January 26, 2009 - Concur Technologies, Inc. (CNQR-NASDAQ) provides employee spend management solutions. Its software solutions include Concur Travel & Expense, a travel procurement and expense reporting solution; Concur Expense, which provides the process and information for management to reduce manual processing, enhance internal controls, increase business policy compliance, speed up reimbursement, and increase expense report accuracy; Concur Cliqbook Travel, an online travel management solution; and Concur Invoice, which enables companies to streamline payment requests, facilitating approval processes, and automatic updating of accounts payable systems.

It also provides Concur Pay that enables the direct deposit of reimbursable employee expenses; Concur Audit, which provides expense report auditing services to streamline the process of managing and substantiating expense receipts; Concur Intelligence offers enhanced report authoring features to help customers analyze, manage, and reduce corporate expenses; Concur Meeting, a Web-based service that enables organizations to manage the planning of corporate events and group travel; Smart Expense, which begins the expense reporting process with the click that books the travel reservation; and Concur Connect, a program that connects suppliers.

In addition, the company does consulting, customer support, and training services. It markets its solutions worldwide to public companies and single-location private companies through its direct sales organization, as well as strategic reseller and referral partners. The company was founded in 1993 and is headquartered in Redmond, Washington.

Do you get the feeling this company focuses on expenses? So do I. That's why it may be the perfect fit for a portfolio looking for a growing company in a shrinking economy. If there's one thing management is drilling down on, it's expenses. Concur offers products to help with the drilling.

In 2002, investors could have bought all of this stock they wanted at 30 cents a share (prices reflect a 1 for 6 reverse stock split in 2004). At that time earnings were still colored red. In 2000, they were negatove $3.06 a share, followed by negative $1.37, then negative 46 cents in 2002. Ever since, the color for earnings has been black, starting in 2003 at 3 cents, then 6 cents, followed by 15 cents. 2006 took a step back, showing earnings at 13 cents but then 2007 saw a better return, moving the number to 20 cents a share. Last year (fiscal year ended on September 30), earnings jumped to 35 cents. For this year, analysts expect 70 cents and for 2010, 94 cents. It looks like things are going in the right direction.

Sales have been ramping as well, going from $71.8 million in 2005 to last year's $215.5 million. This year, analysts see $267.35 million (up 24%) and next year another leap up of 25% to $335.06 million.

Quarterly earnings will be announced on February 4 at 2:00 p.m. PST. Investors can see the presentation slides and listen to the Web cast at www.concur.com/investors.

The current economic recession isn't limited to the U.S. In fact, most others countries are faring worse. That only means more opportunity for Concur. Currently about 11% of sales come from outside the U.S. Analysts see that percentage going to 20 by the years 2011 to 2013. Focus will be on Europe and Asia/Pacific for increased market share and new alignments with other companies to enter new markets.

There's lots of cash in the bank at Concur. $270 million worth. Total long term debt amounts to $2.83 million, giving a debt to equity ratio of less than .005. With all the money, Concur has several options: continued strong R&D to develop new tracking programs; buyback stock; and/or buy other companies for their market share and/or technologies.

More numbers: While the trailing P/E is high (83), the forward P/E is more in line with the company's earnings growth at 31. Price to Book is 2.77. Operating margin for the last 12 months was 12.37% while Profit margin was 7.97%. Return on Equity is a relatively low 4.2%. That large cash position translates into $5.48 a share in cash. Current ratio is 3.94. Book value is $10.63. Beta is a palpitating 1.66 so expect plenty of volatility if you venture into this stock. The 52-week high was $50, set on September 18, 2008. The 52-week low was set 2 months later at $19.52.

Concur Technologies offers the right products at the right time. It's been building successfully from its core technology with add-ons that have been well received in the market place. Investors have followed the success and been impressed. They loved the stock in September of last year, only to lose faith quickly and dump it in November. But then investors dumped everything in November. But this stock saw a 60% collapse in a very short period of time. Remember that as you dig deeper into CNQR and like what you see.

Company Web site: www.concur.com

- Ted Allrich