Category: Internet

Angel.com Announces Availability of ‘Virtual Call Center’

New Hosted Call Center Management Solution Integrates Angel.comâ??s On-Demand Interactive Voice Response Offerings with Automatic Call Distribution Several New Enterprise Customers Adopt Solution that Provides Efficient, Affordable Call Distribution

McLean, Va., (February 16, 2005) –

Angel.com, a leading provider of web-based, advanced telephony solutions and a division of MicroStrategy® Incorporated (Nasdaq: MSTR) today announced the launch and general availability of “Virtual Call Center,” a new hosted and customizable call center management offering that combines the flexibility of Angel.com’s on-demand Interactive Voice Response (IVR) solutions with web-based Automatic Call Distribution (ACD).

Virtual Call Center is a hosted call center management solution that combines the call distribution capabilities of an ACD system with the data collection and automation power of speech recognition. These capabilities are all contained in one easy-to-use interface, Angel.com Site Builder 2005. The solution is managed entirely through a web browser, which allows for rapid deployment, significant management flexibility, real-time monitoring and reporting tools, and zero investment in new hardware or software.

Several enterprise customers have already begun implementation of Virtual Call Center, including Sky High Speed, which designs and installs Wi-Fi networks for the hospitality industry, and Moftware, a global provider of mobile data products, software, and consulting services. Sky High Speed uses Virtual Call Center in its Network Operations Center to provide 24 x 7 hospitality guest technical support. Using a hosted call center allows the Network Operations Center to adapt quickly with Sky High Speed’s rapidly expanding customer base, while enhancing the guest experience. For Moftware, Virtual Call Center has already allowed the company to respond to customer inquiries around the clock while increasing the efficiency of its 16 live call center agents.

“Angel.com’s Virtual Call Center is the most cost-effective call center solution in the market,” said Moftware CEO Pinakin Dinesh. “Our biggest problem was that our call center was not available 24-hours-per-day and we received many calls during off hours related to order tracking. With Virtual Call Center, that problem is solved. In addition, the call queuing feature is the best I have seen; it will dramatically improve our call center efficiency and productivity.”

Said Angel.com president and founder Mike Zirngibl, “Companies with a commitment to outstanding customer service no longer need to invest months of time and hundreds of thousands of dollars in hardware and consulting costs to create and manage an effective call center. Angel.com’s Virtual Call Center is a remarkably innovative solution that can be deployed and maintained at a low cost, is easy to use, integrates seamlessly with speech recognition technology, and features real-time reporting and monitoring tools. We believe that enterprise call center managers will adopt Virtual Call Center as they recognize its unique benefits.”

The Angel.com hosted model, combined with Angel.com’s award-winning Site Builder toolkit and speech technology, makes Virtual Call Center a cost-effective alternative for enterprises considering an ACD system and related hardware and support costs.

Scenarios where the Angel.com Virtual Call Center may be particularly beneficial:
o Companies with home-based call center agents. According to Network World, call centers with home-based agents are gaining in popularity as companies look for alternatives to running a traditional, in-house call center or using an offshore outsourcer. Experts say the use of home-based agents eliminates some concerns about cultural differences when using offshore providers.*
o Organizations with a large pool of volunteer call center agents who require the ability to check-in and check-out seamlessly. This is particularly relevant and effective for organizations with volunteers in the field who provide virtual support.
o Existing call centers or multi-tiered support organizations that require special routing for peak hours and routing based on specific agent skills.
o Small-to-medium-sized businesses that receive many support calls but cannot afford the investment in an ACD solution.
o Small businesses with limited personnel who share customer service duties.
o Sales organizations responding to inbound leads. Virtual Call Center provides call queuing and routing to the appropriate agent based on pre-set criteria such as territory or skill set.

Virtual Call Center Features
Call Routing & Queuing – Simple agent addition/deletion options; customizable on-hold music and wait prompts; call screening options to provide information to agents; route calls to any number; unlimited call queues.
Integrated IVR- Sophisticated speech recognition technology captures caller data for agent use; packaged applications available for pre-agent/post-agent interaction; integrates easily with existing web applications.
Call Reporting & Monitoring – Easy, web-based administration; managers can view real-time call load and agent activity; usage reports allow for current/historical metrics tracking.
Scalability & Reliability – No hardware needed; scalable capacity without capital expense; 24/7 technical support options; carrier-grade facilities; fault-tolerant reliability.

Virtual Call Center Benefits
Rapid Return on Investment – Angel.com pricing is primarily usage-based, meaning customers can expect to see a positive ROI within weeks of deployment.
Reduced Wait Times – Angel.com Virtual Call Center is integrated with IVR, meaning the most common requests can be automated without waiting for a live operator.
Fewer Live Operators – With more calls automated through the IVR component, enterprises require fewer live operators, resulting in lower operating costs.
Higher Customer Satisfaction – Live operators will have access to specific information before speaking with a caller and will be able to more effectively manage requests.

For more information, please visit www.angel.com/enterprise/vcc/index.jsp.

*Users Grow Virtual Call Centers, Network World, Jan. 31, 2005, by Ann Bednarz

About Angel.com
Angel.com is a leading provider of web-based, advanced telephony solutions. More than 1,400 customers turn to Angel.com to quickly deploy powerful applications using Angel.com’s patented Voice Site technology. These applications make IVR remarkably easy, and power customer service and marketing phone numbers using intelligent speech recognition technology. With an innovative web-based solution that requires no investment in hardware, software, or human resources, Angel.com balances the need for superior communications with affordable, pay-as-you-go pricing.

About MicroStrategy
Founded in 1989, MicroStrategy is a worldwide leader in the business intelligence software market. Leading Fortune 2000 companies are integrating MicroStrategy’s business monitoring, reporting, and analysis software into their operations. The MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform(TM) distills vast amounts of data into vital insight to help drive cost-efficiency, revenue-generation, and productivity. Top companies are using MicroStrategy to cost-effectively empower thousands of employees, partners, and suppliers with the business insight they need to make better business decisions everyday.

MicroStrategy’s enterprise-class customers include Aventis, eBay, General Motors, Lowe’s Companies, Pfizer, Sprint, Telecom Italia, U.S. Postal Service, Visa International, Wells Fargo, and Yahoo!. MicroStrategy also has relationships with systems integrators and application development and platform partners, including HP, IBM, PeopleSoft, Sun, and Teradata, a division of NCR. MicroStrategy is listed on Nasdaq under the symbol MSTR. For more information or to purchase or demo MicroStrategy’s software, visit MicroStrategy’s Web site at http://www.microstrategy.com.

This press release may include statements that may constitute “forward-looking statements,” including its estimates of future business prospects or financial results and statements containing the words “believe,” “estimate,” “project,” “expect” or similar expressions. Forward-looking statements inherently involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results of MicroStrategy Incorporated and its subsidiaries (collectively, the “Company”) to differ materially from the forward-looking statements. Factors that could contribute to such differences include: the ability of the Company to implement and achieve widespread customer acceptance of its MicroStrategy 8 software on a timely basis; the Company’s ability to recognize deferred revenue through delivery of products or satisfactory performance of services; continued acceptance of the Company’s products in the marketplace; the timing of significant orders; delays in the Company’s ability to develop or ship new products; market acceptance of new products; competitive factors; general economic conditions; currency fluctuations; and other risks detailed in the Company’s registration statements and periodic reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. By making these forward-looking statements, the Company undertakes no obligation to update these statements for revisions or changes after the date of this release.

MicroStrategy, MicroStrategy 8, MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform, MicroStrategy Report Services, MicroStrategy 7, Angel.com, MicroStrategy 7i, Site Builder 2005, Virtual Call Center, Enterprise Voice Sites are either trademarks or registered trademarks of MicroStrategy Incorporated in the United States and certain other countries. Other product and company names mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.

Wende Cover
MicroStrategy, Incorporated
1-703-770-1646
wcover@microstrategy.com

Source: MicroStrategy

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MicroStrategy 8 Receives SAP

Integration Goes Beyond Typical Reporting to Include OLAP Analysis, Scorecards, and Alerting

McLean, VA., (February 10, 2005) –

MicroStrategy® Incorporated (NASDAQ: MSTR), a leading worldwide provider of business intelligence software, today announced that its new Business Intelligence platform, MicroStrategy 8, has been certified by SAP® to access content in SAP Business Information Warehouse (BW).

Using MicroStrategy 8, business users can intuitively and easily report, analyze, and monitor data contained in SAP BW data marts. Users can also combine data from multiple SAP and non-SAP sources in scorecards, dashboards, and reports. With MicroStrategy’s advanced information distribution and collaboration features, business users can create, share, and subscribe to information alerts. Additionally, MicroStrategy 8 provides high performance reporting for SAP users through the use of advanced caching and report scheduling features.

“SAP’s Business Information Warehouse (BW) is becoming further entrenched as a data warehouse (DW) for many enterprises,” said Wayne Eckerson, Director of Research, The Data Warehousing Institute (TDWI). “Making BW and other operational and DW data more easily available to an expanded number of mainstream users is a major priority for these organizations. MicroStrategy 8’s SAP certified BW integration will allow SAP customers to provide highly intuitive integrated reporting and analysis to an expanded base of their mainstream business users.”

MicroStrategy 8 incorporates a high-performance Dynamic MDX (multi-dimensional expression) engine that accesses information in SAP BW cubes via SAP’s OLAP BAPI interface. Because queries are dynamically generated using the multidimensional models in SAP InfoCubes, QueryCubes, and ODS, MicroStrategy users can automatically and transparently drill back into SAP BW for more data, without any prior programming or prior design of drill paths.

“MicroStrategy 8 is becoming the enterprise BI utility of choice for many SAP customers,” said Sanju Bansal, MicroStrategy’s COO. “By leveraging customers’ existing SAP investments, valuable business information stored in SAP can be quickly deployed to thousands of business users in scorecards, dashboards, and reports. In addition, since MicroStrategy 8 has an enterprise-caliber architecture that supports all five styles of business intelligence, organizations can finally standardize on a single BI platform for both their SAP and non-SAP data.”

About MicroStrategy

Founded in 1989, MicroStrategy is a worldwide leader in the business intelligence software market. Leading Fortune 2000 companies are increasingly integrating MicroStrategy’s business monitoring, reporting, and analysis software into their operations. The MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform(TM) distills vast amounts of data into vital insight to help drive cost-efficiency, revenue-generation, and productivity. Top companies are using MicroStrategy to cost-effectively empower thousands of employees, partners, and suppliers with the business insight they need to make better business decisions everyday.

MicroStrategy has over 2,800 enterprise-class customers, including Aventis, eBay, General Motors, Lowe’s Companies, Pfizer, Sprint, Telecom Italia, U.S. Postal Service, Visa International, Wells Fargo, and Yahoo!. MicroStrategy also has relationships with over 300 systems integrators and application development and platform partners, including HP, IBM, PeopleSoft, Sun, and Teradata, a division of NCR. MicroStrategy is listed on Nasdaq under the symbol MSTR. For more information or to purchase or demo MicroStrategy’s software, visit MicroStrategy’s Web site at http://www.microstrategy.com.

This press release may include statements that may constitute “forward-looking statements,” including its estimates of future business prospects or financial results and statements containing the words “believe,” “estimate,” “project,” “expect” or similar expressions. Forward-looking statements inherently involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results of MicroStrategy Incorporated and its subsidiaries (collectively, the “Company”) to differ materially from the forward-looking statements. Factors that could contribute to such differences include: the ability of the Company to implement and achieve widespread customer acceptance of its MicroStrategy 8 software on a timely basis; the Company’s ability to recognize deferred revenue through delivery of products or satisfactory performance of services; continued acceptance of the Company’s products in the marketplace; the timing of significant orders; delays in the Company’s ability to develop or ship new products; market acceptance of new products; competitive factors; general economic conditions; currency fluctuations; and other risks detailed in the Company’s registration statements and periodic reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. By making these forward-looking statements, the Company undertakes no obligation to update these statements for revisions or changes after the date of this release.

MicroStrategy, MicroStrategy 8, MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform, MicroStrategy Report Services, MicroStrategy 7, MicroStrategy 7i are either trademarks or registered trademarks of MicroStrategy Incorporated in the United States and certain other countries. Other product and company names mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.

Wende Cover
MicroStrategy, Incorporated
1-703-770-1646
wcover@microstrategy.com

Source: MicroStrategy

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MicroStrategy 8 Praised by Alliance Partners

Joint Customers Benefit from Reporting, Analysis and Monitoring Enhancements in MicroStrategyâ??s Newest Release

McLean, Va., (February 09, 2005) –

MicroStrategy® Incorporated (NASDAQ: MSTR), a leading worldwide provider of business intelligence software, today announced that its newest product release, MicroStrategy 8, is receiving high praise from MicroStrategy alliance partners. MicroStrategy 8 provides significant enhancements for business decision making with improved access to data, an easy-to-use Web interface and seamless integration of reporting, analysis and business performance monitoring.

MicroStrategy has relationships with approximately 150 alliance partners, including technology partners, consulting/systems integrators, resellers, OEMs, and VARs. Many of these partners previewed MicroStrategy 8 beta software and provided positive feedback on its ability to extend BI to a broader business user population. The technological advancements in MicroStrategy 8 will allow MicroStrategy customers to deploy business intelligence to more users and derive more value from their existing BI investment. Specifically, the innovations in MicroStrategy 8 will allow alliance partners to attract new customers looking for a BI platform that is simple to use and can connect to all enterprise data sources.

“Demand for BI platforms that can support large user populations with high performance has surged in the past few years,” said Tom Villani, MicroStrategy’s Vice President of Global Alliances. “The additional features, capabilities and advancements in MicroStrategy 8 address two of the most important business intelligence issues facing companies today – accessing all their enterprise data and providing an easy-to-use interface for large populations of business users. Our global alliance partners will benefit by having MicroStrategy 8 in their portfolio.”

MicroStrategy’s alliance partners praise MicroStrategy 8:

Ascential Software
“We congratulate MicroStrategy on the launch of MicroStrategy 8 because it brings innovative functionality to the market including interactive reporting and analysis, rapid report design and development, and smoother integration with operational systems,” stated Bob Zurek, Vice President of Product Management and Advanced Technologies, Ascential Software. “Customers can maximize their BI application initiatives by combining MicroStrategy’s next-generation BI Platform with the Ascential Enterprise Integration Suite(TM), our complete, end-to-end data integration solution.”

Ascertane
“The new features in MicroStrategy 8 further extend MicroStrategy’s technology advantage over the competition,” said Eric Reid, Ascertane’s President of Business Intelligence. “In addition to making fully featured report design available in a zero footprint Web client, the new product allows access to ERP data, including direct access to SAP Business Information Warehouse. MicroStrategy has set the standard for open, server based architecture and common metadata, allowing one version of a performance metric to be shared across all information delivery channels.”

Capgemini
“MicroStrategy 8 unveils the power of Business Intelligence by supporting all the five styles of Business Intelligence,” said Mark Vreeland, Technology Services Senior Manager, Capgemini. “With its reporting and analysis techniques, MicroStrategy 8 empowers the user with on-demand information intelligence to make informed and efficient business decisions. MicroStrategy is well positioned to rise to the next level in serving their customers’ needs.”

Claraview
“Customers turning to Claraview for a BI strategy that leverages their SAP BW investment will embrace the new functionality of MicroStrategy 8,” explained Sid Banerjee, CEO of Claraview, Inc. “By delivering direct access to SAP BW for easy-to-use MicroStrategy reporting, rich analytical capability, and full drill-anywhere functionality, SAP users now have a powerful tool to make critical business decisions in real time.”

Cognizant Technology Solutions
“Among the new features in MicroStrategy 8, the heterogeneous data access will be one of the most beneficial to our customers,” said Srini Krishnan, Data Warehouse Practice Manager, Cognizant Technology Solutions. “Users who have organizational constraints and the need to store data across various databases will find MicroStrategy 8 to be a seamlessly integrated, cost effective, and extremely feature-rich business intelligence tool.”

Conversion Services International (CSI)
“CSI’s clients are always searching for new ways to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of their business operations and to capitalize on new opportunities,” said Tim Furey, Data Warehouse Practice Director for CSI. “They will be extremely pleased with the technical advancements incorporated into MicroStrategy 8, as this richer, more unified, industrial-strength business intelligence infrastructure will be able to accelerate the time to market for their BI solutions.”

Dataspace
“With the release of MicroStrategy 8, MicroStrategy has exceeded the expectations of even their most demanding customers,” stated Benjamin Taub, CEO of Dataspace. “The new interactive analytical and design features within the web reports and documents, along with capability to seamlessly analyze data across the enterprise, from data warehouses and SAP BW sources to operational databases, will give companies the confidence and motivation to truly standardize on a single reporting product suite.”

DBWorks Technologies
“DBWorks Technologies has had the pleasure of working with MicroStrategy and our respective clients for many years,” said Tim Nickason, President, DBWorks Technologies. “We have experienced nothing but excellence in regard to functionality, analytical depth, reporting style and ease of use from the 7i platform. With version 8, MicroStrategy has clearly raised the BI reporting bar even further. In addition to existing capabilities, the web enabled WYSIWYG report design and presentation is utterly astounding. By providing reporting directly against SAP BW and other ERP vendor’s data, MicroStrategy has opened up new reporting opportunities for us and our clients.”

High Impact Technologies
“With MicroStrategy 8, we can now implement critical management scorecards and operational reports in real-time,” said Tom Dennis, Director of High Impact Technologies. “Key to our success is the ability of MicroStrategy 8 to connect directly to operating systems and to seamlessly integrate with heterogeneous databases. The intuitive Web interface lets us deploy fully interactive scorecards and reports that senior health care managers and physicians can readily use.”

MapInfo
“The enhancements in MicroStrategy 8, including a much more productive and simple-to-use web interface, familiar windows-based environment and clean, one-click feel, make it even easier for MapInfo’s “Location Intelligence Component for MicroStrategy” to provide organizations with the added dimension of geographic querying and visualization,” said Mike Agron, MapInfo Managing Director, Channel Sales, OEM & Enterprise Partners. “The potential to further maximize ROI on a MicroStrategy 8 platform investment is outstanding.”

MIIX Business Intelligence Systems Limited
“With MicroStrategy 8, our retail customers will be able to make better business decisions with the ability to import the most sophisticated data mining models into any report or analysis, such as merchandise optimization, price optimization and customer segmentation,” explained Roger Johnson, CTO, MIIX Business Intelligence Systems Limited. “In addition, MicroStrategy 8’s increased interactivity and ability to draw real-time information directly from our Merchandise Management package provides realizable benefits to our retailers.”

Netezza
“MicroStrategy 8 now makes it even easier for employees across an enterprise to access and analyze data better than ever before, whenever and wherever they need it,” stated Bill Doyle, VP Channel Sales, Netezza. “This functionality, when combined with the breakthrough performance of the Netezza database warehouse appliance, makes it possible for organizations to discover new insights and make smarter business decisions every day. We are confident that this release will extend the benefits of our joint solution and add to the success of our customers.”

Sybase
“Sybase has experienced a great number of joint customer successes with MicroStrategy for nearly 10 years,” said Steve Capelli, Senior VP and GM, Sybase North America Operations. “We look forward to building on that customer success by providing our customers an even richer and more user friendly BI experience, as MicroStrategy 8 allows a diverse range of business users to dig into the full depth and breadth of the largest data warehouses.”

Teradata
“The combination of the Teradata warehouse with MicroStrategy 8 offers our joint customers a single view of their organization’s data and enables them to deliver decisioning data access, from scorecards and indicators to data mining, to users at all levels in their organization with a single tool,” said Todd Walter, CTO, Teradata.

XeoMatrix
“MicroStrategy 8 sets a new standard for web-based BI reporting,” said Chris Monahon, President, XeoMatrix Incorporated. “Business users now are empowered to design and refine their own Report Services reports using MicroStrategy Web’s WYSIWYG interface. This new achievement can translate into an immediate project cost savings by reducing report development cycles, decreasing project deployment timelines, and increasing overall end-user productivity.”

About MicroStrategy

Founded in 1989, MicroStrategy is a worldwide leader in the business intelligence software market. Leading Fortune 2000 companies are increasingly integrating MicroStrategy’s business monitoring, reporting, and analysis software into their operations. The MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform(TM) distills vast amounts of data into vital insight to help drive cost-efficiency, revenue-generation, and productivity. Top companies are using MicroStrategy to cost-effectively empower thousands of employees, partners, and suppliers with the business insight they need to make better business decisions everyday.

MicroStrategy has over 2,800 enterprise-class customers, including Aventis, eBay, General Motors, Lowe’s Companies, Pfizer, Sprint, Telecom Italia, U.S. Postal Service, Visa International, Wells Fargo, and Yahoo!. MicroStrategy also has relationships with over 300 systems integrators and application development and platform partners, including HP, IBM, PeopleSoft, Sun, and Teradata, a division of NCR. MicroStrategy is listed on Nasdaq under the symbol MSTR. For more information or to purchase or demo MicroStrategy’s software, visit MicroStrategy’s Web site at http://www.microstrategy.com.

This press release may include statements that may constitute “forward-looking statements,” including its estimates of future business prospects or financial results and statements containing the words “believe,” “estimate,” “project,” “expect” or similar expressions. Forward-looking statements inherently involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results of MicroStrategy Incorporated and its subsidiaries (collectively, the “Company”) to differ materially from the forward-looking statements. Factors that could contribute to such differences include: the ability of the Company to implement and achieve widespread customer acceptance of its MicroStrategy 8 software on a timely basis; the Company’s ability to recognize deferred revenue through delivery of products or satisfactory performance of services; continued acceptance of the Company’s products in the marketplace; the timing of significant orders; delays in the Company’s ability to develop or ship new products; market acceptance of new products; competitive factors; general economic conditions; currency fluctuations; and other risks detailed in the Company’s registration statements and periodic reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. By making these forward-looking statements, the Company undertakes no obligation to update these statements for revisions or changes after the date of this release.

MicroStrategy, MicroStrategy 8, MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform, MicroStrategy Report Services, MicroStrategy 7, MicroStrategy 7i are either trademarks or registered trademarks of MicroStrategy Incorporated in the United States and certain other countries. Other product and company names mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.

Wende Cover
MicroStrategy, Incorporated
1-703-770-1646
wcover@microstrategy.com

Source: MicroStrategy

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MicroStrategy Hosts Online Event to Launch Next Generation Business Intelligence Technology

Webcast to Demonstrate New Features of MicroStrategy 8

MCLEAN, Va., (February 03, 2005) –

MicroStrategy(R) Incorporated (Nasdaq: MSTR – News), a leading worldwide provider of business intelligence software, today announced that it will offer an online launch event on February 10, 2005, to demonstrate the exciting new features and capabilities available from MicroStrategy 8. On Monday, January 31, 2005, MicroStrategy unveiled MicroStrategy 8, its latest innovation in BI technology. MicroStrategy’s new release integrates enterprise reporting, analysis and continuous performance monitoring into one BI platform and empowers end-users with a comprehensive range of easy-to-use capabilities for improved business decision-making.

MicroStrategy 8 provides streamlined functionality and more than 2,000 enhancements that enable all levels of business users to access more of their enterprise data. With a scalable architecture and a single metadata, users can easily navigate between reporting, analysis and monitoring without using multiple BI tools or navigating dissimilar interfaces. MicroStrategy 8 also offers a redesigned, easy-to-use Web interface and expands the universe of data sources that business users can access for their reporting and analysis activity.

MicroStrategy 8 has already received positive reviews from customers, global partners and industry analysts. Nigel Pendse, author of The OLAP Survey 4 (http://www.survey.com/olap) and The OLAP Report (http://www.olapreport.com), stated, “The OLAP Surveys have consistently found that MicroStrategy sites have the most users, and the highest level of Web- deployment. MicroStrategy 8 provides further improvements in the Web user interface and better source data connectivity while still providing the only fully integrated product set ideally suited for large scale, complex data analysis, highly formatted reporting, proactive exception reporting and advanced queries.”

On February 10, the 90-minute Webcast will highlight the features and business benefits of MicroStrategy 8. MicroStrategy executives will provide an overview of the technology and discuss its innovative new capabilities. In addition, participants will hear what industry experts have to say about the technical achievements of MicroStrategy 8 and customers will share comments on how they plan to use MicroStrategy 8 to enhance their business performance. There will be six convenient times for participants around the globe to join the launch event.

In addition to the Webcast, MicroStrategy is planning a global city tour to over 60 locations in February. To register for the February 10th Webcast or the global city tour, visit the MicroStrategy website, http://www.microstrategy.com.

About MicroStrategy

Founded in 1989, MicroStrategy is a worldwide leader in the business intelligence software market. Leading Fortune 2000 companies are increasingly integrating MicroStrategy’s business monitoring, reporting, and analysis software into their operations. The MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform(TM) distills vast amounts of data into vital insight to help drive cost-efficiency, revenue-generation, and productivity. Top companies are using MicroStrategy to cost-effectively empower thousands of employees, partners, and suppliers with the business insight they need to make better business decisions everyday.

MicroStrategy has over 2,800 enterprise-class customers, including Aventis, eBay, General Motors, Lowe’s Companies, Pfizer, Sprint, Telecom Italia, U.S. Postal Service, Visa International, Wells Fargo, and Yahoo!. MicroStrategy also has relationships with over 300 systems integrators and application development and platform partners, including HP, IBM, PeopleSoft, Sun, and Teradata, a division of NCR. MicroStrategy is listed on Nasdaq under the symbol MSTR. For more information or to purchase or demo MicroStrategy’s software, visit MicroStrategy’s Web site at http://www.microstrategy.com

This press release may include statements that may constitute “forward- looking statements,” including its estimates of future business prospects or financial results and statements containing the words “believe,” “estimate,” “project,” “expect” or similar expressions. Forward-looking statements inherently involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results of MicroStrategy Incorporated and its subsidiaries (collectively, the “Company”) to differ materially from the forward-looking statements. Factors that could contribute to such differences include: the ability of the Company to implement and achieve widespread customer acceptance of its MicroStrategy 8 software on a timely basis; the Company’s ability to recognize deferred revenue through delivery of products or satisfactory performance of services; continued acceptance of the Company’s products in the marketplace; the timing of significant orders; delays in the Company’s ability to develop or ship new products; market acceptance of new products; competitive factors; general economic conditions; currency fluctuations; and other risks detailed in the Company’s registration statements and periodic reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. By making these forward-looking statements, the Company undertakes no obligation to update these statements for revisions or changes after the date of this release.

MicroStrategy, MicroStrategy 8, MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform, MicroStrategy Report Services, MicroStrategy 7, MicroStrategy 7i are either trademarks or registered trademarks of MicroStrategy Incorporated in the United States and certain other countries. Other product and company names mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.

Wende Cover
MicroStrategy, Incorporated
1-703-770-1646
wcover@microstrategy.com

Source: MicroStrategy

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Inovant Executive Wins MicroStrategy’s Individual Excellence Award

MicroStrategy(R) Incorporated (Nasdaq: MSTR – News), a leading worldwide provider of business intelligence software, today announced that it has selected Kate Kristensen, Vice President of Information Services Product Support at Inovant LLC, a Visa Solutions Company, as the recipient of MicroStrateg

Las Vegas, NV (February 02, 2005) –

MicroStrategy(R) Incorporated (Nasdaq: MSTR – News), a leading worldwide provider of business intelligence software, today announced that it has selected Kate Kristensen, Vice President of Information Services Product Support at Inovant LLC, a Visa Solutions Company, as the recipient of MicroStrategy’s Individual Excellence in Business Intelligence award. Ms. Kristensen was recognized at MicroStrategy World 2005 in Las Vegas, Nevada.

“I am honored to receive MicroStrategy’s Individual Excellence award,” said Ms. Kristensen. “I share this award with the talented group of people who work with me to maximize our MicroStrategy investment, and I thank MicroStrategy for this honor.”

According to her peers at Inovant, Ms. Kristensen has the vision and insight to understand the vital role of IT in making the business more efficient. Ms. Kristensen has always put her customers’ needs first to drive IT initiatives. By involving the business community closely with the IT development team, Ms. Kristensen has successfully delivered results to her customers.

“Kate Kristensen has defined leadership and innovation for business intelligence deployments everywhere,” said MicroStrategy’s COO Sanju Bansal. “With over 20 years of experience in information technology, Kate Kristensen played a critical role in deploying MicroStrategy’s business intelligence platform at Visa. We congratulate Kate Kristensen and the entire Inovant Information Services team for their outstanding work.”

About MicroStrategy

Founded in 1989, MicroStrategy is a worldwide leader in the business intelligence software market. Leading Fortune 2000 companies are increasingly integrating MicroStrategy’s business monitoring, reporting, and analysis software into their operations. The MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform(TM) distills vast amounts of data into vital insight to help drive cost-efficiency, revenue-generation, and productivity. Top companies are using MicroStrategy to cost-effectively empower thousands of employees, partners, and suppliers with the business insight they need to make better business decisions everyday.

MicroStrategy has over 2,800 enterprise-class customers, including Aventis, eBay, General Motors, Lowe’s Companies, Pfizer, Sprint, Telecom Italia, U.S. Postal Service, Visa International, Wells Fargo, and Yahoo!. MicroStrategy also has relationships with over 300 systems integrators and application development and platform partners, including HP, IBM, PeopleSoft, Sun, and Teradata, a division of NCR. MicroStrategy is listed on Nasdaq under the symbol MSTR. For more information or to purchase or demo MicroStrategy’s software, visit MicroStrategy’s Web site at http://www.microstrategy.com.

This press release may include statements that may constitute “forward- looking statements,” including its estimates of future business prospects or financial results and statements containing the words “believe,” “estimate,” “project,” “expect” or similar expressions. Forward-looking statements inherently involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results of MicroStrategy Incorporated and its subsidiaries (collectively, the “Company”) to differ materially from the forward-looking statements. Factors that could contribute to such differences include: the ability of the Company to implement and achieve widespread customer acceptance of its MicroStrategy 8 software on a timely basis; the Company’s ability to recognize deferred revenue through delivery of products or satisfactory performance of services; continued acceptance of the Company’s products in the marketplace; the timing of significant orders; delays in the Company’s ability to develop or ship new products; market acceptance of new products; competitive factors; general economic conditions; currency fluctuations; and other risks detailed in the Company’s registration statements and periodic reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. By making these forward-looking statements, the Company undertakes no obligation to update these statements for revisions or changes after the date of this release.

MicroStrategy, MicroStrategy 8, MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform, MicroStrategy Report Services, MicroStrategy 7, MicroStrategy 7i are either trademarks or registered trademarks of MicroStrategy Incorporated in the United States and certain other countries. Other product and company names mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.

Wende Cover
MicroStrategy, Incorporated
1-703-770-1646
wcover@microstrategy.com

Source: MicroStrategy

Tags:

MicroStrategy Honors Five Organizations for Excellence in Enterprise-Class Business Intelligence

U.S. Postal Service, Ace Hardware Corporation, Watkins Motor Lines, Brazil’s IRS and Lowe’s Companies Recognized at MicroStrategy World 2005 User Conference

LAS VEGAS, NV, (February 02, 2005) –

MicroStrategy(R) Incorporated (Nasdaq: MSTR – News), a leading worldwide provider of business intelligence software, today honored five companies for achieving outstanding business performance with their MicroStrategy-based business intelligence applications. The “Best Practices in Business Intelligence” award winners for 2005 are U.S. Postal Service, Ace Hardware Corporation, Watkins Motor Lines, Brazil’s IRS and Lowe’s Companies. By deploying MicroStrategy business intelligence (BI) applications, these customers are sharing information across their enterprises to increase revenue, enhance efficiency and productivity, strengthen customer relationships and expand their competitive advantage. The awards were announced at the company’s annual user conference, MicroStrategy World 2005, in Las Vegas, NV. The award categories and the winners are:

* Data Scalability: U.S. Postal Service
* User Scalability: Ace Hardware Corporation
* Extranet Deployment: Watkins Motor Lines
* Corporate Portal Deployment: Brazil’s Internal Revenue Service
* Enterprise Deployment: Lowe’s Companies, Inc.

“Each of these organizations is a leader in its industry and we congratulate them for their exceptional use of business intelligence to streamline and enhance their business performance,” said MicroStrategy COO Sanju Bansal.

Following is a brief description of this year’s winners:

* U.S. Postal Service: A MicroStrategy customer since 1997, the U.S. Postal is the winner in the Data Scalability category. The USPS is using MicroStrategy to analyze over 20 terabytes of product, market and customer data stored in a 96 node Teradata® data warehouse. Over 70 data sources are currently feeding an enterprise data warehouse that supports twelve MicroStrategy applications. Approximately 20,000 employees including financial and account analysts, service delivery analysts, budget coordinators, retail managers, and postmasters working in nearly 10,000 locations across the USPS run thousands of reports daily to monitor and analyze financial performance, on-time delivery performance, network efficiency, in-plant operations and retail outlet performance. Approximately 15,000 reports are run daily, with an average response time of 20 seconds per report and with 95% having less than a 60 second response time.

“This award recognizes the hard work of our Information Technology team in reaching the goals of the Postal Service Transformation Plan, our blueprint for the future,” said Chief Technology Officer and Vice President, Bob Otto. “It is also about constantly innovating to accelerate the Postal Service’s productivity and profitability so we can continue to provide affordable service to everyone nationwide.” The U.S. Postal Service delivers more than 46 percent of the world’s mail volume – some 206 billion letters, advertisements, periodicals and packages per year, and serves seven million customers each day at its 37,000 retail locations nationwide. With annual revenues of more than $69 billion, it is the world’s leading provider of mailing and delivery services.
* Ace Hardware Corporation: The winner in the User Scalability category, Ace Hardware has adopted MicroStrategy as its enterprise business intelligence standard for reporting and analysis to help more than 8,000 business people across Ace Hardware’s global organization make proactive decisions that improve corporate and retail performance. Ace Hardware’s employees in the loyalty marketing, category management, pricing, market research and inventory management groups use MicroStrategy to perform targeted customer promotions, determine optimal product mixes and establish product pricing. As a result, Ace Hardware cites process improvements, cost reductions, and additional revenue opportunities. Headquartered in Oak Brook, Ill., Ace Hardware Corp. is the largest retailer-owned cooperative in the industry and currently operates 15 distribution centers in the United States, with stores located in all 50 states and 70 countries. Ace’s annual retail sales from its more than 4,800 hardware, home center and lumber and building materials retailers top $13 billion.
* Watkins Motor Lines, Inc.: Watkins Motor Lines is the winner in the Extranet Deployment category. A leading transportation company, Watkins provides its customers with up-to-date information about shipments, delivery times and schedules via its extranet website, mywatkins.com. MicroStrategy powers the customer web reporting application, which supports approximately 12,000 Watkins customers and 250 account executives. End users receive custom shipment schedules and real-time freight shipment reports, from data in an IBM® UDB DB2 database. The application produces over 20,000 on-demand or scheduled emails and faxes each month. With annual revenues approaching $1 billion, Watkins Motor Lines is the nation’s largest privately held less-than-truckload (LTL) carrier and currently has more than 10,000 employees and contractors, and operates approximately 2,900 company and contractor-owned tractors and 10,000 trailers.
* Brazil’s Internal Revenue Service: Brazil’s Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is the winner in the Corporate Portal Deployment category. Brazil’s IRS developed and deployed a corporate portal on their intranet allowing several thousand end users, including secretariats, superintendents, agents and inspectors, to monitor, report, and analyze taxpayer activity information. End users run more than 300 distinct reports against a 6-terabyte Oracle® data warehouse that provide insight into the auditing, tax levy, inspection and administration of taxpayer activity. With MicroStrategy, Brazil’s IRS is able to identify parties with possible filing irregularities, analyze taxpayer activity for the purposes of uncovering fraud, monitor payments made to the IRS, and supply information to prepare the nation’s budget forecast. Brazil’s Internal Revenue Service is the government department responsible for collecting taxes and controlling the customs operations, fulfilling and requiring the fulfillment of applicable legislation, promoting tax improvement and customs policy, offering Brazil’s society excellent service and stimulating the voluntary fulfillment of tax obligations.
* Lowe’s Companies, Inc.: A MicroStrategy customer since 1998, Lowe’s Companies is the winner in the Enterprise Deployment category. Lowe’s has more than 2,500 users accessing ten applications providing insight into a 16 terabyte Teradata® data warehouse. Lowe’s Companies has deployed MicroStrategy products across their business, and their users include 2,000 employees and approximately 500 vendors. Employees from Logistics, Merchandising, Marketing, Store Operations, Finance, Human Resources and Distribution manage inventory, improve margin, review market specificity and identify sales opportunities using MicroStrategy. Lowe’s vendors review performance specific to their products and locations to manage inventory performance. Approximately 55,000 reports are run each week. Lowe’s also uses MicroStrategy to power their merchandising and executives dashboards; both these projects were deployed in under ten weeks. With fiscal year 2003 sales of $30.8 billion, Lowe’s Companies, Inc. is a FORTUNE® 50 company that serves approximately 10 million customers a week at more than 1,050 home improvement stores in 46 states. In 2004, FORTUNE named Lowe’s America’s Most Admired Specialty Retailer for a second consecutive year. Based in Mooresville, N.C., the 59-year old company is the second-largest home improvement retailer in the world.

This year marks the 4th annual MicroStrategy Best Practices in Business Intelligence Awards, a program created to recognize successful and innovative MicroStrategy customers. Last year’s winners were TRX, Inc., KPMG, METRO Group and FleetBoston Financial.

About MicroStrategy

Founded in 1989, MicroStrategy is a worldwide leader in the business intelligence software market. Leading Fortune 2000 companies are increasingly integrating MicroStrategy’s business monitoring, reporting, and analysis software into their operations. The MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform(TM) distills vast amounts of data into vital insight to help drive cost-efficiency, revenue-generation, and productivity. Top companies are using MicroStrategy to cost-effectively empower thousands of employees, partners, and suppliers with the business insight they need to make better business decisions everyday.

MicroStrategy has over 2,800 enterprise-class customers, including Aventis, eBay, General Motors, Lowe’s Companies, Pfizer, Sprint, Telecom Italia, U.S. Postal Service, Visa International, Wells Fargo, and Yahoo!. MicroStrategy also has relationships with over 300 systems integrators and application development and platform partners, including HP, IBM, PeopleSoft, Sun, and Teradata, a division of NCR. MicroStrategy is listed on Nasdaq under the symbol MSTR. For more information or to purchase or demo MicroStrategy’s software, visit MicroStrategy’s Web site at http://www.microstrategy.com

This press release may include statements that may constitute “forward- looking statements,” including its estimates of future business prospects or financial results and statements containing the words “believe,” “estimate,” “project,” “expect” or similar expressions. Forward-looking statements inherently involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results of MicroStrategy Incorporated and its subsidiaries (collectively, the “Company”) to differ materially from the forward-looking statements. Factors that could contribute to such differences include: the ability of the Company to implement and achieve widespread customer acceptance of its MicroStrategy 8 software on a timely basis; the Company’s ability to recognize deferred revenue through delivery of products or satisfactory performance of services; continued acceptance of the Company’s products in the marketplace; the timing of significant orders; delays in the Company’s ability to develop or ship new products; market acceptance of new products; competitive factors; general economic conditions; currency fluctuations; and other risks detailed in the Company’s registration statements and periodic reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. By making these forward-looking statements, the Company undertakes no obligation to update these statements for revisions or changes after the date of this release.

MicroStrategy, MicroStrategy 8, MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform, MicroStrategy Report Services, MicroStrategy 7, MicroStrategy 7i are either trademarks or registered trademarks of MicroStrategy Incorporated in the United States and certain other countries. Other product and company names mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.

Wende Cover
MicroStrategy, Incorporated
1-703-770-1646
wcover@microstrategy.com

Source: MicroStrategy

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MicroStrategy Unveils New, Next-Generation Business Intelligence Technology

MicroStrategy 8 Features Integrated Reporting, Analysis and Continuous Performance Monitoring

McLean, Va., (January 31, 2005) –

MicroStrategy(R) Incorporated (Nasdaq: MSTR – News), a leading worldwide provider of business intelligence software, today announced the release of MicroStrategy 8, a new business intelligence technology that integrates enterprise reporting, analysis and continuous performance monitoring into one BI platform. With innovative, easy-to-use functionality and more than 2,000 enhancements, MicroStrategy 8 allows a greater number of business people to access more of their enterprise data, enabling them to make better business decisions.

With MicroStrategy 8, companies no longer need numerous distinct products from different vendors to provide reporting, analysis, and performance monitoring. With a scalable architecture and a single metadata, users can navigate seamlessly from scorecards and dashboards to reports and analysis without being forced to open and close multiple BI tools and navigate dissimilar interfaces. MicroStrategy 8 also features a newly designed Web interface that makes business intelligence more approachable for the average business user.

Additionally, MicroStrategy 8 broadens the universe of data sources that business users can access for their reporting and analysis activity. Business users can now directly query data stored in their financial, human resources, supply chain, and other operational systems, without having to first move this data into a data mart or data cube. MicroStrategy also provides direct access to data stored in SAP(R) BW.

“MicroStrategy has long been known for having advanced and innovative technology,” said Sanju Bansal, MicroStrategy’s COO. “MicroStrategy 8 raises the bar again by providing the reporting, analysis, and business monitoring capabilities users require as well as access to the data sources they need to improve business decision-making.”

World-Class Enterprise Reporting

MicroStrategy 8 offers outstanding reporting flexibility, allowing creation of operational reports, business reports, invoices, and statements with pixel-perfect, print-perfect, and page-perfect precision. In addition, MicroStrategy 8 provides these new capabilities:

1. End-User Report Design – Business users can now rearrange report groupings, sections, and calculations, while still preserving the integrity of the original design. Unlike other products that require technically-trained report developers to make modifications, MicroStrategy 8 allows business users to control the content and structure of boardroom-quality reports. From these reports, business users can drill into the data to uncover additional insights without any further IT support.

2. End-User Report Formatting and Layout – For the first time, MicroStrategy 8 enables business users to format reports and scorecards in WYSIWYG (what-you-see-is-what-you-get) mode. Developers no longer need to anticipate the exact formatting requirements of business users, since these users can now leverage the PowerPoint(R) or Excel(R) formatting skills they already have to fine-tune reports. Formatting can be completed over the web using a zero-footprint, multi-browser Web interface. By allowing users formatting of reports without IT involvement, report development cycles can be dramatically reduced.

“MicroStrategy 8 is reporting at its finest,” said Jose Lora, Senior Systems Engineer for Meredith Corporation. “With a unique focus on reporting, it offers an effortless convergence of reporting and analysis not available in other business intelligence products. Our users will be able to see exactly how their reports look as they build them, without having to go into a separate design mode. As a result, we envision faster report writing production.”

Sophisticated Analysis Capabilities

MicroStrategy 8 boasts a wide array of sophisticated analytic capabilities with over 200 internal functions including OLAP, math, financial, logical, and statistical functions. Additionally, with MicroStrategy’s Relational OLAP (ROLAP) technology, users can perform slice-and-dice analysis against very large databases to view business performance from many different perspectives.

MicroStrategy 8 introduces a new Data Mining and Predictive Analysis analytic module that enables users to integrate data mining insight into mainstream reports. MicroStrategy 8 can now calculate four of the primary data mining functions: neural networks, clustering, multivariate regression, and tree algorithms. MicroStrategy 8 can now import data mining models from vendors like IBM, Teradata, SAS, and SPSS using the PMML (predictive modeling mark-up language) standard and automatically convert those models into standard MicroStrategy metrics.

“We are impressed by the wide range of technical breakthroughs and business benefits found in MicroStrategy 8,” said Julio Garcia Florez, Manager of Technology, Information Group for Cortefiel. “MicroStrategy 8 provides a new fresh look and feel that you typically don’t see in other business intelligence offerings. MicroStrategy 8 implements windows-like screen paradigms for all action, while maintaining a 100% zero-footprint, browser-independent web architecture.”

Enterprise Performance Monitoring

MicroStrategy 8 delivers dynamic enterprise performance monitoring with personalized scorecards, dashboards and event-triggered alerts. Using visual indicators such as charts, gauges, symbols, thresholds, and pictures, customized scorecards can be generated for each user based on their role and affiliations. Managers can track performance at all levels of an organization from corporate to division to department, and even to the individual. MicroStrategy 8 is scalable to thousands of users and with cascaded scorecards and dashboards, every person can take responsibility for his or her performance goals. Business users can also use MicroStrategy 8 as a tool that continuously scours databases and actively alerts them with reports and email notifications based on business rules or when data exceeds threshold values.

“With MicroStrategy 8, FNAC will spend far less time developing, creating, and maintaining reports,” stated Bruno Aubert, FNAC’s BI and Marketing Technical Manager. “Our decision-makers will be able to monitor performance by receiving visually intuitive scorecards and dashboards. Employees will be able to easily drill down into the data to uncover trends and present information in user-friendly, boardroom quality reports.”

The MicroStrategy 8 user interface has been redesigned to greatly improve the productivity of the business user. It incorporates dozens of enhancements focused on improving the ease-of-use and user productivity. MicroStrategy 8 also offers:

* Personal work areas to store and organize frequently-used personal reports
* Shared work areas to permit easy workgroup collaboration
* Short-cuts to launch frequently-used, centrally-administered reports
* Over 20 new one-click actions in new Windows-like toolbars and icons
* One-click metrics to allow users to easily add popular calculations such as rank, percents-to-total, and time comparisons to their reports
* Right-mouse click actions throughout the interface
* Windows-like dialog boxes and wizards for multi-step actions such as report formatting

The MicroStrategy 8 interface can be custom-tailored for any user depending on the user’s skill level through over 50 administrator-controllable settings. Entire workgroups can start with the same introductory interface and, as individual users gain competency, additional features can be made available for them.

“The MicroStrategy 8 offering takes usability to a whole new level, well beyond existing report writers,” said Sherrie Benn, Business Intelligence Consultant with the Office of Information Resources for the State of Tennessee. “MicroStrategy 8 has a pleasant, easy-to-use and enjoyable interface. It offers a highly interactive, Web-based reporting and analysis environment that is ideal for all of our users.”

Accessing Data Throughout the Enterprise

MicroStrategy 8 permits reporting, analysis, and monitoring of a company’s critical data, even if this data is not in a data warehouse or data mart. Users have direct access to systems such as SAP BW, operational (OLTP) databases, ERP systems, as well as structured data warehouse databases. By inheriting the full relational OLAP capability of the MicroStrategy 7 architecture, MicroStrategy 8 can dynamically access the full breadth of the data warehouses and data marts with high performance and high scale. New features of MicroStrategy 8 include:

1. Accessing Multi-dimensional Databases such as SAP BW – MicroStrategy 8 can now dynamically generate Multidimensional Expressions (MDX) to access multi-dimensional or cube databases. Specifically, MicroStrategy 8’s new Dynamic MDX Engine generates optimized MDX syntax that is fully certified with SAP BW using SAP’s high performance BAPI’s.

2. Accessing ERP and Operational Data – MicroStrategy 8’s new Operational SQL Engine enables MicroStrategy reports to include data from any operational system using completely free-form SQL, including stored procedures and views. Companies can now directly access operational systems, without having to place the data into a data mart or data warehouse. The Operational SQL Engine facilitates quick deployment of reporting applications, either while a data mart is being constructed or even if no data mart is planned.

3. Accessing Heterogeneous Data – Providing outstanding flexibility, MicroStrategy 8 can access data across heterogeneous data stores, without the use of enterprise information integration tools. MicroStrategy 8 can join data from multiple sources and present the integrated data in reports and scorecards. Data can come from any source accessible by MicroStrategy 8, including the data warehouse, data marts, SAP BW, and any number of operational system databases.

MicroStrategy 8 is Built Upon a Single Industrial-Strength Backplane

MicroStrategy 8 is built for user and application scalability and inherits the performance for which MicroStrategy 7i is known. Its native 64-bit architecture supports thousands of users and provides high performance for even the most demanding BI applications. Its multi-layer data caching technology provides almost instant response to a wide range of user requests.

Additionally, MicroStrategy 8’s metadata supports re-use of application objects such as metrics, security filters, and reports, speeding application time. Finally, security is built-in to every aspect of MicroStrategy 8. Support for Single sign-on (SSO), LDAP, and database authentication ensure MicroStrategy 8 fits into your existing security architecture. Also, by attaching Access Control Lists to every BI application object, data access and system navigation can be tightly controlled on a user-by-user basis.

One Architecture on Which to Standardize All BI Applications

MicroStrategy 8 is designed as a highly scalable, highly economical, and highly extensible utility upon which organizations can standardize. Its Services Orientated Architecture (SOA) allows companies to start small and grow their BI applications. By providing plug-and-play modules for each of the five styles of business intelligence (Scorecards, Reports, OLAP, Advanced Analysis and Alerting), MicroStrategy 8 allows enterprises to deploy just the functionality they need and upgrade at any time, confident that all their metrics, reports, security filters and other objects will automatically work as the new BI style is added. As a result, organizations can start with small independent departmental BI applications and gradually grow and converge these applications into a seamless, enterprise-wide business intelligence architecture.

Leading Industry Analysts and Partners Applaud MicroStrategy 8:

Dan Vesset, IDC Research

“Robust reporting and interactive analysis have traditionally required multiple products,” explained Dan Vesset, IDC Research Director of Data Warehousing and Information Access. “With the introduction of MicroStrategy 8, integrated reporting and analysis is available from a single Drag-n-Drop based easy-to-use web interface tailored specifically for the mainstream business user. MicroStrategy 8’s intuitive WYSIWYG Report Design and Editing capabilities make it a strong option for organizations looking to deploy self-service based BI to the mainstream.”

Cindi Howson, ASK & author of Intelligent Enterprise’s BI Scorecard

“MicroStrategy 8 takes reporting and analysis integration yet another step further with a highly intuitive web interface designed specifically for the business user,” stated Cindi Howson, President of ASK and author of Intelligent Enterprise’s BI Scorecard. “With an easy to use, highly interactive BI interface, organizations can start simple and unlock more power as users need it. MicroStrategy’s ability to support the whole enterprise through a single BI infrastructure and adaptable interface makes it a strong option for organizations looking to standardize on a single BI product.”

Wayne Eckerson, The Data Warehousing Institute

“SAP’s Business Information Warehouse (BW) is becoming further entrenched as a data warehouse (DW) for many enterprises,” said Wayne Eckerson, Director of Research, The Data Warehousing Institute (TDWI). “Making BW and other operational and DW data more easily available to an expanded number of mainstream users is a major priority for these organizations. MicroStrategy 8’s SAP certified BW integration will allow SAP customers to provide highly intuitive integrated reporting and analysis to an expanded base of their mainstream business users.”

Nigel Pendse, The OLAP Report

“The OLAP Surveys have consistently found that MicroStrategy sites have the most users, and the highest level of Web-deployment,” said Nigel Pendse, author of The OLAP Survey 4 (http://www.survey.com/olap) and The OLAP Report (http://www.olapreport.com). “MicroStrategy 8 provides further improvements in the Web user interface and better source data connectivity while still providing the only fully integrated product set ideally suited for large scale, complex data analysis, highly formatted reporting, proactive exception reporting and advanced queries.”

Sun Microsystems

“Combining MicroStrategy 8’s reporting, monitoring, and analysis capabilities with the unique 64-Bit BI running on Sun Solaris gives companies a flexible architecture,” said Cyrus Golkar, Sun Chief Executive for Business Intelligence and Data Warehousing. “The ability to add more users and data while sustaining high system performance creates a truly world-class BI system.”

Hewlett Packard

“With their recent commitment to port to the HP-UX operating environment on Itanium(R)-based HP Integrity servers, MicroStrategy is poised to fulfill the 64-bit, enterprise BI demand on HP’s enterprise solutions,” said Bruno Castejon, Director, Business Applications Solutions, HP. “We are excited that MicroStrategy 8 will be serving this additional major HP operating system and look forward to continued great customer success together.”

Teradata

“Over 150 of our joint customers have enjoyed tremendous scalability and advanced analytical capabilities due to our highly optimized integration with MicroStrategy,” stated Alan Chow, Vice President Research and Development, Teradata. “MicroStrategy 8 will usher in the most demanding BI/DW applications developed by our customers yet.”

Join MicroStrategy on February 10 for a special Webcast unveiling MicroStrategy 8. Additionally, MicroStrategy will be conducting a 60+ city road show with an interactive demonstration featuring the new world-class BI capabilities available with MicroStrategy 8. Register for both events on the MicroStrategy website, http://www.microstrategy.com.

About MicroStrategy

Founded in 1989, MicroStrategy is a worldwide leader in the business intelligence software market. Leading Fortune 2000 companies are increasingly integrating MicroStrategy’s business monitoring, reporting, and analysis software into their operations. The MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform(TM) distills vast amounts of data into vital insight to help drive cost-efficiency, revenue-generation, and productivity. Top companies are using MicroStrategy to cost-effectively empower thousands of employees, partners, and suppliers with the business insight they need to make better business decisions everyday.

MicroStrategy has over 2,800 enterprise-class customers, including Aventis, eBay, General Motors, Lowe’s Companies, Pfizer, Sprint, Telecom Italia, U.S. Postal Service, Visa International, Wells Fargo, and Yahoo!. MicroStrategy also has relationships with over 300 systems integrators and application development and platform partners, including HP, IBM, PeopleSoft, Sun, and Teradata, a division of NCR. MicroStrategy is listed on Nasdaq under the symbol MSTR. For more information or to purchase or demo MicroStrategy’s software, visit MicroStrategy’s Web site at http://www.microstrategy.com.

This press release may include statements that may constitute “forward- looking statements,” including its estimates of future business prospects or financial results and statements containing the words “believe,” “estimate,” “project,” “expect” or similar expressions. Forward-looking statements inherently involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results of MicroStrategy Incorporated and its subsidiaries (collectively, the “Company”) to differ materially from the forward-looking statements. Factors that could contribute to such differences include: the ability of the Company to implement and achieve widespread customer acceptance of its MicroStrategy 8 software on a timely basis; the Company’s ability to recognize deferred revenue through delivery of products or satisfactory performance of services; continued acceptance of the Company’s products in the marketplace; the timing of significant orders; delays in the Company’s ability to develop or ship new products; market acceptance of new products; competitive factors; general economic conditions; currency fluctuations; and other risks detailed in the Company’s registration statements and periodic reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. By making these forward-looking statements, the Company undertakes no obligation to update these statements for revisions or changes after the date of this release.

MicroStrategy, MicroStrategy 8, MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform, MicroStrategy Report Services, MicroStrategy 7, MicroStrategy 7i are either trademarks or registered trademarks of MicroStrategy Incorporated in the United States and certain other countries. Other product and company names mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.

Wende Cover
MicroStrategy, Incorporated
1-703-770-1646
wcover@microstrategy.com

Source: MicroStrategy

Tags:

MicroStrategy’s Q4 2004 Revenue Increases 39% Over Q4 2003 and Operating Margin Rises to 38% in Q4 2004

MicroStrategy Ends 2004 With $132.5 Million in Cash Plus Short and Long-Term Investments, an $80.6 Million Increase Over 2003

MCLEAN, Va., (January 27, 2005) –

MicroStrategy(R) Incorporated (Nasdaq: MSTR), a leading worldwide provider of business intelligence software, today announced its financial results for the three- month period ended December 31, 2004 (the fourth quarter of its 2004 fiscal year) and for the full year ended December 31, 2004.

Fourth quarter 2004 revenue was $71.6 million versus $51.7 million in the fourth quarter of 2003, a 39% increase. License revenue for the quarter was $34.1 million versus $23.4 million in the fourth quarter of 2003, a 46% increase. Net income for the fourth quarter of 2004, determined in accordance with GAAP, was $24.5 million, or $1.43 per share on a diluted basis. Fourth quarter 2004 income from operations was $27.2 million, or 38% of revenue, versus $12.5 million, or 24% of revenue, in the fourth quarter of 2003. MicroStrategy’s cash plus short and long-term investments at the end of the fourth quarter of 2004 was $132.5 million versus $51.9 million at the end of the fourth quarter 2003.

Full year 2004 revenue was $231.2 million versus $175.6 million in 2003, a 32% increase. License revenue for the full year 2004 was $97.0 million versus $77.2 million in 2003, a 26% increase. Net income for the full year 2004, determined in accordance with GAAP, was $168.3 million, or $9.83 per share on a diluted basis. The full year 2004 tax benefit of $99.0 million included a net non-cash benefit of $102.1 million related to the release of the Company’s U.S. and Canadian deferred tax asset valuation allowance and the utilization of non-cash U.S. deferred tax assets. Full year 2004 income from operations was $68.5 million, or 30% of revenue, versus $28.0 million, or 16% of revenue, in 2003.

Highlights of the Fourth Quarter 2004

* Customer wins at Albertson’s, Alticor, Cingular Wireless, Emory
Healthcare, Ingenix, Lending Tree, McGraw-Hill Companies, Metropolitan
Life Insurance, Oakwood Homes, Pacific Gas and Electric, PPL Services
Corporation, The Bank of New York, The Container Store, and Wausau
Benefits

* Services revenue increased 33% over the fourth quarter of 2003

* Deferred revenue increased by $14.2 million, or 46% over the fourth
quarter of 2003

* The revenue mix for the quarter was 57% domestic and 43% international

* License contracts during the quarter totaled approximately 505, an
increase of approximately 32% over the fourth quarter 2003

* 29 contracts greater than $500K and 12 contracts greater than $1 million

* Days sales outstanding was 52 days

* Headcount at the end of the fourth quarter was 945

“MicroStrategy delivered another strong quarter, with record revenues, excellent operating margins, and outstanding license revenue growth,” said MicroStrategy President and CEO Michael Saylor. “Sales execution was excellent, and we continued to drive operational efficiency throughout our business. MicroStrategy benefited from a robust new product cycle, including the release of MicroStrategy Report Services(TM), MicroStrategy Office(TM), and MicroStrategy Universal(TM) in the past fourteen months. With the scheduled release next week of MicroStrategy 8(TM), we believe we are well positioned for another solid year in 2005.”

Examples of Noteworthy Customer Deals from Q4 2004:

Oakwood Homes

Oakwood Homes has phased out its Crystal Reports environment and recently expanded its MicroStrategy deployment. Several hundred Oakwood Homes’ employees across finance, HR, sales and building operations groups receive MicroStrategy-based operational reports daily. A MicroStrategy- powered extranet environment lets trade partners, lenders and realtors prepare home buyers for the purchasing and closing of their new home. These reports enable the lender to gather proper documentation to ensure a more efficient home closing process.

Oncology Therapeutics Network

Oncology Therapeutics Network (OTN) is a leading distributor of chemotherapeutic drugs for treatment of cancer. OTN selected MicroStrategy for its ease-of-use, advanced analytical capabilities, and scalability for large databases and thousands of users. Approximately 120 employees will use MicroStrategy to report, analyze and monitor sales and marketing information against an Oracle(R) data warehouse. Such analyses will provide Oncology Therapeutics Network with the insight needed to be more responsive to its customers, increase sales force productivity and support the company’s business objectives.

Winn-Dixie Stores, Inc.

Winn-Dixie Stores, Inc., with headquarters in Jacksonville, FL, is one of the nation’s largest food retailers. After an in-depth evaluation of many of the competing products in the industry, Winn-Dixie selected the MicroStrategy platform for its ease-of-use, scalability, and superior Web-based platform. Approximately 50 merchandising analysts, pricing analysts, and category managers will perform sales and customer reporting and analyses against a 3.4-terabyte Teradata(R) data warehouse. The company will utilize MicroStrategy to more effectively monitor pricing and sales in order to improve revenue and profitability.M

Update on Recently Released MicroStrategy Products

MicroStrategy Report Services(TM) continued to garner increased customer adoption in 2004. MicroStrategy Report Services allows business users to retrieve information from corporate databases for display in boardroom-quality documents over the web or in email. Since its release in November 2003, hundreds of customers worldwide have adopted MicroStrategy Report Services. MicroStrategy Report Services provides content-rich, user-friendly reports that can enrich existing business intelligence applications and ease the creation of new ones.

New MicroStrategy Report Services customers have praised this product:

Campbell Soup Company

“Campbell Soup Company is utilizing MicroStrategy Report Services for
sales, finance, customer service and marketing applications,” said Paul
Williams, Director IT of Campbell Soup Company. “MicroStrategy Report
Services provides many options for presenting highly formatted
information in a consistent user-friendly format. This exciting new
reporting capability also leverages our existing MicroStrategy
investment.”

R.H. Donnelley

“As a direct result of customer demand, R.H. Donnelley became an early
adopter of MicroStrategy’s Report Services solution,” explained R.H.
Donnelley’s IT Director of Programming Services Jill Mertens. “With
MicroStrategy Report Services, R.H. Donnelley’s senior executives will
leverage pixel-perfect sales and marketing reports to provide daily
feedback on sales and product performance.”

Grange Insurance

“Grange Insurance has deployed a number of MicroStrategy Report Services
reports to more than 100 users in various departments. These users,
including Personal Lines, Commercial Lines, Claims and Agency Relations
personnel, have access to dashboard reports that allow them to analyze
overall agency performance and reveal areas that need improvement,” said
Grange Insurance’s Data Warehouse Project Manager Tony Simpkins.

In April 2004, we introduced MicroStrategy Office allowing business users using Microsoft Word, PowerPoint(R), Excel and Outlook to rapidly call up information stored in corporate databases without starting another program. This corporate information is immediately pasted into Word documents, presentations, spreadsheets and emails. These documents, presentations and emails can automatically update the corporate information each time they are opened because of “SmartTag” technology. Business users can improve their efficiency and productivity because they no longer have to repeatedly cut and paste data from different programs.

Using MicroStrategy Report Services and MicroStrategy Office, non- technical business employees can easily access corporate information to make better informed business decisions that ultimately benefit the bottom line.

In June 2004 MicroStrategy launched the MicroStrategy Universal Edition of its business reporting technology. This Universal edition provides the capacity and high-performance needed for thousands of additional business users, ranging from line-workers to top executives, to benefit from business intelligence. This 64-bit software is compatible with Microsoft Windows, IBM AIX(R) and Sun Solaris(TM) operating systems.

In September 2004, MicroStrategy 8, in development for over two years, went into beta testing. With innovative, easy-to-use functionality and more than 2,000 enhancements across the MicroStrategy Business Intelligence platform, MicroStrategy 8 enables thousands of users throughout an organization to make faster, better-informed business decisions. MicroStrategy 8 raises the bar for BI ease-of-use by providing reporting, analysis, and business monitoring capabilities that users require, as well as an even more sophisticated level of report design and formatting. Additionally, MicroStrategy 8 broadens the data sources available to include data warehouses, data marts, and operational systems.

“The OLAP Surveys have consistently found that MicroStrategy sites have the most users, and the highest level of Web-deployment,” said Nigel Pendse, author of The OLAP Survey 4 (http://www.survey.com/olap) and The OLAP Report (http://www.olapreport.com). “MicroStrategy 8 provides further improvements in the Web user interface and better source data connectivity while still providing the only fully integrated product set ideally suited for large scale, complex data analysis, highly formatted reporting, proactive exception reporting and advanced queries.”

MicroStrategy 8 will be unveiled January 31, 2005 at MicroStrategy World, our annual user’s conference. For additional information on the product launch, please visit http://www.microstrategy8.com/

Outlook and Financial Guidance Information

As of January 1, 2005, the Company determined that it will no longer provide revenue or EPS guidance. The Company believes that it is in the best interests of shareholders to avoid engaging in predictions of short-term financial performance, which are inherently uncertain. We believe that this will allow the management team to more effectively run operations and build long-term shareholder value.

MicroStrategy will be discussing its fourth quarter 2004 results on a conference call today beginning at approximately 5:30 p.m. EST. To access the conference call dial 877-597-9704 (domestically) or 706-364-6550 (internationally) and mention Michael Saylor as Chairperson. A live Webcast and replay of the conference call will be available at http://www.microstrategy.com/investor. A 48-hour replay of the call will also be available by dialing 800-642-1687 (domestically) or 706-645-9291 (internationally), conference ID 3342446.

About MicroStrategy Incorporated

Founded in 1989, MicroStrategy is a worldwide leader in the business intelligence software market. Leading Fortune 2000 companies are increasingly integrating MicroStrategy’s business monitoring, reporting, and analysis software into their operations. The MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform(TM) distills vast amounts of data into vital insight to help drive cost-efficiency, revenue-generation, and productivity. Top companies are using MicroStrategy to cost-effectively empower thousands of employees, partners, and suppliers with the business insight they need to make better business decisions everyday.

MicroStrategy’s enterprise-class customers include Aventis, eBay, General Motors, Lowe’s Companies, Pfizer, Sprint, Telecom Italia, U.S. Postal Service, Visa International, Wells Fargo, and Yahoo!. MicroStrategy also has relationships with over 300 systems integrators and application development and platform partners, including IBM, HP, PeopleSoft, Sun, and Teradata, a division of NCR. MicroStrategy is listed on Nasdaq under the symbol MSTR. For more information or to purchase or demo MicroStrategy’s software, visit MicroStrategy’s Web site at http://www.microstrategy.com.

MicroStrategy, MicroStrategy 7, MicroStrategy 8, MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform, MicroStrategy Report Services, and MicroStrategy 7i are either trademarks or registered trademarks of MicroStrategy Incorporated in the United States and certain other countries. IBM, WebSphere, IBM Workplace and Lotus Notes are registered trademarks. All other brands, product names, company names, trademarks and service marks are the properties of their respective owners.

This press release may include statements that may constitute “forward- looking statements,” including its estimates of future business prospects or financial results and statements containing the words “believe,” “estimate,” “project,” “expect” or similar expressions. Forward-looking statements inherently involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results of MicroStrategy Incorporated and its subsidiaries (collectively, the “Company”) to differ materially from the forward-looking statements. Factors that could contribute to such differences include: the ability of the Company to implement and achieve widespread customer acceptance of its MicroStrategy 8, MicroStrategy 7i, MicroStrategy Universal Edition, and MicroStrategy Report Services software on a timely basis; the Company’s ability to recognize deferred revenue through delivery of products or satisfactory performance of services; continued acceptance of the Company’s products in the marketplace; the timing of significant orders; delays in the Company’s ability to develop or ship new products; market acceptance of new products; competitive factors; general economic conditions; currency fluctuations; and other risks detailed in the Company’s registration statements and periodic reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. By making these forward-looking statements, the Company undertakes no obligation to update these statements for revisions or changes after the date of this release.

MICROSTRATEGY INCORPORATED
CONSOLIDATED STATEMENTS OF OPERATIONS
(in thousands, except per share data)

Three Months Ended Twelve Months Ended
December 31, December 31,
2004 2003 2004 2003
(unaudited) (unaudited) (unaudited) (audited)

Revenues
Product licenses $34,100 $23,403 $96,995 $77,221
Product support and other
services 37,492 28,269 134,213 98,356

Total revenues 71,592 51,672 231,208 175,577

Cost of Revenues
Product licenses 1,110 899 3,875 3,240
Product support and other
services 7,365 6,388 28,996 24,745

Total cost of revenues 8,475 7,287 32,871 27,985

Gross profit 63,117 44,385 198,337 147,592

Operating Expenses
Sales and marketing 20,753 16,846 69,924 57,475
Research and development 4,322 6,048 24,915 27,684
General and administrative 10,817 8,955 34,977 32,580
Restructuring and impairment
charges – – – 1,699
Amortization of intangible
assets 18 16 71 182

Total operating expenses 35,910 31,865 129,887 119,620

Income from operations 27,207 12,520 68,450 27,972

Financing and Other (Expense)
Income
Interest income 554 99 1,221 644
Interest expense (1) (9) (61) (53) (5,109)
Gain (loss) on investments 4 – (83) –
Loss on early extinguishment
of notes payable – – – (31,069)
Other (expense) income, net (620) 449 (215) 307

Total financing and other
(expense) income (71) 487 870 (35,227)

Income (loss) from continuing
operations before income
taxes 27,136 13,007 69,320 (7,255)
Provision (benefit) for
income taxes 2,619 (3,722) (98,993) (2,587)

Net income (loss) from
continuing operations 24,517 16,729 168,313 (4,668)

Discontinued Operations
Gain on discontinued
operations – 765 – 765

Net income (loss) $24,517 $17,494 $168,313 $(3,903)

Basic earnings (loss)
per share
Continuing operations $1.52 $1.05 $10.48 $(0.31)
Discontinued operations – 0.05 – 0.05
Net income (loss)
attributable to common
stockholders $1.52 $1.10 $10.48 $(0.26)
Basic weighted average
shares outstanding 16,103 15,950 16,055 14,804

Diluted earnings (loss)
per share
Continuing operations $1.43 $0.98 $9.83 $(0.31)
Discontinued operations – 0.04 – 0.05
Net income (loss)
attributable to common
stockholders $1.43 $1.02 $9.83 $(0.26)
Diluted weighted average
shares outstanding 17,195 17,152 17,119 14,804

(1) Interest expense for the twelve months ended December 31, 2004 and
2003, includes discount amortization expense on notes payable of $0
and $2,137, respectively.

MICROSTRATEGY INCORPORATED
CONSOLIDATED BALANCE SHEETS
(in thousands, except per share data)

December 31, December 31,
2004 2003
Assets (unaudited) (audited)
Current assets
Cash and cash equivalents $68,314 $51,882
Restricted cash 1,210 747
Short-term investments 37,816 36
Accounts receivable, net 40,917 30,993
Prepaid expenses and other current
assets 6,337 3,852
Deferred tax assets, net 20,583 1,807
Total current assets 175,177 89,317

Property and equipment, net 16,096 16,113
Capitalized software development
costs, net 5,479 3,693
Long-term investments 26,365 –
Deposits and other assets 3,021 1,984
Deferred tax assets, net 110,818 3,686
Total Assets $336,956 $114,793

Liabilities and Stockholders’ Equity
Current liabilities
Accounts payable and accrued
expenses $18,906 $12,768
Accrued compensation and employee
benefits 25,292 17,968
Accrued restructuring costs 1,762 2,599
Deferred revenue and advance
payments 43,674 28,374
Total current liabilities 89,634 61,709

Deferred revenue and advance payments 1,681 2,750
Other long-term liabilities 3,157 2,443
Accrued restructuring costs 1,906 3,544
Total Liabilities 96,378 70,446

Stockholders’ Equity:
Preferred stock undesignated;
$0.001 par value; 4,971 shares
authorized; no shares issued or
outstanding – –
Class A common stock; $0.001 par
value; 330,000 shares authorized;
12,909 shares issued and 12,841
shares outstanding, and 12,362
shares issued and outstanding,
respectively 13 12
Class B common stock; $0.001 par
value; 165,000 shares authorized;
3,394 and 3,604 shares issued and
outstanding, respectively 3 4
Additional paid-in capital 417,287 387,625
Treasury stock, at cost; 68 shares
and 0 shares, respectively (2,331) –
Accumulated other comprehensive
income 3,206 2,619
Accumulated deficit (177,600) (345,913)
Total stockholders’ equity 240,578 44,347
Total Liabilities and Stockholders’
Equity $336,956 $114,793

MICROSTRATEGY INCORPORATED
Additional Financial Information

Net Income and Additional Financial Information
(in thousands)
(unaudited) Three Months Ended Twelve Months Ended
December 31, December 31,
2004 2003 2004 2003

Net income (loss) from
continuing operations $24,517 $16,729 $168,313 $(4,668)

Additional Financial
Information:
Restructuring and impairment
charges – – – 1,699
Amortization of intangible
assets 18 16 71 182
(Gain) loss on investments (4) – 83 –
Loss on early extinguishment
of notes payable – – – 31,069
Discount amortization expense
on notes payable – – – 2,137
Noncash deferred tax valuation
allowance and other tax items 1,538 (5,175) (102,075) (5,175)
Other items (113) 26 (346) 26
Total $1,439 $(5,133) $(102,267) $29,938

Additional Financial Information –
Cash vs. Non-cash
(in thousands)
(unaudited) Three Months Ended Twelve Months Ended
December 31, December 31,
2004 2003 2004 2003

Non-cash:
Amortization of intangible
assets $18 $16 $71 $182
(Gain) loss on investments (4) – 83 –
Loss on early extinguishment
of notes payable – – – 31,069
Discount amortization expense
on notes payable – – – 2,137
Noncash deferred tax valuation
allowance and other tax items 1,538 (5,175) (102,075) (5,175)
Total non-cash 1,552 (5,159) (101,921) 28,213

Cash:
Restructuring and impairment
charges – – – 1,699
Other items (113) 26 (346) 26
Total cash (113) 26 (346) 1,725

Total $1,439 $(5,133) $(102,267) $29,938

MICROSTRATEGY INCORPORATED
Non-Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (“Non-GAAP”)
Financial Measures

Management believes that the presentation of the additional financial information is helpful in understanding the ongoing operating results and cash flow indicators with respect to the Company’s core business because the additional financial items are non-cash or cash related gains and expenses incurred during the period that are not associated with ongoing operating results and are not cash flow indicators of the Company’s core business operations.

EBITDA and Additional Financial Information
(in thousands)
(unaudited) Three Months Ended Twelve Months Ended
December 31, December 31,
2004 2003 2004 2003

Net income (loss) $24,517 $17,494 $168,313 $(3,903)

Interest income (554) (99) (1,221) (644)
Interest expense 9 61 (53) 5,109
Provision (benefit) for income
taxes 2,619 (3,722) (98,993) (2,587)
Depreciation and amortization 2,095 1,989 8,252 8,652
Amortization of intangible assets 18 16 71 182
Gain on discontinued operations – (765) – (765)

EBITDA $28,704 $14,974 $76,369 $6,044

Additional Financial Information:
Restructuring and impairment
charges – – – 1,699
(Gain) loss on investments (4) – (83) –
Loss on early extinguishment
of notes payable – – – 31,069
Other expense (income) 620 (449) 215 (307)

Total $616 $(449) $132 $32,461

MICROSTRATEGY INCORPORATED
CONSOLIDATED STATEMENTS OF CASH FLOWS
(in thousands)

Years ended December 31,
2004 2003

Operating activities:
Net income (loss) from continuing
operations $168,313 $(4,668)
Adjustments to reconcile net (loss)
income from continuing operations
to net cash provided by operating
activities:
Depreciation and amortization 8,323 8,834
Bad debt expense 290 171
Deferred income taxes 5,753 (7,634)
Change in deferred tax asset
valuation allowance (107,413) 2,715
Net realized loss on sale and
write-down of short-term
investments 83 –
Loss on early extinguishment of
notes payable – 31,069
Discount amortization expense on
notes payable – 2,137
Other, net 171 89
Changes in operating assets and
liabilities:
Accounts receivable (8,798) (1,055)
Prepaid expenses and other
current assets (2,398) 347
Deposits and other assets (1,034) 162
Accounts payable and accrued
expenses, compensation and employee
benefits, interest and preferred
dividends 11,793 3,002
Accrued restructuring costs (2,515) (2,791)
Deferred revenue and advance payments 12,200 4,925
Other long-term liabilities 714 (245)
Net cash provided by
operating activities 85,482 37,058
Investing activities:
Purchases of property and equipment, net (5,649) (4,179)
Capitalized software development costs (4,268) (1,174)
Purchases of short-term investments, net (37,742) –
Purchases of long-term investments (26,353) –
(Increase) decrease in restricted cash (379) 5,554
Net cash (used in) provided
by investing activities (74,391) 201
Financing activities:
Proceeds from sale of class A common
stock and exercise of stock options,
net of offering costs 5,759 3,717
Purchases of treasury stock (2,331) –
Repayments of promissory notes
issued to former preferred
stockholders – (5,000)
Other – 328
Net cash used in financing activities 3,428 (955)
Effect of foreign exchange rate
changes on cash and cash
equivalents 1,837 957
Net increase in cash and cash equivalents
from continuing operations 16,356 37,261
Net cash received from (used in)
discontinued operations 76 (415)
Net increase in cash and cash equivalents 16,432 36,846
Cash and cash equivalents, beginning
of period 51,882 15,036
Cash and cash equivalents, end of
period $68,314 $51,882

Supplemental disclosure of noncash
investing and financing activities:
Early extinguishment of notes payable $- $(46,875)
Issuance of class A common stock in
connection with early extinguishment of
notes payable $- $78,576

Supplemental disclosure of cash flow
information:
Cash paid during the year for interest $51 $2,530
Cash paid during the year for
income taxes $2,615 $2,057

SOURCE MicroStrategy Incorporated

CONTACT: Bill Chatterton of MicroStrategy Incorporated, +1-703-770-1670,
or bchatterton@microstrategy.com

Source: MicroStrategy

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MicroStrategy Selected to Integrate Into Two IBM Retail Industry Solutions

Joint Customers to Gain from MicroStrategyâ??s Expertise in Retail Business Intelligence

MCLEAN, Va., (January 25, 2005) –

MicroStrategy® Incorporated, a leading worldwide provider of business intelligence software, announced that the MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform is integrated into two IBM retail industry solutions, IBM® Workplace(TM) for Retail Store Operations and IBM® Workplace(TM) for Retail Merchandise Management, for which MicroStrategy is currently the only BI offering. MicroStrategy’s BI platform will be integrated with these retail solutions because of its in-depth experience in the retail marketplace. IBM Workplace retail solutions include software components from IBM Lotus, Tivoli, and WebSphere brands and are available through IBM and their partners.

MicroStrategy’s BI platform offers enhanced integration with IBM WebSphere Portal technology, allowing merchandisers to anticipate and support retailers’ buying, assortment, allocation, and pricing needs. MicroStrategy’s content- rich and highly interactive BI dashboards provide customers with the ability to monitor, report and analyze their enterprise data and applications through a single interface. MicroStrategy’s integration involved creating a set of portlets that expose rich functionality from its BI platform through the IBM WebSphere Portal.

“MicroStrategy has been exceptional in delivering on our very demanding retail analytical requirements. Their technology is ideally suited for reporting and analyzing the atomic level of detail we need to run our business more effectively. We are thrilled that MicroStrategy’s expertise and product functionality is now combined with IBM’s retail initiatives,” said Rosann Eydeler, Senior Manager, Data Warehouse, CSK Auto Corp.

Using the analytical power of the MicroStrategy platform, retail customers can perform sophisticated analyses to compare product performance and evaluate promotion effectiveness across individual items, categories, geographies and vendors. Additionally, customers can benefit from advanced capabilities to study seasonal buying patterns, effectively monitor and manage inventory levels to improve product sales and company profitability, perform market basket analyses, inventory and scenario planning.

“We’re very proud of our long standing relationship with IBM, particularly as it now leverages one of MicroStrategy’s traditional strengths in the retail market,” said MicroStrategy COO Sanju Bansal. “As MicroStrategy is implemented at seven of the top ten global retailers, we are optimistic that our technology combined with IBM’s initiative will result in continued customer success in this vertical market.”

In November 2004, during the launch of IBM Workplace retail solutions, MicroStrategy demonstrated its integration with the solutions to over 250 attendees at the “IBM Workplace: Productivity’s Best Practice Roadshow” event. This roadshow took place in 6 North American cities including Calgary, Indianapolis, New York, San Francisco, Seattle and Toronto.

For more information visit:
http://www.microstrategy.com/Partners/Directory/IBM/websphere_portlets.asp
http://www.ibm.com/software/workplace/solutions

About MicroStrategy

Founded in 1989, MicroStrategy is a worldwide leader in the business intelligence software market. Leading Fortune 2000 companies are increasingly integrating MicroStrategy’s business monitoring, reporting, and analysis software into their operations. The MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform(TM) distills vast amounts of data into vital insight to help drive cost-efficiency, revenue-generation, and productivity. Top companies are using MicroStrategy to cost-effectively empower thousands of employees, partners, and suppliers with the business insight they need to make better business decisions everyday.

MicroStrategy has over 2,800 enterprise-class customers, including Aventis, eBay, General Motors, Lowe’s Companies, Pfizer, Sprint, Telecom Italia, U.S. Postal Service, Visa International, Wells Fargo, and Yahoo!. MicroStrategy also has relationships with over 300 systems integrators and application development and platform partners, including IBM, HP, PeopleSoft, Sun, and Teradata, a division of NCR. MicroStrategy is listed on Nasdaq under the symbol MSTR. For more information or to purchase or demo MicroStrategy’s software, visit MicroStrategy’s Web site at http://www.microstrategy.com.

MicroStrategy, MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform, MicroStrategy Report Services, MicroStrategy 7, MicroStrategy 7i are either trademarks or registered trademarks of MicroStrategy Incorporated in the United States and certain other countries. Other product and company names mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.

Wende Cover
MicroStrategy, Incorporated
1-703-770-1646
wcover@microstrategy.com

Source: MicroStrategy

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MicroStrategy Achieves SAP ‘Powered by NetWeaver’ Certification

Industry’s Leading Business Intelligence Platform Provides Stronger SAP Integration

MCLEAN, Va., (January 24, 2005) –

MicroStrategy® Incorporated, a leading worldwide provider of business intelligence software, today announced that it has received the SAP “Powered by NetWeaver” certification, allowing SAP customers to develop business intelligence applications that leverage the NetWeaver technology they already own. MicroStrategy applications can run on SAP Application Server, and MicroStrategy business intelligence content can now be easily and securely distributed to thousands of users through the SAP Enterprise Portal Server.

MicroStrategy has made SAP-specific integrations and optimizations in order to receive the “Powered by NetWeaver” certification. Specifically, MicroStrategy Web Universal can now run on SAP Web Application Server (SAP Web AS) Release 6.40. Also, MicroStrategy reports can be accessed using the iViews feature within SAP Enterprise Portal Server. iViews displaying MicroStrategy reports support single sign-on (SSO) as well as advanced report personalization capabilities.

“SAP’s NetWeaver platform is becoming more accepted for many large enterprises. Making SAP’s environment more easily available to an expanded number of mainstream users is a major priority for these organizations. MicroStrategy’s SAP NetWeaver certification will allow SAP customers to provide easy-to-use integrated reporting and analysis to an expanded base of their mainstream business users,” said Dan Vesset, IDC Research Director, Data Warehousing and Information Access.

SAP NetWeaver certification for the MicroStrategy BI Platform will allow SAP customers with substantial amounts of data and exacting technical requirements to deploy numerous business intelligence applications enterprise- wide. MicroStrategy’s integrated architecture and scalability can help SAP customers to extend business intelligence’s benefits further and deeper into their enterprises.

“MicroStrategy’s advanced business intelligence architecture provides SAP customers with the ease of administration and scalability they expect, as well as the monitoring, reporting and analysis capabilities business users require,” said MicroStrategy’s COO Sanju Bansal. “As SAP customers start deploying business intelligence applications enterprise-wide, they often need the integrated reporting and analysis capabilities uniquely offered by MicroStrategy.”

About MicroStrategy

Founded in 1989, MicroStrategy is a worldwide leader in the business intelligence software market. Leading Fortune 2000 companies are increasingly integrating MicroStrategy’s business monitoring, reporting, and analysis software into their operations. The MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform(TM) distills vast amounts of data into vital insight to help drive cost-efficiency, revenue-generation, and productivity. Top companies are using MicroStrategy to cost-effectively empower thousands of employees, partners, and suppliers with the business insight they need to make better business decisions everyday.

MicroStrategy has over 2,800 enterprise-class customers, including Aventis, eBay, General Motors, Lowe’s Companies, Pfizer, Sprint, Telecom Italia, U.S. Postal Service, Visa International, Wells Fargo, and Yahoo!. MicroStrategy also has relationships with over 300 systems integrators and application development and platform partners, including HP, IBM, PeopleSoft, Sun, and Teradata, a division of NCR. MicroStrategy is listed on Nasdaq under the symbol MSTR. For more information or to purchase or demo MicroStrategy’s software, visit MicroStrategy’s Web site at http://www.microstrategy.com.

This press release may include statements that may constitute “forward- looking statements,” including its estimates of future business prospects or financial results and statements containing the words “believe,” “estimate,” “project,” “expect” or similar expressions. Forward-looking statements inherently involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results of MicroStrategy Incorporated and its subsidiaries (collectively, the “Company”) to differ materially from the forward-looking statements. Factors that could contribute to such differences include: the ability of the Company to implement and achieve widespread customer acceptance of its MicroStrategy 7i and MicroStrategy Report Services software on a timely basis; the Company’s ability to recognize deferred revenue through delivery of products or satisfactory performance of services; continued acceptance of the Company’s products in the marketplace; the timing of significant orders; delays in the Company’s ability to develop or ship new products; market acceptance of new products; competitive factors; general economic conditions; currency fluctuations; and other risks detailed in the Company’s registration statements and periodic reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. By making these forward-looking statements, the Company undertakes no obligation to update these statements for revisions or changes after the date of this release.

MicroStrategy, MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform, MicroStrategy Report Services, MicroStrategy 7, MicroStrategy 7i are either trademarks or registered trademarks of MicroStrategy Incorporated in the United States and certain other countries. Other product and company names mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.

Wende Cover
MicroStrategy, Incorporated
1-703-770-1646
wcover@microstrategy.com

Source: MicroStrategy

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