WANdisco confident for year as revenues soar

The Sheffield-based tech company, which helps businesses transfer information from servers into the cloud, said its strong business pipeline underpins its confidence in the outlook for the full year.

David Richards, CEO and chairman of WANdisco, said: "We made a prediction two or three year ago that the cloud would be at the centre of global information technology.

"Most companies will have to move into cloud."

The group is seeing an increasing number of annual-recurring, cloud contract wins. Contracts generally start off at around £150,000 to £230,000 and then can grow to £2m to £4m.

"Rather than upfront, lumpy, unpredictable cloud, it's a much more elongated lifespan that grows naturally," said Mr Richards.

The group made an adjusted EBITDA loss of £7.3m in 2018. Revenue for the year was £13m, down from £15m in 2017, although second half revenue rose 13 per cent to £9m.

Mr Richards said the fall in turnover was caused by the group doing more deals, but they were of smaller size.

"We are moving to an annual, recurring revenue," he said.

The market's forecast for this year is revenue of £24m and a break even at the EBITDA level.

He said the 38 per cent increase in revenue to £3m in the first quarter of 2019 occurred during the group's weakest quarter traditionally.

"It's a sign of things to come," said Mr Richards.

"We've seen steady and good progress and we've got a very strong pipeline this year."

Analyst Matthew Davis at WH Ireland said: "WANdisco has released 2018 results illustrating a business in transition towards a recurring subscription-based cloud business.

"This won’t be achieved overnight, but the longer term benefits are well understood. 2019 has started well."