Sourcefire (FIRE) is still lighting things up

Posted Feb 27th 2009 11:10AM by Tom Taulli
Filed under: Earnings Reports

While the tough economy is pressuring information technology (IT) spending, there are still some growth areas. An example is security. Basically, it is a must-have technology – for essentially any environment.

And, one of the beneficiaries in the space is Sourcefire, Inc. (NASDAQ: FIRE). The company leverages an open source model --- for intrusion protection -- that has gained lots of traction over the past few years. Just take a look at its Q4 results.

Total revenues increased 33% to $25.7 million (full-year revenues were up 35% to $75.7 million). Earnings came to $2.3 million, or 8 cents per share. This compares to $800,000 or 3 cents per share in the same period a year ago.

Sourcefire is getting lots of uptake from large sales. In the quarter, the company snagged 46 six-figure transactions, of which eight were in excess of $500,000.

There was also a boost from federal government customers. In fact, sales spiked 195% to $5.1 million.

Even though Sourcefire is showing nice organic growth, it looks like the company wants to pump up the momentum with acquisitions. Keep in mind that the company's CEO, John Burris, has handled about 15 acquisitions during his career, at companies like Citrix Systems (NASDAQ: CTXS). Oh, and Sourcefire has about $101 million in the bank.

And, so far in today's trading, Sourcefire's share are up 10.73% to $6.40.

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook and The Streetsmart Guide to Short Selling: Techniques the Pros Use to Profit in Any Market. He is also the founder of BizEquity, a free online business valuation tool for small businesses.

Tags: Security software, SecuritySoftware, Sourcefire