“In addition to the seasonal softness we normally experience in the first quarter of a new fiscal year, product sales during the quarter reflected a marked decrease in the number of deals greater than $1 million,” said John McAdam, F5 president and chief executive officer. “While this resulted in slower than expected revenue growth for the quarter, the number of large deals in the current pipeline is encouraging and indicates that we should see a resumption of the recent trend toward larger deals in the second quarter.
“From a product perspective we were also encouraged by the continuing strong growth of software revenue, which increased 44 percent year over year. The growing percentage of software as a component of our product offerings highlights increasing customer demand for hybrid solutions that allow greater flexibility in the deployment of application services within and across data centers and out into the cloud.”