Acme Packet (APKT) Offers Preliminary Q4 Results Below Expectations

Acme Packet (NASDAQ: APKT) today provided a financial update for the quarter ended December 31, 2011. The Company will release final financial results for the fourth quarter on Thursday, February 2, 2012 after the market closes.

Based on preliminary fourth quarter estimates which are subject to change, the Company expects:

• Total revenues to range between $84 million to $86 million, versus the consensus of $93.42 million.
  
• GAAP gross margin to be approximately 82%.
  
• Non-GAAP1 gross margin to be approximately 83%.
  
• Earnings per share on a GAAP basis to range between $0.16 and $0.18.
  
• Earnings per share on a non-GAAP1 basis to range between $0.26 and $0.28, versus the consensus of $0.37.

Based on preliminary full year estimates which are subject to change, the Company expects:

• Total revenues for 2011 to range between $308 million and $310 million compared to its earlier outlook of between $315 million and $320 million, versus the consensus of $317.95 million.
  
• Earnings per share on a GAAP basis for 2011 to range between $0.66 and $0.68, compared to its earlier outlook of between $0.78 and $0.82.
  
• Earnings per share on a non-GAAP1 basis for 2011 to range between $1.03 and $1.05, compared to its earlier outlook of between $1.14 and $1.18 and the consensus of $1.14.
  
• Cash and cash equivalents to be approximately $372 million, compared to $338 million at the end of the third quarter.

“Our results were impacted by uncertainty in the North American service provider market,” said Andy Ory, President and Chief Executive Officer of Acme Packet, Inc. “Outside of the North American service provider market, Acme Packet continued to perform very well – particularly in our enterprise business as well as in our Europe and Latin America businesses. Looking ahead, we believe we are very well positioned to leverage the broad, multi-year, secular growth drivers associated with the global transition from TDM to IP for real time communications like voice and video.”

The Company’s management team will host a live conference call at 5:00 p.m. eastern time today to discuss today’s announcement. The conference call may be accessed in the United States by dialing 1.800.288.8967 and using access code “APKT”.

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