NICE Systems (NASDAQ: NICE) reported Q3 EPS of $1.12, $0.05 better than the analyst estimate of $1.07. Revenue for the quarter came in at $356 million versus the consensus estimate of $351.46 million.

• Revenues: Third quarter 2018 non-GAAP total revenues increased to $356.4 million, up 9.1% from $326.8 million for the third quarter of 2017.
• Gross Profit: Third quarter 2018 non-GAAP gross profit increased to $252.1 compared to $232.5 million for the third quarter of 2017. Non-GAAP gross margin was 70.7% compared to 71.2% for the third quarter of 2017.
• Operating Income: Third quarter 2018 non-GAAP operating income and non-GAAP operating margin increased to $90.8 million and 25.5%, respectively, from $78.3 million and 24.0%, respectively, for the third quarter of 2017.
• Net Income: Third quarter 2018 non-GAAP net income and non-GAAP net income margin increased to $71.6 million and 20.1%, respectively, from $58.9 million and 18.0%, respectively, for the third quarter of 2017.
• Fully Diluted Earnings Per Share: Third quarter 2018 non-GAAP fully diluted earnings per share increased 17.9% to $1.12, compared to $0.95 for the third quarter of 2017.

“The results reported for the third quarter of 2018 reflect our continued focus on driving excellent execution around our strategic pillars of cloud, analytics and artificial intelligence that led to strong growth on both the top and bottom lines. As we look forward to ending the year on a high note, we now expect to exit 2018 with a cloud revenue run rate of $550 million up from our previous expectation of $500 million, while continuing to drive profitability,” said Barak Eilam, CEO of NICE.

Mr. Eilam continued, “CXone, our open cloud platform which has gained tremendous market presence among our customers and high regard from industry analysts in just a little over one year since it was introduced, has been our vehicle to deliver our strategic pillars to the customer engagement market. We are now proceeding on a similar course with X-Sight, which was announced just a few weeks ago. X-Sight is the industry’s first financial crime and compliance platform-as-a-service that combines advanced analytics and AI, automated data management, and robotics all delivered through the cloud.

GUIDANCE:

NICE Systems sees FY2018 EPS of $4.53-$4.69, versus the consensus of $4.56. NICE Systems sees FY2018 revenue of $1.45-1.466 billion, versus the consensus of $1.45 billion.

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