VMware said results for its fourth quarter came within or higher than expectations. The company also announced the appointment of Zane Rowe as chief financial officer and the start of a company-wide restructuring.
VMware said it plans to “realign” 800 roles and that it expects to take a one-off charge of USD 55-65 million in the first half of this year. It will then reinvest the associated savings in field, technical and support resources associated with growth products.
Rowe will succeed Jonathan Chadwick, who has decided to leave VMware and expand his advisory roles, working with a number of companies as a non-executive board member. Rowe previously held executive roles at Apple, United Airlines, Continental Airlines and most recently as CFO of EMC. Rowe will assume his new role on 1 March. EMC said Rowe will be replaced by Denis Cashman, its chief accounting officer.
Revenues for Q4 meanwhile rose 10 percent from the year before to USD 1.87 billion. On a constant currency basis, revenues lifted 12 percent. License revenues went to USD 825 million, up 6 percent year-on-year and by 11 percent on a constant currency basis. The net profit advanced 17 percent to USD 373 million or USD 0.88 per diluted share. Results were boosted by growth across VMware’s portfolio of emerging products and businesses, including NSX, End-User Computing and Virtual SAN, with positive momentum for newer solutions heading into 2016.
For full year 2015, revenues amounted to USD 6.57 billion, an increase of 9 percent from 2014 or up 12 percent on a constant currency basis. License revenues went to USD 2.72 billion, higher by 5 percent year-in-year and by 9 percent on a constant currency basis. The net profit rose 15 percent to USD 997 million or USD 2.34 per diluted share.
At the end of December, cash, cash equivalents and short-term investments amounted to USD 7.51 billion.
During the year, VMware's End-User Computing business grew over 30 percent, bringing the total annual bookings run rate to over USD 1.2 billion. Its VMware NSX business, the network virtualization and security platform for the software-defined data centre, grew over 100 percent, bringing the total annual bookings run rate to well over USD 600 million. The Virtual SAN business grew nearly 200 percent, with a total annual bookings run rate well over USD 100 million.
