Bell Microproducts Aims To Get Relisted On NASDAQ

At that point, the San Jose, Calif.-based distributor can begin the process of having its stock relisted on Nasdaq. The ongoing investigation into the company's stock option and accounting practices for 2006 indirectly led Nasdaq to delist Bell Microproducts' stock in March.

"Our priorities for 2009 are to get the financial reporting up to date. Our stock was at $5 earlier this year, it's about 65 cents now. It's embarrassing, but a fact," said Bell at the Raymond James & Associates IT Supply Chain Conference in New York on Tuesday. "We believe there's a significant amount of baggage hanging over [Wall Street] because of the delisting. Completing the audit will get a major chunk of that out of the way. In the meantime, we continue to run the business, with our core strength of storage and focusing on selling solutions capabilities in high growth areas like security, the surveillance market, the medical market."

Bell doesn't believe the company has lost any significant revenue or market share as a result of the investigation and delisting.

"When it happened, we rallied the troops and asked ourselves what does it mean to the running of the business. The answer is not much. We went to all the major vendors and banks. The banks have been phenomenally supportive. Our suppliers have been great. We had a few problems with some of the credit insurers, that was more in Europe and Latin America. I can't think of a single credit line that was cut by the suppliers."

Bell Microproducts has not filed financial documents with the Securities and Exchange Commission since the third fiscal quarter of 2006.

Bell told the audience of Wall Street investors and analysts Tuesday that the company's revenue fell 10 percent in the third quarter, to $903 million from $1 billion in the year-ago quarter.

Bell noted that Bell Microproducts recently won a two-year $20 million contract with Hewlett-Packard, a $50 million incremental deal with an existing company and the near close of another $50 million deal. Bell noted that the company has seen more solid business coming from SMB customers as opposed to the enterprise.

"The closer you get to London and New York, the softer it gets. The farther away you get from those financial markets, the enterprise market is better, particularly in health care," Bell said.

Bell agreed with many distribution executives at the Raymond James conference noted that credit and the financial strength of their solution provider customers has not posed a problem to business.

"It's been surprisingly good. We are watching it like a hawk. We're maybe a little more conservative than others," Bell said. "We're leaning on our credit people to be out there early, calling before it's due. So far it's been OK, fairly normal. We're knocking on wood and hoping it stays that way."