Transaction Systems Architects Inc., a software developer that has moved its headquarters and is changing its name, is changing its fiscal calendar and the way it reports revenue.
As a result of the changes, the New York vendor said it will take longer to recognize a profit from its October acquisition of the online cash management service provider P&H Solutions Inc. It also said it would restate some results from 2002 and earlier.
But Philip G. Heasley, Transaction Systems' president and chief executive officer, emphasized the strength of the underlying business in a call with analysts Friday.
"I don't think this company has ever been better positioned than it is right now," Mr. Heasley said. "We're not reporting any difference in the sales and cash. We're reporting a difference in the harvesting" of sales into revenue, because his company frequently receives significant payments of yearend "spend-or-lose" money from financial services companies, typically for contract renewals.
Henry C. Lyons, a senior vice president and Transaction Systems' chief financial officer, said that starting this quarter it will recognize revenue over the typical 60-month life of a contract, instead of booking it all as soon as the company receives a payment from a customer.
Mr. Heasley said that in the review that followed Mr. Lyons' hiring as the CFO in September, the company decided to adjust its own financial reporting in line with the way P&H had recognized revenue in its own business.
It is planning to change its name this year to ACI Worldwide, reflecting its best-known brand. It moved its headquarters from Omaha to New York last year, after the deal to acquire P&H closed.
Transaction Systems said it anticipates reporting revenue of $92 million to $95 million for its fiscal first quarter, which ended Dec. 31, compared to $85.1 million for the same quarter 2005.
The company is planning to shift its earnings schedule to match the calendar year, starting next year.
Transaction Systems also announced another acquisition Thursday, of Visual Web Solutions Inc., a North Brunswick, N.J., developer of cash management and trade finance applications that has a sales office in Singapore and 110 employees in Bangalore, India.
George Sutton, an analyst at Craig-Hallum Capital Group LLC of Minneapolis, said Mr. Heasley's strategy is "a chess match," focusing several moves ahead, but "it's not necessarily clear to us what he's doing" at each step of the way.
"Nothing fundamentally has changed about the outlook for the company, the enthusiasm of the customer base, or the prospects for the product line," he said.
