[London, ENGLAND] Web infrastructure software developer
Autonomy Corporation plc announced that its fourth
quarter revenues were up 198 percent on the fourth
1999 quarter, while gross profits increased 213 percent
in the same period.
The news ought to have brought some cheer on Thursday
to an otherwise gloomy week in which the failure of the
Orange flotation has depressed markets in Europe — but
that was not to be.
Even though Autonomy has turned a US $1.57 million
loss in the quarter to December 1999 into a US $5.93 million
net profit for the third quarter 2000, its shares dipped
slightly Thursday on the London Stock Exchange. Investors
were worried that Autonomy will be hit by any slow-down in
the U.S. economy.
Autonomy’s fourth quarter revenues were US $21.5 million,
gross profits were US $20.7 million, and the margin was
(as readers can calculate) 96 percent.
Founded in the U.K. in 1996, Autonomy has developed software
that lets major corporations link related pieces of
information on their computer networks, audio archives
or on their Web sites. It now derives 44 percent of its
business from the United States.
Autonomy Chief Executive Mike Lynch referred to his company’s
list of over 425 corporate customers with their average
spend of US $0.44 million — and claimed that Autonomy has
set the standard in providing an infrastructure for automating
the management and delivery of unstructured information.
“OEM royalty revenues continue to grow, providing a recurring
high-margin revenue stream, which further enhanced our
profitability,” noted Lynch.
Lynch also drew attention to the company’s cash pile of
US $137 million at year-end 2000, which he said would allow
it to expand and to penetrate new markets worldwide.
Recent developments at Autonomy have included the first
commercial deployment of its voice technology and its new
support for both WAP protocol and NTT DoCoMo
i-Mode.
During the fourth quarter Autonomy signed agreements
with companies that included Philips, Sonera, Royal &
SunAlliance, Fireman’s Fund and General Electric. It
also derived additional license revenue from its existing
clients including Ford Motor Company, Ericsson, Intel, NASA,
World Online, and the U.S. Department of Energy.
Despite this excellent performance, Autonomy has been
the fifth-worst performer on the FT-SE 100 during
2001, losing around 20 percent of its value. Others,
performing less well, have fallen further.
