TBR Weekly Preview: March 11-15

We’re going all over the technology space this week, with reports spanning U.S. federal government IT services to long-established hardware and data center providers, plus a couple of European-centric companies.

Wednesday:

• Talent continues to be the constraining factor on ManTech’s bright revenue growth outlook. Focus in defense and intelligence segments of the U.S. federal market on innovation creates healthy demand for ManTech’s labor-based technical services offerings, such as R&D, testing and evaluation of emerging technology. As a smaller competitor compared to many of its large prime peers in the federal sector, ManTech acutely feels the resource impacts of the security clearance backlog and overall tight labor market. TBR’s 4Q18 ManTech report, written by Senior Analyst Joey Cresta, will explore how ManTech uses adaptive learning, continuous monitoring software and new leadership hires to address the human capital challenges associated with scaling up its labor base to meet robust client demand.

Thursday:

• As detailed in our initial response, Lenovo achieved its sixth consecutive quarter of year-to-year revenue gains, reporting $14 billion in revenue in 4Q18, up 8.5% from the year-ago compare, even as consolidation opportunities cool in the PC market. Despite these high notes for Lenovo exiting 2018, the company will still face hurdles over the next two years. Its PC and Smart Devices businesses will have to deal with challenging and shifting PC environments. Data Center Group continues to deliver on its promises, but it remains in the red despite improvements to its bottom line. Lenovo’s Mobile business is still teetering in profitability. Read our full report by Analyst Dan Callahan to find how Lenovo will navigate these challenges and tee up for a seventh consecutive quarter of revenue growth in 1Q19. 
• Our detailed assessment of Atos will note that the company’s Digital Transformation Factory portfolio accounted for 30% of revenue in 2018, up from 23% of revenue in 2017, positively affected by increased activities with clients in areas such as orchestrated hybrid cloud, Digital Workplace and cybersecurity. As Senior Analyst Elitsa Bakalova will report, Atos’ efforts to position as a trusted partner for clients’ digital journeys are starting to pay off, and the new digital services strategy will shape the company’s activities over the next three years.
• As reported in our initial response, Hewlett Packard Enterprise’s (HPE) revenue fell 1.6% year-to-year to $7.6 billion. While revenue growth is always a goal, TBR believes HPE is more focused on improving profitability in the near term before it shifts to boosting revenue growth. In our full report Analyst Stephanie Long will dive into the long-term strategy of CEO Antonio Neri and how it will impact 2019. Key cost-cutting initiatives and strategic investments, such as in high-performance computing and the edge, will be likely highlights in 2019.
• Analyst Kelly Lesiczka will be reporting that T-Systems’ portfolio and organizational investments continue to improve its ability to gain wallet share in newer areas and stabilize revenue growth in 2018. Building out its emerging technology portfolio offerings, such as for IoT using DT’s product offerings, enables T-Systems to provide more comprehensive and personalized solutions to clients and generate larger-scale engagements to accelerate growth.

As promised, we published a new report last week by Senior Analyst Boz Hristov on Accenture Technology, and today published a report on TELUS International from Boz as well as a report on Mobile World Congress Barcelona 2019 by Principal Analyst Chris Antlitz.

While we do not have a webinar scheduled for this Wednesday, the next one will be on March 20 featuring Senior Analyst John Caucis talking about healthcare IT services.