ASX Tech Stocks: Cybersecurity play Prophecy flags ~50% boost in ARR, shares bounce

PRO plans Snare subscription sales model for customers
Alchemy Tribridge Sapphire invests in OpenLearning via $2.9m placement
EROAD FY22 revenue up with Coretex acquisition to complete 1 December

Prophecy International Holdings (ASX:PRO)

The business software developer ripped higher in morning trade, with a gain of 35.2% today.

Investors responded positively to the company’s latest update on annualised recurring revenues (ARR) — often viewed as the holy grail for subscription-based tech businesses.

The company said it has delivered ongoing subscription-based annualised recurring revenue (ARR) growth through its eMite and Snare products – adding more than $1.8 million of ARR in November to date to now total more than $15.4 million.

Total ARR for eMite, the company’s SaaS-based customer experience and contact (call) centre analytics platform is $10.5 million.

And the ARR for the Snare cyber security platform is $4.1 million (combined maintenance and subscriptions).

The company announced on 16 November it would make Snare available to purchase on a subscription basis as an on-premises or as a hosted cloud offering – with the new sales model designed to enhance Opex/Capex flexibility for customers and support growth in the base of ARR.

After booking total revenues of just over $10m in FY21, Prophecy said it’s on track to book revenues of more than $15m in FY22.

OpenLearning (ASX:OLL)

Up 16.7% today was educational software provider OpenLearning.

The company has secured a strategic investment from global tech-growth firm Alchemy Tribridge Sapphire (ATL) of up to 19.9% via a $2.9 million placement at $0.093 a share – plus an additional $0.6 million worth of options with a strike price of $0.093 a share.

OpenLearning also plans to undertake a non-renounceable rights issue to raise around $3.06 million, with ATL expected to participate by providing an additional $0.48 million in capital – bringing its total investment in the company to $3.38 million .

OpenLearning group CEO and managing director Adam Brimo said ATL’s “strategic guidance and deep knowledge of how leading tech and education companies have grown around the world.”

“With the direct involvement and assistance from Alchemy Tribridge, we will have additional resources to realise the value of OpenLearning’s technology and IP by pushing into new market segments and geographies,” he said.

EROAD (ASX:ERD)

Unchanged today was transportation tech company EROAD.

The company has released its financial results for the first half of FY22, with revenue increasing NZ$2.2 million to NZ$48 million from H1 FY21, flowing through to EBITDA of NZ$12.6 million.

The company said this was driven by the growth in units, dash-cams and additional add-on subscriptions sold to customers, with contracted units increasing by 6,500 despite COVID-19.

The company is increasing R&D spend to 28% of revenue, and accelerating its growth strategies by developing strategic partnerships and via the acquisition of Coretex – which is expected complete with effect from 1 December.

“Sales momentum is expected to increase with the easing of COVID-19 impacts, the launch of the next generation platform and hardware, the release of Clarity Solo, and the Coretex acquisition,” CEO Steven Newman said.

FastBrick Robotics (ASX:FBR)

FastBrick Robotics was down 5.7% in early morning trade.

The company has completed a $10 million placement at 4.5 cents per share – representing a 14% discount to the 5-Day VWAP and an 11% discount to the 30-day VWAP.

“The funds raised will position the Company well to execute on and expand its current committed work pipeline and to capitalise on commercial opportunities that are frequently presenting themselves globally, particularly in North America and Europe,” managing director and CEO Mike Pivac said.

Damstra Holdings (ASX:DTC)

Enterprise protection software business Damstra was trading down 10.7%.

Chairman Johannes Risseeuw addressed the AGM today, stating his disappointment around the company’s recent share price performance.

“Despite achieving record revenue for the year of $27.4 million, the market appears to have lost short term confidence in the company,” he said.

“As a board, we acknowledge there have been issues both outside our control, such as the impact of COVID-19, and within our control, such as client specific activity.”

“The first related to a contractual dispute with a client acquired through the Vault Intelligence Limited (Vault) acquisition, and the second to a descoping and reduction of service from a global mining client, as they internalised their hardware and site access requirements.”

“Both were extremely disappointing and adversely impacted our near-term organic growth outlook, resulting in adjustments to our FY22 guidance.”

The company has further downgraded its FY22 revenue guidance to $30-34 million, but said that still marks annual growth of between 10-24% as it looks to scale up operations in North America.