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Sapient reports strong quarterly revenue

Sapient announces an 83 percent increase in first quarter revenue and earnings that beat analysts' consensus estimates.

Kim Girard
Kim Girard has written about business and technology for more than a decade, as an editor at CNET News.com, senior writer at Business 2.0 magazine and online writer at Red Herring. As a freelancer, she's written for publications including Fast Company, CIO and Berkeley's Haas School of Business. She also assisted Business Week's Peter Burrows with his 2003 book Backfire, which covered the travails of controversial Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina. An avid cook, she's blogged about the joy of cheap wine and thinks about food most days in ways some find obsessive.
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Kim Girard
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Sapient continued to shine today, announcing an 83 percent increase in first quarter revenue and earnings that beat analysts' consensus estimates.

Sapient, an IT consulting and systems integration firm, reported revenue for the quarter ended March 29 of $56.06 million, compared to $30.73 million a year ago.

The Cambridge, Massachusetts-based firm posted net income of $7.039 million, or 24 cents a share, compared to $4.262 million, or 16 cents a share, in the year-ago quarter. Results surpassed analysts' expectations by a penny, according to First Call.

Those results exclude a one-time cost of $2.34 million for last month's acquisition of design firm Adjacency, and deferred compensation charges of $1.69 million. Net income for the quarter, including charges, was $4.279 million, or 14 cents per share.

Including Adjacency's sales, revenue for the three months increased 83 percent to $57.79 million, the company said.

In a research note, Goldman Sachs analyst Greg Gould said Sapient should be able to sustain 40 percent to 45 percent earnings growth over the next four to five years. He believes the firm can maintain this as it competes in expanding markets, holds a small market share (about 1 percent worldwide), and executes well on contracts.

Up to 50 percent of Sapient's revenues now come from Internet-related systems integration and consulting, he said, noting demand for those services is growing at a rapid clip as companies that lack the internal talent turn to experts for help with Web projects.

Sapient's turnover rate is also a low 15 percent, well below the industry average of 20 to 30 percent, he noted.