Metropolis losses dominate local IT headlines

The multi-billion take-overs of Broadband Access by ADC telecom, and Cobalt Networks by Sun Microsystems, and the multi-billion investment in Airtel Movel SA by Vodafone AirTouch, together with several other significant acquisitions, dominated the international world of IT and telecommunications last week.

We saw the appointments of Rob Matthews as the new MD of First Technologies and Stuart Russell as the new GM of FrontRange (ex-SalesLogix).

Paul Booth, MD, Global Research Partners

At home, the finalisation of Nedcor`s holding in Dimension Data, following the latter`s listing in London, and the various developments involving Metropolis, stole the local headlines.

• full-year losses from Metropolis (loss greater than total revenue!) and Spicer (revenue also well down);
• satisfactory interims from Square One solutions (both revenue and income less than 50% of last year`s numbers); and
• the announcement that ASAS, following decisions ratified at its AGM, will move to the insurance sector at the beginning of next month, and change its name to "Insure".

[Local]

Other local news included:

• the appointments of Rob Matthews as the new MD of First Technologies and Stuart Russell as the new GM of FrontRange (ex-SalesLogix);
• the resignation of Renier van Rooyen as chairman of Hicor and his replacement by Danny Pringle; and
• the comment from Datatec that it would prefer to sell UUNet South Africa, its Internet subsidiary, to WorldCom, rather than list it.

• we saw the name changes of Netrix to Nx Networks and Reliable Software Technologies to Cigital;
• the announcement by Informix that it intends to split the company into two units; and
• the restructuring at Walker Interactive Systems.

[International]

Other international news included

• the appointments of Mary Coleman (ex-Baan) as CEO of RightWorks, Rob Csonger as CEO of HearMe, John Frieling as CEO of Aquis Comms Group and Duane Gardner as CEO of Symplex Comms;
• the resignations of George Bell, CEO of Excite@Home and Paul Brand, CEO of AMS; and
• job cut announcements from CMGI, Gtech Holdings, NTT, Telstra, Walker Interactive Systems and Xceed.

We saw excellent figures from Jabil Circuit and Nu Horizons.

Losses came from CMGI, Data Translation, Futuremedia, Gtech Holdings, Input/Output, Liberate Technologies, Manugistics, Megadata, MKS, NaviSite, OutPost.com, Procom Technology, SmarTone Telecomms, SofTech, Sopheon and Voss Net.

Good numbers were recorded by Cable Design Technologies, Cognos, Electro Scientific Industries and Spectrum Control; and satisfactory ones by Dicom Group and National Data.

Mediocre returns came from Avery Comms, Circuit City, Compel Group, Navison Software, Policy Master Group, Progress Software and Science Systems; while very poor results came from Manchester Equipment and Prophet 21.

Other financial news included profit warnings from Allaire, AMS, Anadigics, CellStar, Concero, Eloquent, HearMe, ICG Comms, Informix, Intel, InterWorld, Printronix, Sprint, Sykes Enterprises, Trimble, US Interactive and Valassis.

There were also share split announcements from Bisys, Exar, Rainbow Technologies and Tektronix; very good IPOs from InRange Technologies (fibre channel switch), OmniSky (wireless Internet services) and TTM Technologies (manufacturing services); and satisfactory IPOs from ViryaNet (business-to-business software) and Zengine (e-commerce technology). Additionally, Intershop AG, the German-based e-commerce software company, has revived its planned Nasdaq listing that was put on hold earlier this year.

Locally

C-Tech (+33.3%)
Casey (-28.6%)
Conlog (-28%)
Crux (+46.2%)
ERP.com (-25.6%)
Explorer (-28.6%)
Hicor (+25%)
Metropolis (-56.4%)
Stella Vista (-25%)
Synergy (-40%)
UAM (+62.5%)

Internationally

Auspex Systems (+49.8%)
Clarus (-29.5%)
Extreme Networks (+37.8%)
Golden Telecom (-34.9%)
Global Telesystems (-30.4%)
ICG Comms (-80.8%)
Onyx Software (40.1%)
Sykes Enterprises (-40.5%)
US Interactive (-43.8%)
Ursus Telecom (-27.7%)
World Access (-32.6%)
Zomax (-52.9%)

This week sees several sets of local results, including those from Mustek and TopTech; and many companies preparing themselves for the first SA Comdex exhibition and conference being held next week.