Autonomy sees turnaround

January 24, 2002 Posted: 0839 GMT

LONDON (CNN) -- Autonomy, the once high flying British software company, said fourth-quarter net income fell 52 percent but believes the market is picking up.

The company, based in San Francisco and Cambridge, England,  which makes software to manage data on the Web, along with many of it counterparts has seen demand plunge in the wake of a global economic slowdown.

Net income fell to $2.05 million, or 2 cents a share, in the three months to December 31 from $4.28 million, or 3 cents a share, in the same period a  year ago. Sales declined 37 percent to $13.5 million.

Revenue for the fourth quarter increased 31 percent on the third quarter to $13.5 million, reversing a series of quarterly declines.  

"We believe these results confirm that the third quarter 2001 was the bottom of this market as far as Autonomy was concerned," said chief executive Mike Lynch.

Its full year pretax profit came in at $13.3 million, at the higher end of analysts' expectations but down from last year's figure of $20.6 million. Analysts polled by Reuters expected profits of $10.6 million to $15.6 million.

Autonomy's stock, which dropped more than 80 percent last year, soared 8.8 percent to 338.3 pence in early London trading on Thursday. Autonomy had been valued at £5.2 billion ($7.4 billion) at its peak in October 2000 but saw its share price tumble after issuing a series of profit warnings last year.