Geometric Software leaped on sustained buying support on Friday, following rumours that the company has bagged a huge order.

The stock of the Mumbai-based software firm jumped by 10.08% to Rs 476 on the BSE, recording a huge volume of over 1.58 million shares by 14:50 IST.

The rally in the engineering software firm's stock was purely on market buzz that the company has bagged a huge order from Dassault Services. However, further details regarding the order were not known. Dealers said the order size could be around $40-50 million.

Meanwhile, the rise is also attributed to reports that IBM has won an order from Ford Motors. Further details were not known, but it is said that Ford will purchase 4,000-5,000 copies of IBM's software used by product designers. This order is expected to benefit GSSCL, as both IBM and GSSCL have already started harnessing their resources in Taiwan, which will be deployed for the above assignment.

One of the dealers said the rise in the GSCCL was purely operator-driven. He said the scrip is one of the favourites of Rakesh Jhujhuwala.

Earlier, GSSCL formed an alliance with EDS, the world's second-largest software services company, enabling the company to bid for all the CAD/CAM projects being undertaken by the multinational software giant.

On 9 January 2003, GSSCL unveiled its Q3 results. For the third quarter ended 31 December 2002, it registered a 25% rise in net profit to Rs 4.66 crore as compared to Rs 3.73 crore in the corresponding period of the previous year. Net sales increased by 31.3% to Rs 21.94 crore from Rs 16.71 crore in DQ 2001.

The company has maintained consolidated profit before tax guidance at around Rs 20 crore for FY 2002-03, which is 48% higher than the previous FY's performance. However, it scaled down the revenue guidance for FY 2002-03. According to the new guidance, year-on-year revenue growth will be between 34 and 39% (Rs 84-Rs 87 crore) as against 40% given in the September 2002 quarter.

As on 31 December 2002, promoters held 3370% stakes in GSSCL. The public, local institutions and foreign institutiona held 37.49%, 3.95% and 10.57% respectively.