Red Brick Systems Inc, the Los Gatos, California data warehousing outfit, continued on its bumpy ride through the second quarter, with widening losses and rapidly disappearing revenues. Second quarter net losses were $6.1m, substantially higher than last year’s net losses of $1.5m while revenues declined 26% to $7.7m. Red Brick’s market space has steadily been invaded over the last two years by the big database vendors like IBM Corp and Oracle Corp. And over the same time period, Red Brick’s shares have declined from $54 to around $4. And so earlier this year, the company announced a recovery strategy, which involved a shift of focus to the business intelligence market. But the effect has been less than dramatic. While we are disappointed with our overall quarterly results, we have laid the groundwork for our strategy which we believe is highly responsive to market requirements, said Christopher Erickson, president and CEO. Red Brick’s cash reserves declined again this quarter, down by 17% to $22.5m, despite a huge squeeze on accounts receivable. On the positive side Red Brick says it won several big accounts in the quarter, including Boeing North America and Mizuno Corp and Kawasaki Steel.
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