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Digital River shifts strategy

Last update: August 11, 2008 - 6:37 PM

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Digital River Inc., the manager of Symantec Corporation's online store, will seek business from more consumer electronics makers, relying less on the software maker for growth, Chief Executive Joel Ronning said.

Symantec, the world's biggest maker of security programs, accounts for about a third of revenue, Ronning said Monday in a Bloomberg Television interview. The company is Digital River's largest customer.

Sales growth has slowed in four of the past five quarters and picked up in the latest period, partly because of new contracts from consumer electronics makers.

Eden Prairie-based Digital River designs and maintains e-commerce websites, processing payments from shoppers and helping to direct customers to those pages.

"What we're working on is trying to grow the rest of the organization in the consumer electronics and the games industry, and we're having some success there," Ronning said.

Digital River also is targeting other software makers and Fortune 500 companies as clients, he said.

Last month, Digital River said its second-quarter profit fell 9 percent but beat Wall Street's expectations. The company also raised its full-year forecast. Digital River shares have gained 34 percent this year.

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