Sophos Group Share News (SOPH)

(Sharecast News) - Sophos got a boost on Wednesday as Liberum initiated coverage of the security software and hardware company with a 'buy' rating and 530p price target, saying it expects billings to return to fast growth in the second half.The brokerage noted that Sophos shares have been battered year-to-date, down 17% due to perceived competitive pressures and a disappointing first-quarter billings growth rate of 6%."However, the company has a leading cloud platform which combined with top-performing products can drive cross-selling into existing and new customers. We expect billings to return to fast growth in H2, and the mid-term guidance of circa $1bn in billings remains deliverable, in our view."Liberum said Sophos Central is a "superb" cross-selling tool, easy to use and allowing partners and managers to perform diagnosis routines on customers' systems. It noted that the platform currently has more than 65,000 signed up customers and generated $186m in billings in FY18."While we do not forecast Sophos Central separately, going forward we believe it will be a crucial contributor to both billings and revenue growth," it said.It also highlighted the group's Synchronised Security offering, which allows cybersecurity applications to communicate between each other when suspicious behaviour or threats are identified."Our analysis has identified that intelligence sharing is one of the prominent trends in cybersecurity, and we believe Sophos has a first mover advantage in this space. In our view, Synchronised Security can become a significant billings driver, as the more products customers acquire, the more ring-fenced against threats virtual environments become."At 1050 BST, the shares were up 4.7% to 495.60p.