VMware, Inc. (NYSE: VMW), a leader in cloud infrastructure and business mobility, today announced financial results for the fourth quarter and full year of 2015:

Quarterly Review

Annual Review

"VMware's Q4 2015 was a solid finish to 2015," said Pat Gelsinger, chief executive officer, VMware. "We were especially pleased with the growth across our portfolio of emerging products and businesses, including NSX, End-User Computing and Virtual SAN. All of these businesses demonstrated strong growth in both Q4 and for the full year, underscoring the momentum we expect to continue into 2016." 

"Our Q4 and 2015 results met or exceeded our revenue and operating margin expectations for the quarter and the year," said Jonathan Chadwick, chief financial officer, chief operating officer and executive vice president, VMware. "We are seeing the results of our product transitions and have positive momentum with our newer solutions heading into 2016." 

VMware also announced a restructuring and realignment of approximately 800 roles and plans to take a GAAP charge estimated to be between $55 million and $65 million related to this action over the course of the first half of 2016. The company plans to reinvest the associated savings in field, technical and support resources associated with growth products.

In addition, Jonathan Chadwick, VMware's chief financial officer, chief operating officer and executive vice president, has decided to leave VMware and expand his advisory roles, working with a number of companies as a non-executive board member. VMware has appointed Zane Rowe as the company's new chief financial officer and executive vice president. Rowe brings a wealth of executive experience from prior leadership roles at Apple, United Airlines, Continental Airlines and most recently as CFO of EMC. Rowe will assume the CFO role on March 1, 2016.

Recent Highlights & Strategic Announcements

The company will host a conference call today at 2:00 p.m. PT/ 5:00 p.m. ET to review financial results and business outlook. A live web broadcast of the event will be available on the VMware investor relations website at http://ir.vmware.com. Slides will accompany the web broadcast. The replay of the webcast and slides will be available on the website for two months. In addition, six quarters of historical data for revenues, which include year-over-year comparisons, will also be made available at http://ir.vmware.com in conjunction with the conference call.

About VMware 

VMware is the leader in virtualization and cloud infrastructure solutions that enable businesses to thrive in the Cloud Era. Customers rely on VMware to help them transform the way they build, deliver and consume Information Technology resources in a manner that is evolutionary and based on their specific needs. With 2015 revenues of $6.6 billion, VMware has more than 500,000 customers and 75,000 partners. The company is headquartered in Silicon Valley with offices throughout the world and can be found online at www.vmware.com.

Additional Information

VMware's website is located at www.vmware.com, and its investor relations website is located at http://ir.vmware.com. VMware's goal is to maintain the investor relations website as a portal through which investors can easily find or navigate to pertinent information about VMware, all of which is made available free of charge. The additional information includes materials that VMware files with the SEC; announcements of investor conferences and events at which its executives talk about its products, services and competitive strategies; webcasts of its quarterly earnings calls, investor conferences and events (archives of which are also available for a limited time); additional information on its financial metrics, including reconciliations of non-GAAP financial measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measures; press releases on quarterly earnings, product and service announcements, legal developments and international news; corporate governance information; and other news, blogs and announcements that VMware may post from time to time that investors may find useful or interesting.

VMware, NSX, Virtual SAN, VMware Cloud Management Platform, vRealize and AirWatch are registered trademarks or trademarks of VMware or its subsidiaries in the United States and other jurisdictions. All other marks and names mentioned herein may be trademarks of their respective organizations.

Use of Non-GAAP Financial Measures

Reconciliations of non-GAAP financial measures to VMware's financial results as determined in accordance with GAAP are included at the end of this press release following the accompanying financial data. For a description of these non-GAAP financial measures, including the reasons management uses each measure, please see the section of the tables titled "About Non-GAAP Financial Measures."

Forward-Looking Statements

This press release contains forward-looking statements including, among other things, statements regarding continued momentum of emerging products and business in 2016, the amount and timing of the expected charges and cash expenditures related to the announced restructuring plan, the timing of the CFO transition and the annual bookings run rate forecast of specified businesses. These forward-looking statements are subject to the safe harbor provisions created by the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Actual results could differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking statements as a result of certain risk factors, including but not limited to: (i) adverse changes in general economic or market conditions; (ii) delays or reductions in consumer, government and information technology spending; (iii) competitive factors, including but not limited to pricing pressures, industry consolidation, entry of new competitors into the virtualization software and cloud, end user and mobile computing industries, and new product and marketing initiatives by VMware's competitors; (iv) VMware's customers' ability to transition to new products and computing strategies such as cloud computing, desktop virtualization and the software defined data center; (v) the uncertainty of customer acceptance of emerging technology; (vi) changes in the willingness of customers to enter into longer term licensing and support arrangements; (vii) rapid technological changes in the virtualization software and cloud, end user and mobile computing industries; (viii) changes to product and service development timelines; (ix) VMware's relationship with EMC Corporation and EMC's ability to control matters requiring stockholder approval, including the election of VMware's board members and matters relating to EMC's investment in VMware, and any changes that Dell may implement following the completion of the Dell-EMC merger; (x) VMware's ability to protect its proprietary technology; (xi) VMware's ability to attract and retain highly qualified employees; (xii) the unsuccessful integration of acquired companies and assets into VMware; (xiii) disruptions to VMware's business resulting from the pendency of EMC's acquisition by Dell and the potential for loss of VMware customers due to uncertainty that the Dell-EMC transaction could have on VMware's business; (xiv)the potential negative impact on VMware's stock price due to any confusion or uncertainty caused by the VMware tracking stock that is expected to be issued by Dell to EMC stockholders in the transaction; (xv) disruptions resulting from key management changes; (xvi) pending or future stockholder litigation related to the Dell-EMC transaction, (xvii) VMware's ability to implement the workforce reductions and other components of the plan in various geographies; and (xviii) possible changes in the size and components of the expected restructuring charges and cash expenditures. These forward-looking statements are made as of the date of this press release, are based on current expectations and are subject to uncertainties and changes in condition, significance, value and effect as well as other risks detailed in documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including VMware's most recent reports on Form 10-K and Form 10-Q and current reports on Form 8-K that we may file from time to time, which could cause actual results to vary from expectations. VMware assumes no obligation to, and does not currently intend to, update any such forward-looking statements after the date of this release.

About Non-GAAP Financial Measures

To provide investors and others with additional information regarding VMware's results, VMware has disclosed in this earnings release the following non-GAAP financial measures: non-GAAP revenues, non-GAAP operating income, non-GAAP operating margin, non-GAAP other income (expense), net, non-GAAP net income, non-GAAP income per diluted share, and free cash flows. VMware has provided a reconciliation of each non-GAAP financial measure used in this earnings release to the most directly comparable GAAP financial measure. These non-GAAP financial measures, other than free cash flows, differ from GAAP in that they exclude stock-based compensation, employer payroll tax on employee stock transactions, amortization of acquired intangible assets, realignment charges, acquisition and other-related items, certain litigation and other contingencies, and the GSA settlement, each as discussed below. Free cash flows differ from GAAP cash flows from operating activities in its treatment of capital expenditures.

VMware has also presented in this earnings release (i) quarterly historical data for total revenues, excluding the GSA settlement, and unearned revenues; and (ii) data on the percentage change in total revenues and license revenues plus the sequential change in unearned revenues and unearned license revenues, respectively. VMware's management believes that these measures are useful to investors because they allow investors to make meaningful comparisons of VMware revenues and unearned revenues across periods.

VMware's management uses these non-GAAP financial measures to understand and compare operating results across accounting periods, for internal budgeting and forecasting purposes, for short- and long-term operating plans, to calculate bonus payments and to evaluate VMware's financial performance, the performance of its individual functional groups and the ability of operations to generate cash. Management believes these non-GAAP financial measures reflect VMware's ongoing business in a manner that allows for meaningful period-to-period comparisons and analysis of trends in VMware's business, as they exclude charges and gains that are not reflective of ongoing operating results. Management also believes that these non-GAAP financial measures provide useful information to investors and others in understanding and evaluating VMware's operating results and future prospects in the same manner as management and in comparing financial results across accounting periods and to those of peer companies. Additionally, management believes information regarding free cash flows provides investors and others with an important perspective on the cash available to make strategic acquisitions and investments, to repurchase shares, to fund ongoing operations and to fund other capital expenditures.

Management believes these non-GAAP financial measures are useful to investors and others in assessing VMware's operating performance due to the following factors:

Additionally, VMware's management believes that the non-GAAP financial measure free cash flows is meaningful to investors because management reviews cash flows generated from operations after taking into consideration capital expenditures due to the fact that these expenditures are considered to be a necessary component of ongoing operations.

The use of non-GAAP financial measures has certain limitations because they do not reflect all items of income and expense that affect VMware's operations. Specifically, in the case of stock-based compensation, if VMware did not pay out a portion of its compensation in the form of stock-based compensation and related employer payroll taxes, the cash salary expense included in operating expenses would be higher, which would affect VMware's cash position. VMware compensates for these limitations by reconciling the non-GAAP financial measures to the most comparable GAAP financial measures. These non-GAAP financial measures should be considered in addition to, not as a substitute for or in isolation from, measures prepared in accordance with GAAP and should not be considered measures of VMware's liquidity. Further, these non-GAAP measures may differ from the non-GAAP information used by other companies, including peer companies, and therefore comparability may be limited. Management encourages investors and others to review VMware's financial information in its entirety and not rely on a single financial measure.

Growth in Constant Currency

A majority of VMware's sales are denominated in the U.S. dollar; however, VMware also invoices and collects in the euro, the British pound, the Japanese yen, the Australian dollar and the Chinese renminbi in their respective regions. The U.S. dollar is the functional currency for all of VMware's legal entities. At the time a non-U.S. dollar transaction is recorded, the value of the transaction is converted into U.S. dollars at the exchange rate in effect for the month in which each order is booked.

As a result, the amount of license and total revenues and unearned revenues derived from these transactions will be impacted by foreign exchange fluctuations. In order to provide a comparable framework for assessing how VMware's business performed adjusted for the impact of foreign currency fluctuations, management analyzes year-over-year license and total revenue growth on a constant currency basis.

Revenue Growth in Constant Currency and Sequential Change in Unearned Revenues

License and total revenues recognized during the current period derived from non-U.S. dollar based transactions were converted into U.S. dollars using the exchange rates that were effective in the comparable prior year period. The calculated current period license and total revenues, adjusted for foreign currency fluctuations, is compared to the license and total revenues of the comparable prior year period, as reported, in calculating license and total revenue growth in constant currency.

Unearned license revenues and unearned total revenues at the end of the period, derived from non-U.S. dollar transactions recorded during the current period, were adjusted for foreign currency fluctuations using the exchange rates that were effective in the comparable prior year period. Unearned license revenues and unearned total revenues, adjusted for foreign currency fluctuations at the end of the period, are compared to unearned license revenues and unearned total revenues at the beginning of the period, as reported, in determining the sequential change in unearned revenues.