24/7 Wall St.

Brocade Communications Systems Inc. (NASDAQ: BRCD) reported its fiscal second-quarter after the markets closed on Thursday. 24/7 Wall St. has included some highlights from the earnings report, as well as what analysts are saying about Brocade after the fact.

The company posted $0.22 in earnings per share (EPS) on $523 million in revenue. Consensus estimates called for $0.22 in EPS on revenue of $541.1 million. Previously the company released preliminary results that predicted revenue in the range of $518 million to $528 million, compared to the previously guided range of $542 million to $562 million. EPS are expected to be in the range of $0.21 to $0.23, down slightly from the previous range of $0.22 to 0.24.

Management thinks that despite the challenging environment for both SAN and IP networking, Brocade had a productive second quarter. Additionally the company began shipping its industry-leading Gen 6 Fibre Channel switching solution, and garnered its first customer win for the New IP-based mobility platform, Brocade Virtual Core for Mobile, that it launched earlier in the quarter.

Merrill Lynch gave its investment rationale as follows:

Brocade trades at a significant discount to peers despite: 1) a more durable SAN business that expectations, 2) a number of product cycles over the next several quarters impacting business lines that account for over 87% of product revenues and 3) long-term opportunities in the growing SDN and NFV trends.

24/7 Wall St.
Why Analysts See Cisco Going Even Higher After Earnings