04 Aug Sonic Foundry reports 12th consecutive quarter of record sales for Mediasite
Madison, Wis., — Sonic Foundry Inc. on Thursday reported significant revenue increases and a 12th consecutive quarter of record sales for its Mediasite communications systems, and reported reduced losses over the last nine months.
In reporting its third quarter and nine-month period of fiscal 2005, the company said third-quarter revenues were 83 percent higher than those of last year’s third quarter, rising from $1.2 million to $2.2 million.
For the nine-month period, revenues rose 95 percent to $5.8 million, compared to $3 million, for the nine-month period in fiscal 2004. Continued market momentum and growth in Mediasite sales, coupled with growing customer support revenue, contributed to the significant increase, Sonic Foundry reported.
For the third quarter of 2005, the company’s Mediasite sales jumped to $1.9 million, an increase of nearly $900,000 from the $959,000 recorded for the third quarter of fiscal 2004. Correspondingly, the number of Mediasite units sold almost doubled for the third quarter — up from 68 in third quarter of last year to 131 for third quarter of fiscal 2005.
Contributing to the continued improvement were increased product revenues from Mediasite ML mobile unit sales to newly signed channel partners and international customers. As a result, the company experienced an inventory shortfall by selling out its entire stock of ML units for the quarter.
Repeat and multi-unit customers this quarter included Baptist Health System, Booz Allen Hamilton, Domino’s Pizza, East Carolina University, Northrop Grumman, Northwestern University, Penn State University, South Africa Dept. of Health, State of Wisconsin, University of Houston, University of Illinois, UCLA and USC.
“There’s a communications revolution happening in enterprises large and small and it’s called rich media,” Rimas Buinevicius, chairman and CEO of Sonic Foundry said in a release on the financial report. “We’ve spent the last two-plus years evangelizing and putting the infrastructure in place to stake a leadership claim in what is shaping up to be a great market opportunity. Through the introduction of our new product lines and service offerings, we’re now positioned to truly help accelerate the market’s adoption of this powerful communication medium.”
Sonic Foundry also reported that:
• Third quarter, gross margins rose to 64 percent compared to 62 percent a year ago.
• Operating expenses increased in line with recent promotions, but the company believes that increased operating efficiency is now taking hold. For the third quarter, operating expenses increased slightly to $2.5 million compared to $2.3 million a year ago. The company reported that incremental sales and marketing expenses related to the launch of new products and activities at InfoComm 2005 resulted in higher operating expenses from the prior quarter.
• Cash used for operations decreased. Year-to-date, cash used in operating activities decreased 30 percent from $4.7 million cash used in fiscal 2004 to $3.3 million used this year.
• Sonic Foundry reported an improved net loss of $1.1 million, or three cents per share, versus a loss of $1.6 million, or five cents per share, for the third quarter of fiscal 2004. For the fiscal 2005 nine-month period, the company reported an improved loss of $3.4 million, or 11 cents per share, compared to a loss of $4.0 million, or 14 cents per share.