Quarterly Reports that Ain't
Quarterly reports are not really quarterly reports if you are a privately held company like Veeam, and you don't have to list the specifics about how many dollars you made in this past quarter as opposed to the same quarter a year ago. So what Veeam does in an effort to jump on the publicly held earnings bandwagon is tell us that "Total bookings revenue grew 166 percent in Q2 of 2010 over the same period in 2009, and new license bookings revenue increased 145 percent over that same period."
Only after wading through this dubious data do we arrive at something that could pique our interest: Veeam claims they added 2,330 new customers during Q2, and they break it down by saying an average (plenty of room to equivocate here) of 750 new customers were added per month during this quarter, bringing the company's "grand total" to 12,000-plus worldwide. This is no ordinary, garden-variety total, mind you, but the grand total, which suggests Apple Pie, Chevrolet and baseball (pre-steroids).
On to awards--or almost awards--won during this quasi quarter. The company boasts "Veeam Software was selected as a finalist (my emphasis) for the Microsoft Partner of the Year Award in the Core Infrastructure Solutions, Systems Management category." This exciting runner-up revelation will surely carry us to next quarter's hot news.
I like Veeam. Doug Hazelman, their Senior Director, Product Strategy, writes a very good, informative, vendor-neutral CTO blog for us. I'm sure they're doing just fine. Regardless, they and all other privately held companies should be banned from issuing faux quarterly financial reports filled with squishy numbers and "What I did last summer" ramblings, while their competitive counterparts have to lay it on the line in the real world.
Posted by Bruce Hoard on 08/04/2010 at 12:48 PM