Software giant Micro Focus reinstates dividend after ‘solid progress’ in turnaround

Micro Focus reinstated its dividend today after reporting “solid progress” in the first 12 months of its three-year turnaround plan.

The UK-headquarted software giant, which has 14,000 employees and offers software to the world’s biggest pharma and aerospace firms, said it saw preliminary full-year revenue of $3 billion for the year ended October 31, down 10% year-on-year, but slightly ahead of consensus. Adjusted core earnings came in at $1.2 billion, down from $1.4 billion in the prior year.

Chief executive Stephen Murdoch told the Standard he and his team had successfully faced the challenges of “trying to do a heart and lung transplant of a global operation remotely”.

He said: “We’re pleased with progress full stop, but we are especially pleased in the context of trying to execute a turnaround where everyone is meeting on Microsoft Teams or Zoom.

“We’ve refinanced our debt in the period, so we’ve no maturities out until 2024.

“We’ve still got a huge amount to do, but we generated a really strong amount of cash and really strong levels of profit, which is allowing us to make the investments that we want to make in the business so that we actually come out the other end stronger."