SAS grows 2003 revenue by 13.5% worldwide

SAS, the largest privately held software company in the world, has reported overall revenue of $1.34 billion for 2003 - a 13.5% increase in revenue growth. This marked the 27th consecutive year of profitable revenue growth for the company.

"At a time when other large software vendors have experienced reduced revenue and slashed both headcount and R&D spending, SAS has continued to grow in both market presence and revenue," says SAS CEO Dr Jim Goodnight.

"Our ability to tailor our software to industry-specific needs and help companies create data-driven approaches to managing cost pressures, regulatory requirements and the profitability of their customer relationships, were key factors behind another successful year."

Comments Bill Hoggarth, managing director at SAS Institute SA: "We were delighted with the continued support we received in 2003 from key customers such as Nedcor, SITA, Cell C, Absa, Mutual & Federal, Eskom, MTN, Old Mutual and many others. We were especially pleased to see the very strong ROI results of our engagements being translated into measurable bottom and top line benefits for our customers."

According to Hoggarth, the economic downturn and market instability during the first half of 2003 led to a sharpened focus on accurately predicting future revenue streams and cutting costs. In addition, the imperative to focus on corporate governance issues has caused many organisations to reconsider issues such as data quality and accuracy of financial reporting. SAS continued to give its customers rapid ROI, minimised cost of ownership and shortened implementation times.

"We anticipate continued demand for SAS products in 2004. We are poised to make generally available the final phases of revolutionary new technology in the SAS 9 Intelligence Platform, at the end of first quarter 2004. We will soon follow with SAS 9 solutions based on this landmark technology, which will take them well beyond the realm of traditional business intelligence applications," Hoggarth says.

Growth was strong across all geographies, which was particularly notable given the decline in business confidence and spending slowdown during the first half of 2003. SAS saw 46% of revenue coming from North America, 43% from Europe/Middle East/Africa and nine percent from the Asia/Pacific region. Latin America, which made up 2% of overall revenues, experienced the greatest percentage increase in revenue, up 43% over 2002.

Financial services continue to be the leading source of revenue by industry, accounting for 34% of industry-specific revenue for the company. SAS also has seen continued strength in the public sector and in manufacturing, at 13% and 12% of industry revenue, respectively. Emerging industry sources of revenue include life sciences, retail and telecommunications, each at 5% to 7% of revenue.

Areas in which SAS experienced significant growth in new sales included one of SAS's core strengths - data management - which increased by more than 80%, with a large portion of that growth driven by data quality initiatives. Applications related to monitoring and managing organisational health - activity-based management, activity-based costing and performance management - increased in new sales by approximately 40%.

IT management applications new sales revenue increased by 35%, risk management applications by about 65%, and supply chain management new sales doubled, all driven by the trend in business to get a better handle on costs. SAS's customer intelligence solutions fared well with new sales for marketing automation applications increasing by 70% as companies in the financial, retail and telecommunications industries continue to battle for customers.

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SAS continues to demonstrate that it has the most complete solution on the market for supporting the entire intelligence-creation process within all areas of a business. SAS has earned a reputation for making it easy for customers to access data from virtually any database or platform, equipping companies to take full advantage of their existing investments in ERP environments.

SAS solutions continued to be successful in 2003, particularly customer intelligence (identifying and retaining the profitable customer segments).

Other SAS solutions that performed well include:

* Supply chain intelligence, which enables organisations to drive revenue and reduce costs by anticipating customer demand, improving procurement strategies, and identifying actions that achieve targeted customer and quality service levels);

* Financial intelligence (corporate governance, financial transparency and activity-based intelligence); and

* Performance management (translating strategy into actions that can be measured and monitored via a 'balanced scorecard' throughout the organisation and distributed in an easy-to-use dashboard).

SAS also continued to expand its line of industry-specific solutions, combining its analytic strength with the added value of domain expertise in banking, insurance, manufacturing, pharmaceuticals, telecommunications and retail.

Financial services continues to be the leading source of industry-specific revenue for SAS with more than 2 000 customers in this industry. SAS recognised expanded opportunity in the financial sector, which is facing new compliance requirements such as Basel II, anti-money laundering regulations, and the Sarbanes-Oxley Act that require sophisticated data management, analysis and reporting capabilities.

SAS's ability to provide a complete view of the retail/demand supply chain gives retailers a competitive advantage for external negotiations and internal efficiencies. The linking of Marketmax retail optimisation solutions with the total-cost-of-supply information of SAS Value Chain Analytics helps retailers make more profitable, demand-driven decisions.

SAS will continue to deliver quick ROI to its customers, allowing them to implement technology that is tied to the way they do business more easily. In 2004, SAS will introduce additional targeted vertical solutions beyond banking, insurance and telecommunications, beginning with the retail sector.

SAS will place greater focus on the telecommunications industry, which is showing signs of resurgence as the industry looks for solutions to critical business problems such as customer churn.

SAS will extend its lead in the market by providing software that takes customers beyond the traditional notion of business intelligence, not limiting customers' insight to simply understanding historic performance, but also allowing them to better predict outcomes and plan future strategies.

As the final components of the SAS 9 Intelligence Platform become generally available, SAS will be uniquely positioned to deliver the ability to integrate data across an organisation and make intelligence available to use as a strategic company asset.

On the heels of this major platform release, SAS will begin shipping enhanced versions of its family of solutions for enterprise intelligence and industry-specific solutions, which all build upon the strength of the new SAS 9 Intelligence Platform - usability, manageability, scalability and interoperability.