BMC Software shines in tech earnings parade

Cloud-related and software as a service companies shined in the latest batch of technology earnings Thursday.

Here's a look at the key results:

• BMC Software reported second quarter earnings of $132 million, or 73 cents a share. Non-GAAP earnings were $148 million, or 82 cents a share. Revenue in the quarter was $502 million, up 9 percent from a year ago. Wall Street was expecting earnings of 70 cents a share on revenue of $483.3 million. The company said it expects fiscal 2011 earnings of $2.92 a share to $3.02 a share. Wall Street was expecting earnings of $2.87 a share.
• McAfee reported fiscal third quarter earnings of 30 cents a share on revenue of $523 million, up 8 percent from a year ago. Non-GAAP earnings were 67 cents a share. Wall Street was looking for earnings of 64 cents a share on revenue of $514.2 million. The results come a day after rival Symantec also reported strong results. Symantec on Wednesday reported second quarter non-GAAP earnings of 34 cents a share on revenue of $1.48 billion. Wall Street had expected earnings of 28 cents a share on revenue of $1.45 billion.
• RightNow, an on-demand CRM vendor, reported third quarter earnings of $2.9 million, or 9 cents a share. Non-GAAP earnings were 15 cents a share. Revenue of $48.6 million was up 25 percent from a year ago. Wall Street was expecting earnings of 14 cents a share on revenue of $47.4 million. RightNow projected fourth quarter non-GAAP earnings of 15 cents a share on revenue of $49.3 million. Those projections are in line with estimates.
• Ariba reported fiscal fourth quarter earnings of $4.1 million, or 5 cents a share, on revenue of $95.1 million, up from $84.3 million a year ago. Wall Street was expecting earnings of 19 cents a share on revenue of $92.3 million.