IT firm Cognizant, on Wednesday, reported a 16 per cent increase in fourth quarter profit, largely in line with market expectations, on the back of healthy orders during what is a seasonally slow quarter.
The New Jersey-based firm, which has a majority of its employees in India, also forecast a revenue growth of at least 16.5 per cent for 2014—a guidance that is lower than this year’s growth but should still reassure most investors of the healthy prospects of the overall software export industry. Cognizant follows a January – December reporting period.
For the fourth quarter ended December 31, 2013, the company reported a net profit of $324.3 million, compared with $278.8 million a year ago. Revenue also surged 21 per cent to $2.36 billion.
“Our strategy through these twenty years has been to challenge the status quo, and constantly reinvent for the future. We believe that we are well positioned to continue to do so in 2014 and beyond,” said Francisco D’Souza, Chief Executive Officer, in a statement.
For the full year (2013), the software services exporter reported an increase in net profit to $1.23 billion ($1.05 billion) on revenue of $8.8 billion, up 20 per cent from $7.346 billion 2012.
“The company anticipates the first quarter 2014 revenue to be at least $2.42 billion and full-year revenue to be $10.3 billion, which is up 16.5 per cent compared to 2013,” the statement said.
For 2013, Cognizant had raised its forecast twice and posted a full-year revenue growth of 20%, which was in line with its own expectations and was well above the industry average.
According to Gordon Coburn, President, the growth during 2013 was broad-based across industries, geographies and service lines. “We anticipate the healthy demand environment we witnessed in 2013 will continue in 2014 ,” the release quoted him as saying.
Stock splitThe board of directors of Cognizant also declared a two-for-one stock split on its Class A common stock in the form of a 100% stock dividend.
Stockholders will be entitled to one additional share of Class A common stock for each share held on February 21, 2014.
