Akamai posts strong Q4, announces CFO transition
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Akamai reported strong fourth quarter financial results after the bell on Tuesday. The cloud services provider delivered first quarter net income of $94 million, or 57 cents a share, on revenue of $713 million, up 8 percent from a year ago. Non-GAAP earnings for the quarter came to $1.07 a share.
Wall Street was looking for fourth quarter non-GAAP earnings of $1 a share on revenue of $703.9 million.
Akamai saw growth it its Web division, with revenue up 9 percent from a year ago to $385 million. The media division, Akamai's unit that speeds up webpages, saw first quarter revenue rise 8 percent to $328 million. The company's cloud security unit had revenue of $185 million, up 36 percent from a year ago.
Akamai's non-GAAP EPS for 2018 came to $3.62 on revenue of $2.71 billion, which is in line with expectations.
"Both revenue and earnings exceeded our expectations due to the very rapid growth of our cloud security business, robust seasonal traffic and our continued focus on operational excellence," said Tom Leighton, Akamai CEO. "As a result, we achieved our fifth consecutive quarter of non-GAAP operating margin improvement, and we are well on our way to achieving our 30 percent margin goal in 2020, while continuing to invest in innovation and new products to drive future growth."
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In terms of guidance, analysts expect Akamai to deliver first quarter earnings of 96 cents a share on revenue of $710.6 million.
Akamai also announced today that its finance chief Jim Benson was retiring and would be replaced current finance SVP Ed McGowan.