Riverbed Tech's Profit Soars on Sale of SteelStore Products

By Maria Armental 

Riverbed Technology Inc.'s fourth-quarter profit soared on the sale of its SteelStore product line to NetApp Inc.

The sale of its cloud backup and recovery business added $38.9 million, after tax.

It is the first quarter of results Riverbed reports since San Francisco private equity firm Thoma Bravo LLC and an arm of the Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan agreed to buy Riverbed for about $3.6 billion, following a takeover bid by hedge-fund manager Elliott Management Corp.

Riverbed did not offer financial projections and said it would not hold a conference call with investors to discuss results given its pending sale.

Founded in 2002, Riverbed pioneered a niche in networking hardware and completed one of the hottest stock offerings of 2006.

Riverbed sells products to boost the performance of companies' software applications. It initially focused on a category called wide-area network optimization, selling boxes that companies place in their data centers and branch offices to streamline the flow of data and make software work faster.

For the most recent period, Riverbed reported a profit of $49.7 million, or 31 cents a share, up from $8.4 million, or five cents a share, a year earlier. Excluding stock-based compensation expenses and other items, profit rose to 34 cents from 31 cents.

Riverbed had expected 31 cents to 33 cents a share.

Revenue edged up 0.05% to $283.4 million, below the consensus of $287.6 a share, according to analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters.

Shares edged up 0.29% to $20.65 in recent after-hours trading.

Through Thursday's closing, the company's stock had risen nearly 6% over the past 12 months.

Write to Maria Armental at [e-mail]

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