Cloud firm sees revenues pass the £50m mark
Profits before tax at Manchester based cloud firm UKFast grew by 13% last year.
The firm’s profit before tax was £9m, which was affected by the non-recurring items of loss on sale of property £1.2m and a £5m donation to local charities.
As a result adjusted profit before tax would be £15.2m, a 13% growth on last year’s figure of £13.45m.
The audited 2018 accounts for the firm show a 12% rise in revenue and a 13.5% rise in adjusted EBITDA.
Overall revenue for the year to 31st December 2018 climbed to £53.9m, up from £48.3m in 2017.
Adjusted EBITDA grew from £19.3m in 2017 to £21.9m, delivering a margin of 41%.
The biggest growth area was the enterprise hosting division, with wins across private and hybrid cloud environments, which now represent 43% of total sales.
Headcount grew by almost a quarter to 365 in 2018, with a particular focus on R&D and development.
Senior hires also saw the firm further boost its capability in specialist areas including cloud security, networks and remote desktop services.
Alongside the recruitment of technical personnel, UKFast’s significant investment in product development, hardware and infrastructure puts it in a strong position to sustain robust growth as the firm approaches its 20th anniversary.
Chief executive Lawrence Jones said: “We continue to invest heavily in R&D, building the products our customers tell us they need. This, coupled with the hard work our team puts in every day, helps us to keep delivering double-digit growth.
“We also put a huge amount of effort into training and developing our teammates, investing in their growth, which is essential to ensure they provide the best possible support to our clients.
“As the demands of our customers evolve we are expanding our network globally, with new points of presence in Amsterdam, Seattle and Washington. The opportunities this investment gives us are hugely exciting.”
The landmark year also saw UKFast take a minority private equity investment from Inflexion Private Equity, handing over a 31.6% stake in newly formed holding company UKFast Group Ltd.
UKFast Group Ltd comprises the firm’s public sector arm, which continues to grow from strength to strength, and ClearCloud, which offers hybrid and public clouds to new and existing customers, combining UKFast infrastructure with hyperscale cloud solutions from Amazon and Microsoft.
