The Santa Cruz Operation saw revenues 11% up from last year and sharply higher earnings yesterday, as it announced its first fiscal quarter of 1999. Revenues for the quarter were $52.7m, up from last year’s $47.5m in the same period. Profits shot up to $3.1m, or 0.09 per share, compared to last year’s nominal $424,000. While SCO lost $14.7m last year on revenues of $171.9m, it’s now seeing sequential revenue growth, partly as a result of the changes to its business model put in place last July (CI No 3,449), but also due to a resurgence in the Unix operating system market, and the fact that it is now focused on server operating system sales and not desktop. SCO reported solid sales of OpenServer, increasing industry support of UnixWare 7, and the first enterprise deployments of its Tarantella application broker software. Operating expenses were down except for sales, as SCO flew its entire sales force to Miami for briefings and training, an effort from which it says it’s already seeing returns. Revenues from electronic licensing tripled during the quarter, with 37 distributors now doing business electronically. It still has $44.1m in cash and short term investments on the balance sheet.
