Check Point reported: Revenue grew by 4.9% and amounted to $ 534 million

Israeli information security giant Check Point reported its results for the third quarter of 2021 with an improvement in the revenue line but a decline in the profit line. In both parameters, Check Point exceeded market forecasts.
The Israeli company traded on the Nasdaq Stock Exchange reported adjusted earnings (NON-GAAP) of $ 219.8 million or $ 1.65 per share, compared to $ 230.8 million or $ 1.64 per share in the corresponding quarter last year. Adjusted earnings exceeded analysts' expectations of $ 1.6 per share on average.
GAAP was $ 187 million or $ 1.41 per share, compared to $ 200.7 million or $ 1.44 per share in the third quarter of 2020. The decline in earnings is mainly due to a 16.3% increase in research and development expenses in the quarter to $ 71.3 million, and an increase of About 9% in marketing and sales expenses to about $ 148.3 million in the quarter.
The Israeli information security company's revenue grew by 4.9% in the quarter compared to the same period last year and amounted to $ 534 million, with analysts forecasting an average revenue of $ 529.61 million.
In the background, among other things, the currency market is awaiting an update from the ECB (European Central Bank) in light of rising inflation. The president of the bank, Christine Lagard, will speak today immediately after the interest rate decision at 14:45 (Israel time), which is expected to remain at a negative level of 0.5%.
Most of the increase in revenue was due to the subscriptions section, which increased by 12.5% ​​and brought the company $ 190 million in the third quarter, along with $ 224.9 million from software and maintenance updates which increased by 2% and $ 119.1 million from product sales and licenses, which decreased slightly by 0.9% during The quarter.
Gil Schweid, Founder and CEO of Check Point: “The company's revenue came towards the high end of our forecasts, and non-GAAP earnings per share exceeded forecasts. Subscriber revenue increased by approximately 13% as a result of triple-digit growth in Infinity platform sales and double-digit growth in Harmony and CloudGuard.
"During the quarter, we further expanded the Infinity platform with the acquisition of Avanan, the fastest growing e-mail security and collaboration security company to address the most vulnerable attack vector - e-mail-delivered malware."
Schweid also referred to the latest cyber threats: "If the 5th generation cyber attacks (attacks that use a variety of vectors in one tool) were quite rare until a few years ago, today they occur on a weekly basis. Israel is experiencing a significant increase in attacks, with 1 in 56 organizations Israel is currently experiencing cyber attacks on a weekly basis.
The medical sector is one of the most attacked sectors, also in Israel, and experiences about 1,400 attacks a week. In Israel, this is organization 1 for every 24 organizations attacked each week. The reason for the vulnerability of health organizations is mainly that the medical environment is open and rich in relatively old devices.
But all organizations today are more exposed, as the information is no longer stored only within the walls of the organization, but is exposed, among other things, in the cloud. In addition, most existing defenses today fail to prevent attacks, because most solutions detect the attack after it has already happened, and then it remains to repair damage that has already been done. What is needed is prevention. "