NetApp Profit Falls

By Patrick Thomas

NetApp Inc. (NTAP) said its profit fell for its first quarter as revenue declined about 16% from a year earlier.

The Sunnyvale, Calif.-based cloud data services company reported a profit of $103 million, or 42 cents a share, compared with $283 million, or $1.05 a share, a year ago.

The company reported adjusted earnings of 65 cents a share. Analysts polled by FactSet were expecting earnings of 44 cents a share, or 62 cents a share on an adjusted basis.

Revenue fell to $1.24 billion from $1.47 billion a year earlier. Analysts had expected $1.25 billion of revenue in the quarter. Revenue from the year-earlier period included a one-time $90 million gain from enterprise software license agreements.

For its current quarter, the company said it expects revenue between $1.33 billion and $1.48 billion and earnings between 86 cents and 94 cents a share. Analysts are expecting $1.37 billion in revenue and 77 cents a share for the second quarter.

NetApp guided second-quarter adjusted earnings between 91 cents and 99 cents a share.

For the year, the company expects revenue to decline between 5% and 10%.

Shares of NetApp were up about 6% during after-market trading.

"I am clearly disappointed with our Q1 top line results but remain confident in our strategy and the fundamentals of our business model," Chief Executive George Kuria said in a statement.

"The gross margin and cost structure improvements we've made provide support for our free cash flow generation and enable us to navigate the ongoing macroeconomic headwinds while making the strategic moves that position us well to return to growth," he said.

Write to Patrick Thomas at [e-mail]

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

August 14, 2019 16:35 ET (20:35 GMT)

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