IRVINE, Calif. -

As company leadership stated it is “well positioned” for even more progress, Autobytel revealed last week that it generated increased revenues and improved profitability during the first quarter compared with the year-ago period.

Autobytel determined that first-quarter revenues grew 4 percent to $16.7 million. This sum was up  from $16.0 million a year ago.

The company indicated revenues generated from purchase requests, the company’s core product offering, rose 6 percent year-over-year to $15.8 million,  primarily reflecting stronger demand from manufacturers and other wholesale channels.

As a result, Autobytel highlighted that its first-quarter gross profit grew 11 percent to $6.8 million, as it was up from $6.2 million a year ago.

The company said its gross margin improved to 40.9 percent of total revenues for the first quarter that ended March 31. Officials pointed out that level is higher than the first quarter of the previous year when it was 38.4 percent.

“The improvement in gross margin was due, in part, to a higher level of internally generated purchase requests,” Autobytel explained.

The company calculated its total first-quarter operating expenses declined to $6.5 million from $6.6 million for the same quarter last year.

After sifting through the data, Autobytel found its first-quarter net income totaled $253,000 or 1 cent per diluted share, marking quite a turnaround from a year earlier. That’s when Autobytel sustained a net loss of $571,000 or 1 cent per share.

The company also noted cash flow provided by operations was $894,000 for the first quarter compared with cash flow used in operations of $1.2 million for the prior-year first quarter.

“Our focus on helping automotive dealer and manufacturer customers generate higher levels of sales conversions by providing them with quality purchase requests is continuing to drive improvements in our business,” stated Jeffrey Coats, president and chief executive officer of Autobytel.

“As a comprehensive resource for car buyers, and with what we believe to be the industry’s largest combined dealer and manufacturer automotive purchase request distribution network, Autobytel is well positioned to benefit from ongoing improvements in our core business, along with the continuing recovery in the automotive sector,” Coats added.