Cloud accounting software firm Xero's revenue and customer base continued to soar despite mounting net losses.
Revenue rose 36 percent to $552.8 million for the year ended 31 March 2019, up from $406 million the previous year, driven by growth in its overall customer base.
However, the company posted a net loss after tax of $27 million, up 9 percent from $24.9 million in 2018. The losses were pinned on impairments and an increase in finance costs in the first half.
Xero’s ANZ customer base grew 22 percent to hit 1.08 million, partly credited to the single touch payroll legislation in Australia and the launch of its Hubdoc platform in New Zealand.
“We’ve delivered a strong result with a number of major milestones for Xero including our first positive cash flow result,” Xero chief executive Steve Vamos said.
“As we head to FY20 and beyond, we’re making great progress towards our strategic priority of driving cloud accounting adoption globally.”
Customer growth in other markets also grew, with UK subscribers up 48 percent to 463,000 and US subscribers up 48 percent to 195,000. Markets lumped in as “rest of the world” saw 43 percent growth to 83,000 subscribers.
Xero said it will focus on growing its small business platform moving forward and to reinvest any cash generated. It expects free cash flow in the financial year ending 31 March 2020 to be a similar proportion of this year’s reported operating revenue.
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