Software firm’s Q2 revenue up 21 per cent

So far so good for new Kinaxis CEO John Sicard, who took over from long-serving Douglas Colbeth at the beginning of the year.

His Kanata supply-chain-management software firm on Thursday reported a 21-per-cent jump in second-quarter revenues, year over year, to US$28.7 million.

Adjusted earnings didn’t follow suit, slipping to US$7.3 million from US$9.2 million in the second quarter of 2015. However, the yearearlier quarter was an unusually good one, making it difficult to top. Kinaxis, in addition, spent more heavily on sales and marketing in its latest quarter. Apparently to good effect. The company revised its revenue guidance for the year to a range of $112 million to $115 million — up from $108 million to $111 million.

This appeared to be enough to satisfy investors. Kinaxis shares at midday were stable at C$62 Cdn — up 32 per cent year to date, a remarkable performance for shares that jumped 154 per cent last year.

Kinaxis is now valued at US$1.2 billion — roughly the same as Mitel, which generates 10 times the revenue. The big difference, of course, is that Mitel is suffering a short-term hit as it shifts its telecom hardware sales to a model that favours software subscription revenues over a longer period.

Both Kinaxis and Mitel are worth considerably less than Shopify, the Ottawa e-commerce software maker that posted better-thanexpected earnings on Wednesday.

While Shopify’s second-quarter net loss rose to 10 cents per share from six cents, revenues jumped 93 per cent to $86.6 million. It raised its revenue projection for the year to between $361 million and $367 million, and lowered its forecast for operating losses.

Shopify shares were up sharply Wednesday to $48.01 Cdn on the TSX, giving the company a market value of roughly $3 billion.