Irina Guseva: Random Thoughts on CMS, WCM, ECM and Other Acronyms

Gotta admit, I am about to run out of the (semi-) witty headlines for Day Software that continues to build on the momentum and report bright financial results quarter after quarter. That is, let’s not forget, following the not-so-bright period a bit of time ago.

After reviewing and changing their accounting policies, doing a bit of a re-org in the upper echelons and shedding some extra weight, Day continues to deliver positive numbers in Q3 2009. The highlight of Q3 (interim results) is a considerable increase in license revenue — a 37% growth over the same period in 2008 and a 26% increase over 1H 2009.

Day attributes these revenue numbers to “global demand for CQ5” and “major new customer wins.” I’ve looked at both CQ5.1 and CQ5.2, as they came out, and do tend to agree that the product is starting to look more and more compelling.

These were interim Q3 results. Not many details are available, but chances are R&D (and associated sales and marketing, etc.) spendings are sky-rocketing to get the upcoming CQ 5.3 to the market.

At this time, we don’t know much about how the license revenue increase correlates to, for example, consulting, training and overall Professional Services (Does Day even have PS? Not really.) revenues. Someone’s got to implement all those sales deals…

Cross-published on CMSWire.com: Day Boasts License Revenue Jump in Q3 2009

Day’s customer? Evaluating Day CQ5 CMS? CMS geek generally curious about the present and the future of web content management? Check out Day’s customer summit that is scheduled to take place in Zürich (October 14-15, 2009) and Chicago (October 28-29, 2009).

Day’s plan for this event is, mainly, to share strategies and customer stories around CQ5 Web CMS that was released in November 2008. CQ5.2 that came out earlier this year included new DAM and Social Collaboration features.

There are several tracks planned at the summit, including business and technical. The business track is focused on CMS project objectives, CQ5 selection and criteria, and CQ5 business results. In the technical track, attendees will look into CMS project objectives and implementation plan, CQ5 deployment details, and lessons learned in best leveraging Day’s CQ5.

Very often, it’s best to get right into the vendor’s camp if you want to get more insight into what’s going on with the company and where it is going. While, as we reported, Day has had many good days lately, nothing beats a chance of being able to talk to the actual customer who had already put a check mark next to that line that says “CMS implementation.” Getting direct access to Day’s management and technical teams wouldn’t hurt either.

A bit of gazing into the crystal ball is also on the menu with one of Gartner’s analysts leading a discussion on where Day and the content management industry are headed in 2010.

Don’t miss:

• Unveiling of CRX 2.0: the JCR 2.0 (JSR-283) content repository
• Day’s 2010 roadmap

Cherry on top: Day’s CTO David Nüscheler will give a sneak peek of the upcoming CQ5.3. Now, that should be interesting.

Back in April 2009, when Day announced the nominations of Barry Bycoff and David Arnott to the Board of Directors. Both were elected in May at Day’s Annual Shareholder meeting in Basel, Switzerland.

Today, board member Barry Bycoff was elected the Board’s Chairman, replacing Michael Moppert, the founder of Day.

Moppert assumed the Chairman role in May 2008, after he handed off his Day CEO reigns to a former Interwoven exec Erik Hansen. Moppert is said to remain an active member of Day’s Board.

Bycoff took over the steering wheel on a good day, shortly after Day’s announcement of positive 1H 2009 financial results.

“I am pleased to be working with Day’s CEO Erik Hansen and the remainder of the Board to help Day capitalize on this opportunity and build on its recent success,” said Bycoff.

Hansen’s initial plan to make Day more appealing seems to be working out so far. Upon accepting the CEO role, he wanted to focus on growing Day’s strongest points: the content infrastructure business and the core content management product.

Since then, we’ve seen CRX new releases and updates, as well as new versions of Web CMS CQ5 and CQ5.2, hit the streets of the content management world.

Originally published on CMSWire

I talked quite a bit about the hyped about and much-anticipated Day’s CQ5 in this blog, including CQ5 installation experiences and random thoughts. And then, I also talked about CQ5.2. My impressions were mostly positive, but not without some healthy constructive criticism

Looks like the WCM market , and the new and existing Day’s customers, are mostly positive about the product as well, as they keep investing in this Web CMS and making Day’s 2009 first half numbers shine brightly yet again.

1H 2009 revenue growth was reported at CHF 17.0M, which is an increase of 33% from total revenue of CHF 12.8M for 1H 2008. License revenue accounted for a whopping 42% of total revenue at CHF 7.2M, an increase of 26% from total license revenue of CHF 5.8M compared to same time last year. According to Day, there is an increase in re-orders from the existing installed base due to the interest in updates and new modules that came out in CQ 5.2 (e.g. DAM and Social Collaboration).

Support and maintenance revenues came in at CHF 5.4M, or 32% of total revenue. Day also reported operating income of CHF 1.8M, or 11% of revenue, and better-than-expected GAAP net income of CHF 1.1M, or 6% of revenue. Total cash was CHF 18.3M, a 21% increase over 1H 2008.

Day’s success in the challenging economy is partially due to the operational restructuring efforts that took place last and this year, along with key new hires and additions of new members to its Board of Directors.

We should see more R&D, sales and marketing investments at Day in the second half of 2009. If you wish to geek out on accounting numbers, head over here. I, in the meantime, cannot wait to get my hands on the next release — CQ 5.3.

Originally published on CMSWire: Day Software Continues to Roll in Cash in 1H 2009

Ask and you shall receive. I was curious to hear Nuxeo’s thoughts on CMIS and Chemistry, and (many thanks to Eric Barroca and Florent Guillaume) my wishes were granted. Now, I can go to my exile in Siberia

As a follow-up on my chat with Day’s David Nüscheler about Chemistry, here’s a very insightful interview with another major Chemistry contributor — open source ECM vendor Nuxeo via Florent Guillaume, head of R&D.

Full interview on CMSWire: Nuxeo’s Take on Apache CMIS Implementation aka Chemistry

So, following up on the initial post, as promised. Had a good chat with Day’s David Nüscheler and Kevin Cohrane yesterday. Thanks again, guys!

Nüscheler is one of Chemistry committers and had a lot of interesting info to share. Would be nice to hear from Nuxeo and Alfresco, too… Referring you to my post on CMSWire for the rest:

The CMIS specification is still in early stages, but the buzz around it is consistently loud. Most recently, the spec has piqued interest of the Apache Software Foundation (ASF), as some saw a “reference implementation” ingredient missing from the CMIS recipe for success.

Meet Chemistry — a recently-proposed Apache Incubator Project with a goal of creating a generic, open-source, Java-language implementation of CMIS.

More on CMSWire: Apache CMIS Implementation: Is There Chemistry?