Darktrace ups revenue guidance after adding customers

Darktrace increased its annual revenue guidance after adding 359 net new customers in the third quarter.

The cybersecurity group said the extra customers took its client base to 6,890 at the end of March - 37.3% more than a year earlier. About 0.8 percentage point was gained from the acquisition of Cybersprint in March.

Including Cybersprint, Darktrace added $35.4m of annual recurring revenue (ARR) in the third quarter and $105.3m in the nine months to the end of March - growth of 56.8% and 51.3% respectively. Without Cybersprint, ARR rose 37%.

Third-quarter revenue rose 50.1% to $109.8m.

Darktrace said increased its estimate for constant currency ARR growth to between 40% and 41.5%, up from an earlier estimate of 38.5% to 40.0%. This implies net ARR added of between 29% and 34% - up from 24% to 29%.

The company said extra ARR at this late stage in the financial year had little effect on group revenue and that the strength of the dollar and potential volatility could affect its results. But it tweaked its revenue growth guidance upwards to 45.5%-47% from 44.5% to 46.5%.

Darktrace shares rose 4.3% to 472.2p at 08:30 BST.

Cathy Graham, Darktrace's chief financial officer, said: "In our third quarter, we sustained strong growth trends across our customer base, ARR and revenue, as well as maintaining the gains in churn and net ARR retention rates we made in the first half of the financial year. Year-to-date results and a continuing positive operating outlook have led us to again increase our FY 2022 expectations across all financial and customer measures."

Darktrace said costs would increase as a percentage of revenue in the second half because of the restart of travel, workers returning to offices, extra staff and moves to larger premises. These factors may temporarily flatten margin growth, it said.