First Derivatives plans to hire over 200 graduates in 2021.
The Newry-based company has a strong track record of hiring people out of college and has been “ramping up [graduate hires] over the first couple of months of this year,” according to its CEO Seamus Keating.
“It’s a little bit more than we did last year, less than we did probably the year before,” Mr Keating told the Irish Independent.
With thousands of people continuing to work from home due to restrictions aimed at limiting the spread of Covid-19, Mr Keating said it “takes a little bit longer to get graduates trained in the remote world.”
The increase in graduate hires comes as the company warned that employees with certain attributes, “particularly the combination of industry skill and technical skills,” are in short supply.
The company plans to change the name of the group to FD Technologies and will run the business as three entities; MRP, First Derivative, and Kx.
“We are doing this to give each business its identity…to go out and grow and create value,” Mr Keating said. “We are not doing this with any intention that ultimately we won’t own all of them or we will sell them, it is very much to give each business the right framework and the right opportunity to do what it can do.”
The company’s Kx division is a major global player in real-time streaming analytics. First Derivatives plans to invest £16m (€18.5m) this year as it focuses on growing this division.
The company believes it can get the Kx business growing “comfortably” at 25pc per year. Its goal is to enable Kx to become the market-leading technology this market, which says will be worth $39bn by 2025.
Each of the other two businesses can grow in the “double digits,” according to Mr Keating.
First Derivatives saw its profit before tax fall 39pc to £11.1m (€12.9m) in the 12 months to 28 February. The fall in profit was mainly due to increased investment last year, Mr Keating said.
Revenue increased slightly to £237.9m from £237.8m, according to annual results from the company. Gross profit was unchanged year-on-year at £101m. Meanwhile, net debt decreased by 80pc to £9.9m.
Its clients are “very much” back investing in projects that had been delayed due to Covid-19.
“You can see, particularly the US economy being switched back on like a light as we came into this year... A little bit less fast in some parts of Europe,” Mr Keating said.
First Derivatives started out providing services to financial markets firms – in particular to big investment banks. Its customers are increasingly drawn from a range of sectors, from Formula One to satellite operators.
Over the past 12 months the company said it won “multiple” new contracts in key target markets.
Looking forward, the company anticipates that revenue for the year will be in the range of £255m to £260m (€296m-€302m), with adjusted earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation in the range of £31m - £33m (€36m - €38m).
