Palo Alto $PANW third-quarter earnings
Revenue rose 31% to $567 million, topping estimates of $546 million.
Earnings rose 62% to 99 cents a share, topping expectations of 96 cents.
Billings increased 32.5% to $721 million, topping views of $675 million.
New CEO
$PANW picked a Softbank and Google executive as its next chairman and chief executive late Friday. The company said CEO and Chairman Mark McLaughlin would be succeeded in both roles as of June 6 by Nikesh Arora. Arora was president and chief operating officer of Japanese conglomerate Softbank from 2014 to 2016.
Palo Alto Transition Holds Risk
“While any CEO transition holds risk, and seeing a strong leader like Mark McLaughlin leave is a loss to any organization, one would be hard pressed to write a better script for the transition. On his exit, Mark leaves no doubt as to the momentum Palo Alto Networks brings into the transition with 33% year-over-year billings growth at a nearly $3 billion annual run-rate in Q3,” said Keith Weiss, a Morgan Stanley analyst in a report.
For the July quarter, the company said it expects profit of $1.16 a share vs. estimates of $1.21 a share. It forecast revenue of $630 million, topping estimates of $618 million.
Market Summary > Palo Alto Networks Inc
NYSE: PANW Pre-market 208.00 −0.090 (0.043%)