internet ventures to inventory management, order processing, and distribution. The stock, currently at 11 1/8, trades at 14.9 times analysts' 1999 earnings estimate of 75 cents a share, and 11.7 times 95 cents for 2000. ''StarTek is definitely an undiscovered and undervalued Internet play,'' says James Awad, chairman of Awad Asset Management, which has accumulated a stake of more than 4% of the stock. StarTek has $36.4 million in cash, or $2.60 a share, net of all debt. Based on its strong growth and the potential for an ''explosion in its Net business,'' the stock is sure to double this year, says Awad. Indeed, Adam Waldo, an analyst at CS First Boston, thinks opportunities abound for StarTek in E-trade and online business. ''StarTek is seeing explosive growth,'' he notes, in providing such varied services as designing and hosting Web sites, collecting transaction and marketing data, and constructing databases. ''StarTek will be the prime beneficiary of its high-tech clients' drive into E-commerce, in both the consumer and business-to-business markets,'' says Waldo. Last year, for example, Microsoft provided some 72% of StarTek's revenues. Another bull on StarTek is Arnold Ursaner, an analyst at CJS Securities in White Plains, N.Y., who says the stock ''is an attractive way to play the growth in E-commerce, telecom, and technology.'' It's a ''strong buy,'' he says. BY GENE G. MARCIAL