NetApp Earnings Preview: Seasonality And Europe To Slow Growth

-7.88%
Downside
105
Market
96.70
Trefis
NTAP: NetApp logo
NTAP
NetApp

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) is set to announce its Q1 earnings on August 15. We expect the revenue growth momentum witnessed by the company over the past few quarters to hit a speed bump due to seasonality and broader macroeconomic concerns. NetApp is involved in designing solutions for storing, managing and protecting business data through enterprise storage and data management software as well as hardware products and services. It released weak guidance for the quarter with revenues expected to drop by 12%-18% y-o-y to $1.4-$1.5 billion. Earnings per share is expected to be around $0.34-$0.39. [1]
See our full analysis on NetApp

Cloud Storage and Big Data Key for 2013

Companies are moving away from traditional computing environments to cloud computing, and this shift is likely to drive demand for storage. Big data analytics require higher end storage with flash arrays and this will drive up margins in the near term. As more companies demand cloud computing capabilities, we expect strong demand for NetApp’s storage products. Growth in high-end storage purchases have slowed down due to anticipated new releases but is expected to pick up in the coming quarters.

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StorageGRID Can be a Game Changer

In its latest version of StorageGRID software, NetApp has added a key feature called Cloud Data Management Interface (CDMI). CDMI is a standard developed by the Storage Networking Industry Association (SNIA) and addresses the way applications interact with cloud storage such as the creation, retrieval and deletion of data elements from the cloud. This is an open standard for self-provisioning and accessing cloud storage. Storage vendors often provide proprietary interfaces and protocols and CDMI is a more open approach aimed at reducing vendor dependability. In essence, a client can shift vendors easily and is not dependent on a single vendor. Currently, NetApp is one of the few large storage vendors that supports the standard, and we expect this to drive its revenues as it will be able to better manage clients’ storage needs. [2]

We currently have a $45.45 Trefis price estimate for NetApp, which is about 50% higher than its market price.

Understand How a Company’s Products Impact its Stock Price at Trefis

Notes:
  1. NetApp Guidance, www.reuters.com []
  2. NetApp StorageGRID, www.theregister.co.uk, August 13, 2012 []