Inktomi Corp, the network caching server and search engine company, reported its first set of results as a publicly-traded company yesterday and it started public life well following its spectacular IPO with third quarter numbers beating estimates by a couple of cents. The Santa Clara-based company reported net losses of $4.7m, up from $2.1m last time on revenues that rose to $6.3m, from $1.5m a year ago. On a per share level, that’s a 24 cent loss, when 26 cents was the expectation, according to Zacks Investment Research. Inktomi is an OEM provider of search engine technology, and is the engine behind portal sites such as Yahoo!, Snap! and HotBot. During the quarter Inktomi added a new data center in Herndon, Virginia, to add to its existing Santa Clara site. In its other business of network caching software, Inktomi struck deals with America Online Inc and Telenor for its Traffic Server software. Inktomi’s stock was very well received by investors when it floated on June 10 and has gone from strength to strength since then. The target price was between $16 and $18 and it went as high $38.625 on the first day, before closing at $36. Since then it has been as high as $76.50 and yesterday closed down $0.0625 at $67.9375. It should also be remembered that back around June 10 there were a few technology IPOs that did not fare too well. For the nine months to June, net losses were $12.6m, up from $5.3m the year before on revenues of $12.2m, against $3.8m previously. Cash and equivalents at June 30 stood at $54m, of which $39m came from the IPO.
