The Best And Worst Technology Company Stocks In 2014 (So Far)

Tech Vendor Stock Gainers Outnumber Losers By More Than 2-To-1

So far this year the stock markets have continued their roll with the Dow Jones Index up more than 1.5 percent (as of the June 30 closing) and the Nasdaq up more than 5.5 percent.

And many technology vendors have been riding that wave. Of the 36 companies on our watch list, 25 have seen the value of their shares increase – nine of them in double digits. But 11 have recorded stock price declines, some of them in steep double digits as well.

Here's a look at who was up and who was down in the first six months of 2014, based on stock closing prices between Dec. 31, 2013 and June 30, 2014.

BlackBerry

CEO: John Chen

Dec. 31, 2013: $7.44

June 30, 2014: $10.24

Change: +37.6%

After many quarters of plunging sales and a sinking stock price, many people gave this mobile device maker up for dead. But since John Chen took the reins as CEO in November and began executing a turnaround strategy, the company has showed signs of life, including surprising Wall Street with a small profit in its first fiscal quarter ended May 31.

Among the IT vendors on our watch list, BlackBerry recorded the biggest gain in its stock price during the first six months of 2014. False hopes or signs of a true turnaround? Time will tell.

Lexmark International

CEO: Paul Rooke

Dec. 31, 2013: $35.52

June 30, 2014: $48.16

Change: +35.6%

In April printer manufacturer Lexmark reported that revenue in its first quarter ended March 31 declined less than 1 percent to $877.7 million. Earnings declined year-over-year by nearly 27 percent to $29.3 million. In April the company increased its quarterly dividend by 20 percent to $0.36 per share.

Lexmark has been transitioning from a hardware-centric company to one focused more on software and solutions. The company is currently bidding to acquire ReadSoft, a developer of business document processing software.

FalconStor Software

CEO: Gary Quinn

Dec. 31, 2013: $1.35

June 30, 2014: $1.70

Change: +25.9%

FalconStor Software was frequently near the bottom of our tech vendor stock roundups in 2013. But the stock of the data protection and storage virtualization software developer has been rebounding this year, following a comprehensive corporate restructuring and changes to its management team.

For its first quarter ended March 31, FalconStor reported that sales were down 22 percent year-over-year to $12.0 million. The reported loss of $2.6 million for the quarter was smaller than the $3.9 million loss in the first quarter of 2013.

Hewlett-Packard

CEO: Meg Whitman

Dec. 31, 2013: $27.98

June 30, 2014: $33.68

Change: +20.4%

Hewlett-Packard has been in turnaround mode under Whitman for close to three years and the general consensus is that the company is making progress. But the May announcement of plans to lay off between 11,000 and 16,000 employees, after a quarterly sales report failed to meet expectations, was a reminder that the company has a ways to go.

For the company's second quarter ended April 30, HP reported revenue of $27.3 billion, down 1 percent from $27.6 billion in the same period one year earlier. But net earnings for the quarter were up 18 percent to $1.27 billion.

Intel

CEO: Brian Krzanich

Dec. 31, 2013: $25.96

June 30, 2014: $30.90

Change: +19.0%

In its first quarter ended March 29 Intel reported revenue of $12.8 billion, up 1.5 percent from $12.6 billion in the same period one year earlier. Net income for the period, however, was down almost 5 percent year-over-year to $1.95 billion.

In June Intel raised its revenue forecasts for its second quarter and full year, citing stronger than expected demand for business PCs. For the year the company is now expecting some revenue growth, in contrast to earlier forecasts of approximately flat revenue.

Apple

CEO: Tim Cook

Dec. 31, 2013: $80.15

June 30, 2014: $92.93

Change: +15.9%

Apple split its stock 7-for-1 in early June and our share price calculations reflect the change.

In April Apple said revenue in its second fiscal quarter ended March 30 increased almost 5 percent to $45.6 billion. Net income for the period was up 7 percent to $10.2 billion.

In June Apple debuted iOS 8 and OS X 10.10 Yosemite at the vendor's annual World Wide Developers Conference.

Microsoft

CEO: Satya Nadella

Dec. 31, 2013: $37.41

June 30, 2014: $41.70

Change: +11.5%

Satya Nadella took over as Microsoft's CEO from the retiring Steve Ballmer in February. And while five months is certainly too soon to judge whether the new top executive will be successful in transforming the software giant, shareholders apparently like what they see so far.

For the company's fiscal third quarter ended March 31 Microsoft reported revenue of $20.4 billion, down less than 0.5 percent from the same period a year earlier. Net income was $5.7 billion, down more than 6 percent from a year earlier.

Lenovo Group

CEO: Yang Yuanqing

Dec. 31, 2013: $24.43

June 30, 2014: $27.19

Change: +11.3%

Lenovo continues to show impressive growth in the PC market and increase its market share against rivals Dell and Hewlett-Packard. IBM and Lenovo are still working to complete their $2.3 billion deal under which Lenovo will buy IBM's x86 server business. Chinese anti-monopoly regulators approved the deal earlier this month.

In May the company reported that revenue in its fiscal 2014 ended March 31 grew 14 percent to $38.7 billion while earnings were up 29 percent to $817 million.

Cisco Systems

CEO: John Chambers

Dec. 31, 2013: $22.43

June 30, 2014: $24.85

Change: +10.8%

Cisco Systems has suffered some bumpy financial results in recent quarters, citing weakness in its service provider business and emerging markets. But at the Cisco Live event in May CEO John Chambers assured attendees that the vendor's growth prospects are bright.

For its third fiscal quarter ended April 26, Cisco reported revenue of $11.5 billion, down 5.5 percent from the same quarter one year earlier. Net income was $2.2 billion, down 12 percent from one year before.

Western Digital

CEO: Steve Milligan

Dec. 31, 2013: $83.9

June 30, 2014: $92.3

Change: +10.0%

For its third fiscal quarter ended March 28, data storage device and technology vendor Western Digital reported revenue of $3.70 billion, down 1.6 percent from the same period last year. Net income for the quarter was down 4 percent year-over-year to $375 million.

In May the company declared a $0.40 per-share dividend for the quarter that ended June 27.

Juniper Networks

CEO: Shaygan Kheradpir

Dec. 31, 2013: $22.57

June 30, 2014: $24.54

Change: +8.7%

For its first quarter ended March 31 networking gear manufacturer Juniper Networks reported that revenue increased more than 10 percent year-over-year to $1.17 billion. Net income for the quarter grew more than 21 percent to $110.6 million.

In May Juniper and rival Palo Alto Networks announced a settlement to a longstanding patent dispute between the two companies under which Palo Alto made a one-time $175 million payment to Juniper.

Advanced Micro Devices

CEO: Rory Read

Dec. 31, 2013: $3.87

June 30, 2014: $4.19

Change: +8.3%

For its first fiscal quarter ended March 29 AMD reported revenue of $1.40 billion, up more than 28 percent form revenue in the same period one year earlier. The company reported a $20.0 million loss, a big improvement from the $146 million loss reported a year before.

Last month the company shook up its executive team and consolidated several business units in an effort to more aggressively pursue high-growth markets such as embedded devices. The chipmaker promoted Lisa Su to become its chief operating officer, overseeing AMD's new Enterprise, Embedded and Semi-Custom Business Group.

VMware

CEO: Pat Gelsinger

Dec. 31, 2013: $89.71

June 30, 2014: $96.81

Change: +7.9%

The king of virtualization technology has been busy expanding its product lineup into virtual storage with its long-anticipated vSAN technology and expanding sales of its NSX software-defined networking products (which launched in November).

In April VMware reported that revenue in its first quarter ended March 31 grew 14 percent year-over-year to $1.36 billion. Net income was up 15 percent to $199 million. But among those gains was news that licensing revenue from enterprise licensing agreements grew more slowly than expected.

Oracle

CEO: Larry Ellison

Dec. 31, 2013: $38.26

June 30, 2014: $40.53

Change: +5.9%

In recent quarters Oracle hasn't been the growth juggernaut it was a few years ago. In its fiscal fourth quarter ended May 31 the company reported that revenue grew 3 percent to more than $11.3 billion. But new software license revenue was flat year-over-year and net income declined 4 percent to $3.65 billion – deeply disappointing Wall Street.

Last month Oracle said it would acquire Micros Systems, a developer of point-of-sale systems for the retail and hospitality industries, for $5.3 billion.

Netgear

CEO: Patrick Lo

Dec. 31, 2013: $32.94

June 30, 2014: $34.77

Change: +5.6%

For its first quarter ended March 30 Netgear reported revenue of $349.4 million, up 19.1 percent over the same period one year before. But net income dropped 6 percent to $14.4 million.

Salesforce.com

CEO: Marc Benioff

Dec. 31, 2013: $55.19

June 30, 2014: $58.08

Change: +5.2%

For its fiscal first quarter ended April 30 Salesforce reported revenue of $1.23 billion, up 37 percent from the same quarter one year earlier. But the company's net loss grew to $96.9 million compared to a loss of $67.7 million one year before.

During the company's Q1 earnings call in May, CEO Marc Benioff said the company is now forecasting revenue for all of fiscal 2015 to be between $5.30 billion and $5.34 billion.

EMC

CEO: Joe Tucci

Dec. 31, 2013: $25.15

June 30, 2014: $26.34

Change: +4.7%

For its first quarter ended March 31, data storage system giant EMC reported that sales grew 1.7 percent year-over-year to $5.48 billion. But net income for the quarter plunged more than 32 percent to $392 million.

In May EMC acquired DSSD, a Menlo Park, Calif.-based developer of rack-scale, server-side flash storage technology designed to speed up application performance. The company had been in stealth mode and expected to ship its first products next year.

Panasonic Corp.

CEO: Joe Taylor

Dec. 31, 2013: $11.66

June 30, 2014: $12.18

Change: +4.5%

For fiscal 2014 ended March 31, Panasonic Corp. reported revenue of 7.74 trillion Yen ($76.1 billion), up 6 percent from fiscal 2013. Net income for the year was 120.4 billion Yen ($1.19 billion), compared to the net loss of 754.3 billion Yen ($7.44 billion) for fiscal 2013.

Check Point Software Technologies

CEO: Gil Shwed

Dec. 31, 2013: $64.50

June 30, 2014: $67.03

Change: +3.9%

For its fiscal 2014 first quarter, security technology appliance vendor Check Point Software Technologies reported revenue of $342.2 million, up 6 percent from the same period last year. Net income increased 3.5 percent year-over-year to $153.1 million.

Brocade Communications

CEO: Lloyd Carney

Dec. 31, 2013: $8.87

June 30, 2014: $9.20

Change: +3.7%

For its second quarter ended May 3 networking technology vendor Brocade reported revenue of $536.9 million, down about 0.3 percent from the same period one year ago. And the company reported a $13.7 million loss for the period compared to net income of $46.9 million in last year's second quarter.

In May Brocade executives told CRN the company is investing heavily in its federal government business.

SAP

CEOs: Bill McDermott

Dec. 31, 2013: $74.86

June 30, 2014: $77.00

Change: +2.9%

SAP reported 3 percent revenue growth to 3.7 billion Euros ($5.0 billion) in its first quarter ended March 31. After-tax profit also grew 3 percent to 534 million Euros ($726.7 million) during the quarter.

In May McDermott became the company's sole CEO after the departure of co-CEO Jim Hagemann Snabe. On the technology side SAP is heavily investing in its HANA in-memory computing platform and its cloud software: In the first quarter cloud subscriptions and support revenue increased 38 percent.

Google

CEO: Larry Page

Dec. 31, 2013: $559.79

June 30, 2014: $575.28

Change: +2.8%

Google reported revenue of $15.42 billion for its first quarter ended March 31, up 16 percent from the same period one year earlier. Net income grew 3 percent year-over-year to $3.5 billion.

Google has generated a lot of headlines this year with its research projects such as Google Glass and driverless cars. But the ad-driven revenue and other income from the company's websites remain the core of its business, generating $10.47 billion in the first quarter.

In January Google struck a deal to sell its Motorola Mobility business to Lenovo for $2.91 billion.

Xerox

CEO: Ursula Burns

Dec. 31, 2013: $12.17

June 30, 2014: $12.44

Change: +2.2%

Xerox reported revenue of $5.12 billion for its first quarter ended March 31, down 2 percent from the same period one year earlier. Net income declined 5 percent in the quarter to $281 million.

In March Xerox unveiled a new partner program focused on helping channel partners make the jump to managed services and a recurring revenue model.

Quantum

CEO: Jon Gacek

Dec. 31, 2013: $1.20

June 30, 2014: $1.22

Change: +1.7%

Data storage technology developer Quantum reported that revenue for its fourth fiscal quarter ended March 31, was $128.0 million, down more than 8 percent from the same period one year before. The company also reported a $14.4 million loss for the quarter.

For all of fiscal 2014 Quantum reported revenue of $553.2 million, down almost 6 percent from fiscal 2013. Net loss for the year was $21.5 million, an improvement from the $52.2 million loss the company recorded in fiscal 2013.

Seagate Technology

CEO: Stephen Luczo

Dec. 31, 2013: $56.16

June 30, 2014: $56.82

Change: +1.2%

In April hard disk and storage technology manufacturer Seagate reported sales of $3.41 billion for its third fiscal quarter ended March 28, down 3.4 percent from the same period a year earlier. Net income for the quarter was down 5 percent to $395 million.

Seagate will report its fourth quarter and year-end results on July 17.

In May the company announced a deal to acquire the LSI flash technology business from Avago Technologies for $450 million in cash.

Citrix Systems

CEO: Mark Templeton

Dec. 31, 2013: $63.25

June 30, 2014: $62.55

Change: -1.1%

Citrix is the first company on our watch list to record a decline in its stock price in the first half of 2014.

The cloud and virtualization software company reported sales of $750.8 million for its first fiscal quarter ended March 31, up more than 11 percent from the same quarter one year before. But net income declined 6 percent year-over-year to $55.9 million.

In January Citrix CEO Mark Templeton, 61, announced plans to retire within the next year. But in June he changed his mind and announced that he would be staying on as the company's chief executive.

Red Hat

CEO: James Whitehurst

Dec. 31, 2013: $56.04

June 30, 2014: $55.27

Change: -1.4%

Red Hat reported revenue of $423.8 million for its first fiscal quarter ended May 31, up almost 17 percent from the same quarter last year. Net income for the quarter, however, declined more than 6.5 percent to $37.7 million.

Last month Red Hat struck a deal to acquire eNovance, a Paris-based cloud services provider and major contributor to the OpenStack community, for 50 million Euros ($68 million) in cash and 20 million Euros ($27.2 million) in Red Hat common stock.

Motorola Solutions

CEO: Greg Brown

Dec. 31, 2013: $67.50

June 30, 2014: $66.57

Change: -1.4%

Motorola reported sales of $1.8 billion for its first quarter ended March 29, down almost 9 percent from the same quarter one year before. Net income for the communications company's first quarter was $127 million, down almost 34 percent year-over-year.

Symantec

CEO: Michael Brown

Dec. 31, 2013: $23.58

June 30, 2014: $22.90

Change: -2.9%

In May Symantec reported that revenue for its fiscal 2014 ended March 28 was $6.68 billion, down 3 percent from $6.91 billion in fiscal 2013. Net income for the year was up almost 19 percent to $898 million.

Symantec is in the midst of a difficult overhaul of its product line and go-to-market strategy. In March the company fired CEO Steve Bennett and named Brown as the company's interim president and CEO. The company is searching for a permanent replacement.

IBM

CEO: Virginia Rometty

Dec. 31, 2013: $187.57

June 30, 2014: $181.27

Change: -3.4%

For its first quarter ended March 31, IBM reported revenue of $22.5 billion, down 3.9 percent from last year's first quarter. That included a 23 percent plunge in sales from the company's struggling Systems and Technology Group. Net income for the quarter was down more than 21 percent to $2.38 billion.

IBM and Lenovo have been working to wrap up the deal for Lenovo to acquire IBM's x86 server business for $2.3 billion. Earlier this month Chinese anti-monopoly regulators gave their approval for the acquisition.

FireEye

CEO: David DeWalt

Dec. 31, 2013: $43.61

June 30, 2014: $40.55

Change: -7.0%

High-flying security technology developer FireEye went public on September 20 with a lot of fanfare and the security company's stock price rose steadily through March when it hit a high of $95.63 per share. But the price has declined almost as steadily since then, just about returning to its IPO price by June 30 (and has continued declining since then).

There's no arguing about FireEye's growth: For its first quarter ended March 31 the company reported revenue of just under $74.0 million, up from $28.4 million in the same period last year. The company's net loss also grew, however, to $101.2 million from $27.0 million one year earlier.

NetApp

CEO: Tom Georgens

Dec. 31, 2013: $41.14

June 30, 2014: $36.52

Change: -11.2%

For its fiscal year ended April 25, NetApp reported revenue of $6.33 billion, virtually flat with the data storage system maker's fiscal 2013 sales. But NetApp reported a healthy 26 percent boost in net income to $637.5 million in fiscal 2014.

In May IBM announced that it would stop reselling NetApp storage systems, ending a nine-year OEM relationship. Gartner estimated that IBM accounted for 5 percent to 6 percent of NetApp's total storage product sales in calendar 2013.

CA Technologies

CEO: Michael Gregoire

Dec. 31, 2013: $33.65

June 30, 2014: $28.74

Change: -14.6%

In May CA Technologies reported revenue of $4.52 billion for its fiscal 2014 ended March 31, down 2 percent from the $4.61 billion in revenue the company recorded in fiscal 2013. Net income for fiscal 2014 was $914 million, down more than 4 percent from $955 million in fiscal 2013.

Under Gregoire, CA has been overhauling its operations, including laying off some employees and consolidating development operations. The company reported that the revenue decline was primarily attributable to slower Enterprise Solutions product sales.

QLogic

CEO: Prasad Rampalli

Dec. 31, 2013: $11.83

June 30, 2014: $10.09

Change: -14.7%

QLogic in May reported revenue of $460.9 million for the company's fiscal 2014 ended March 31, down almost 5 percent from the $484.5 million in sales the company recorded in fiscal 2013. For the year the network infrastructure technology developer reported a loss of $18.3 million compared to earnings of $73.1 million in fiscal 2013.

NetSuite

CEO: Zach Nelson

Dec. 31, 2013: $103.02

June 30, 2014: $86.88

Change: -15.7%

Cloud application vendor NetSuite has been focused on growth. And that's what it's been doing, reporting revenue growth of 34 percent to $123.0 million in its first quarter ended March 31. For all of 2014 the company is forecasting sales in the range of $540 million to $545 million. But the company's bottom-line losses continu to grow, from $13.0 million in the first quarter of last year to $22.2 million in this year's first quarter.

CommVault Systems

CEO: N. Robert Hammer

Dec. 31, 2013: $74.86

June 30, 2014: $49.17

Change: -34.3%

Among the IT companies on our watch list, data management system vendor CommVault has seen its stock price drop the most in the first half of 2014.

It's difficult to see what's driving the share prices down. The company reported "another solid year in fiscal 2014," in the words of CEO Robert Hammer, with revenue in the fiscal year ended March 31 growing more than 18 percent to $586.3 million. Net income for the year was up 20 percent to $53.2 million.

Perhaps investors were reacting to the company's fourth quarter results in which net income declined almost 8 percent to $15.7 million, despite 13 percent sales growth.