With sales and net income moving up, Blackbaud took the opportunity to get more feet on the street and increased spending on sales and marketing. The company reported a 3-percent increase in net income for the second quarter ended June 30, on a 5.7-percent rise in revenue. And it took just over $19 million out revenue for sales and marketing, 26.2 percent more than the $15.1 million spent in last year's corresponding quarter. Read more...

Deltek took a hit on earnings and profit with revenue down and expenses up as consulting revenues fell to $13.5 million, down 35.1 percent from $19.2 million a year ago. That was an important factor as revenue fell to $64.5 million, off 7.1 percent from $69.5 percent in last year's corresponding period. Net income was $2.9 million, a decline of 38.6 percent from $4.9 million. Consulting was down because of fewer deals in past periods. CEO Kevin Parker said Deltek also wrapped up multi-year implementations which weren't replace by similarly sized deals while the increasing use of fixed price deals led to revenue deferral. Still Parker was optimistic based on current quarterly trends. "We are already seeing positive deal momentum in Q3," he said. Parker noted that accounting and engineering professional services were up 3 percent from a last year, but down 2 percent sequentially. Collections improved with days sales outstanding at 55 days for the period, a six-day improvement from a year ago. During the quarter, Deltek closed its acquisition of Maconomy, which has a number of international advertising and PR firms as clients. That deal also took $1.9 million out of operating income from costs associated with the acquisition. While Maconomy, which also addressed project-based companies, opens up markets in Europe, the greatest opportunity is for expansion of its product line in the United States, Parker said. He also noted that American accounting firms "had always been beyond reach" but that Maconomy was strong below the Big Four. Read more...