Juniper Networks Inc. beat Wall Street’s expectations and notched up a higher profit today as it posted its preliminary fourth-quarter financial results. The report came as the company prepares to face down the U.S. Justice Department in a legal tussle over its pending $14 billion acquisition by its rival Hewlett Packard Enterprise Co.

The Sunnyvale, California-based company provides technology that is used to optimize data traffic across large-scale networks such as those used by cloud and internet service providers. Cloud computing firms have been investing billions to optimize their data center infrastructure,