Juniper in Free Fall

Later, though, Kriens took up a less optimistic tune, and investors took note.

Kriens said on the call that the company won't match Wall Street estimates for its first quarter ending in March, due in part to order softness in Japan. The company expects to make 19 cents a share on a pro forma basis excluding certain costs on revenue of $570 million or so. Analysts were looking for a 20-cent per-share profit on sales of $586 million.

That's not all: going by Kriens' comments, the second quarter will be just as bad. Looking ahead to the second quarter, Juniper expects to post adjusted earnings of about 19 cents a share on $585 million in sales. That forecast is well below the 22-cent pro forma profit on $616.8 million in revenue analysts expected.

The news comes just two weeks after Juniper reshuffled its management ranks by replacing three executives with four, including a hard-charging manager from rival Cisco (CSCO Quote). Juniper says it has now realigned its businesses around two customer groups: enterprises and phone companies.