Earnings roundup: Akamai, Symantec do well; Citrix could do better

It's a busy week for the technology world with many big companies reporting quarterly earnings over the next few days. Let's take a look at how Citrix, Akamai and Symantec did after the bell today.

Long story short: Akamai and Symantec surpassed their targets, while Citrix was a bit of a mixed bag with misses on the revenue and the outlook.

Citrix reported third quarter earnings of $78 million, or 41 cents a share (statement). Non-GAAP earnings were 68 cents a share on a revenue of $641 million.

That's up by 13 percent from $565 million in the third quarter of fiscal 2011, but it was not enough to meet analyst expectations this quarter -- at least in terms of revenue.

Wall Street wanted Citrix to deliver third quarter earnings of 65 cents a share on revenue of $650.4 million.

Chief executive officer Mark B. Templeton reflected on the mixed quarter in prepared remarks:

We executed well in Q3 in spite of the macro factors creating heightened uncertainty around IT spending. We continue to see a fundamental transformation of IT taking place. And Citrix remains in a great position as customers prioritize their investments for a world shaped by mobile workstyles and cloud services.

Nevertheless, Citrix still saw revenue increases across most of its units -- most notably within the software-as-a-service, professional services, and licence management segments.

For the outlook, Citrix again mixed the mark on revenue with a forecast of $700.0 million to $710.0 million for Q4 2012 with non-GAAP earnings between 83 to 85 cents a share.

For the fourth quarter, Wall Street projects Citrix to produce earnings of 84 cents a share on revenue of $715.4 million.

For 2012 overall, Citrix is projecting a revenue within the range of $2.55 billion to $2.56 billion with non-GAAP earnings between $2.80 to $2.82.

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Akamai reported a net income of $48 million, or 27 cents a share (statement), for the third quarter of 2012. Non-GAAP earnings were 43 cents a share on a revenue of $345 million -- up by 23 percent from the same time last year.

Wall Street expected Akamai to post third quarter earnings of 41 cents a share on revenue of $338.2 million.

CEO Paul Sagan gave some background in prepared remarks about the cloud company's fourth consecutive quarter of revenue growth:

We continued to capitalize on our investments in cloud computing, web security, mobile services, and online video by expanding our product portfolio, while effectively managing the cost and efficiency of our network. These efforts paid off in both the Company's top and bottom line performance.

Akamai didn't offer an outlook in its third quarter earnings release, but Wall Street expects Akamai to deliver earnings of 49 cents a share on revenue of $377.6 million.

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Symantec reported second fiscal quarter earnings of $193 million, or 27 cents a share (statement). Non-GAAP earnings were 45 cents a share on a revenue of $1.7 billion.

Wall Street was expecting the security giant to post second quarter earnings of 38 cents a share on revenue of $1.65 billion.

CEO Steve Bennett commented in prepared remarks:

I am pleased with the team's results and progress made this quarter. We delivered solid results during the first quarter of a significant transition for the company. After travelling the world speaking to employees, customers and shareholders, there is a strong sense of excitement about our future success. While focused on running the company, the team is also hard at work building a strategy and operational plan to deliver greater than 5 percent organic growth and 30 percent operating margins on a sustainable basis within the next two-to-three years.

Chief financial officer James Beer added that Symantec is seeing more "strength in enterprise security and backup as well as growth in consumer security."

For the outlook, Symantec is predicting a revenue between $1.72 billion and $1.75 billion at the end of Q3 FY 2013 with non-GAAP earnings between 36 to 38 cents a share.

For the fiscal third quarter, Wall Street wants a little more with earnings expectations of 42 cents a share on revenue of $1.72 billion.