Monday, November 13, 2006

Calls of Note Part 4

- First Albany notes their industry contacts report strong global demand conditions for
salesforce.com (NYSE:CRM). Feedback applies to all major geographies, both small/ medium and enterprise segments, and across most product lines. They expect strong 3Q results, with bookings growth of 55%-70% and upside to the revenue consensus of $128.8M. Firm expects CRM to raise its revenue forecast for FY07.

Contacts report that CRM is now hiring account executives specifically for AppExchange, its on-demand platform for creating and sharing applications. This demonstrates that AppExchange is a primary growth focus, not an after-thought. Contacts suggest CRM is
currently hiring to fill 140+ sales positions worldwide -- a blistering pace likely to extend CRM's footprint relative to competitors.

Contacts also suggest CRM may be able to claim its first 10,000-seat customer, Cisco and added another large enterprise account. The firm expects CRM to introduce a new, higher-priced product version early next year.

Reits Buy.

Notablecalls: Hope the blisterig hiring pace won't affect margins in the n-t. On the other hand CRM ended with 1,300 employees in 2005 (vs 767 in 2004) meaning the pace of hiring may actually be slowing. Also, the news of CSCO sign-up is good. Considering the stock is up almost two fold and trading on a very high multiple I would look to sell it around $44.

No comments: