Baltimore hamstrung by doubting Thomases

Struggling Irish security vendor Baltimore has admitted it's being hamstrung by customer worries that it may go out of business.

Speaking exclusively to silicon.com, Bijan Khezri, CEO of Baltimore, said the company was beating other PKI vendors hands-down in terms of technology, but was still hampered by customer doubts about its long-term future.

He said: "When it comes to winning contracts with customers, we do recognise that capital strength is a key competitive strength, and is something that customers don't perceive us having.

"Does it make competitors win contracts? Yes. But competitors never win on technology."

Khezri said that once the perception of Baltimore as 'struggling' changes, the firm will be in very strong position. "There is not a question of whether Baltimore can be a going concern anymore," he said.

However, Khezri's comments belie the real challenges the firm faces. According to its own financial statements, the firm will run out of cash in six months if it doesn't improve its cash burn.

Baltimore had planned to be in profit by this summer, making the cash burn situation irrelevant, but in its most recent results said the market had worsened and it now doesn't plan to break even until Christmas or early 2003.

In the last year it has rid itself of CEO and founder Fran Rooney, along with almost 700 other employees in an effort to restructure and bring costs under control. It also sold anti-virus arm Content Technologies for just £20.5m, after buying it for £700m in the dot-com boom times.

However Khezri is still bullish about prospects and envisages the company remaining independent.

He told silicon.com: "Increasingly as the commercial sector starts to adopt PKI following the lead of government and finance, the growth will easily give us critical mass we need to be an independent company.

"Customers prefer to deal with a pure-play vendor when it comes to PKI - they feel reassured you know what you are doing. We've a long way to go independently."