Shares in UK tech firm Micro Focus slumped this morning after it warned that revenues had been falling faster than it had expected in January, and its chief executive was stepping down with immediate effect.
Chris Hsu submitted his resignation "in order to spend more time with his family and pursue another opportunity".
Stephen Murdoch, currently Micro Focus chief operating officer, becomes chief executive and rejoins the board.
Shares were down more than 55 per cent in morning trading.
Read more: Micro Focus share price boosted by newly acquired HPE software
The software giant, which bought Hewlett Packard Enterprise's software business last year, said since its interim results on 8 January, the rate of year-on-year revenue decline has been "greater than anticipated". So the group is issuing revised constant currency revenue guidance for the twelve months ending 31 October 2018 of minus six per cent to minus nine per cent, compared to the year before.
In January, with acquisition sales stripped out, Micro Focus posted a 2.9 per cent fall in revenue to $664.7m and earnings fell by 4.1 per cent.
The firm said its recent revenue performance is predominantly due to lower than expected licence income due to a number of factors. Management believe that to be "largely one-off transitional effects" of the combination with HPE software, rather than underlying issues with the end market or the product portfolios.
Despite those integration challenges, Micro Focus said it felt the "fundamental thesis" of the HPE software acquisition remains intact.
Its strategy, dividend policy and leverage target remain unchanged.
Kevin Loosemore, executive chairman of Micro Focus International said:
We remain confident in Micro Focus' strategy whilst recognising that operational issues have led to a disappointing short term performance and outlook. We believe that Micro Focus is well positioned to help our customers with the increasing pace of change across their Hybrid IT environments and to deliver customer centred innovation.
Read more: Here's why Micro Focus shares plunged despite posting an 80pc sales rise
[contf] [contfnew] 
CityAM
[contfnewc] [contfnewc]
