Aliso Viejo’s Quest Software Inc., a maker of business software, reported fourth-quarter results Tuesday that surpassed sales expectations but fell short on profits.
Quest reported sales of $202 million, up 8% from a year earlier and beating analysts’ expected $199 million in revenue.
Excluding charges for stock compensation, write-downs on assets and other costs, Quest saw profits of $39 million, up 35% from a year earlier and short of analysts’ expectation of $34 million in profits.
Including charges, the company posted profits of $29 million, down 14% from a year earlier.
Quest’s shares were roughly flat in afterhours trading on a recent market value of about $1 billion. That’s after investors sent shares down more than 4% at the close of regular trading.
Quest makes software that customizes and boosts the performance of databases and other applications made by Microsoft Corp., Oracle Corp. among others.
For the current quarter, Wall Street is looking for profits of $25 million on sales of $182 million.
