Newry-based First Derivatives hits £200m revenue for the first time

First Derivatives, the Newry-based software development and consultation firm, has posted record year-on-year revenues recently, breaking the £200m milestone for the first time.

Things are looking good for First Derivatives, with its latest published financial stats showing a 17% increase in revenue for the year leading up to February 28th 2019. This pushes the company's revenue over that one year period to £217.4m, a record figure that also translated into a 38% boost in pre-tax profits over the previous year to £16.7m.

The impressive figures are a result of the company's ongoing efforts to adapt and deploy its financial software into other markets. The software was developed to process large amounts of data into understandable information to help make decisions in the capital markets, but handling large volumes of data isn't unique to capital markets and First Derivative's techniques have demonstrated wide-spread applications in other industries.

We covered some of these innovations recently, such as when the firm's software division Kx partnered with Aston Martin Red Bull Racing to provide data analysis services for F1 racing sensor data. The company has also partnered with Ulster University to produce the first ever Masters degree in Professional Services Operational Delivery, and another in Global Capital Markets last year.

This positive year for First Derivatives also saw it hire 500 new staff at the firm, 350 of which were graduate positions. Though the high turnover rate of the tech industry where people switch jobs as opportunities arise caused net staff to rise by only 200 over the year, the company now employs 2,400 staff globally and plans for hundreds more jobs are in the pipeline. The firm is continuing its policy of bringing all international hires to work in its Newry office for their first few months.