Xero's financials just keep growing as revenue climbs to $137.2 million

Xero's latest financial results for the last six months have shown that the company has reaped the fruit of international marketing efforts, subscriber increases and headcount increases across the board.

The company has pulled in $137.2 million in revenue for the last six months - a 48% increase over the previous year, the company's latest interim financial statements show.

The company has gained the most revenue from across the ANZ region (49%), due to increased customer bases and price changes. The UK, North America and other parts of the world account for significant revenue streams of $40.7 million.

This pattern also fits the company's subscriber numbers, which now total 862,000 - a 45% increase since the same period last year. 592,000 subscribers are based in the ANZ region, while the UK accounts for 164,000; North America at 77,000 and rest of the world accounting for 29,000.

The company's profit has also jumped 28% to $103.4 million - despite an increasing cost of revenue now reaching $33.8 million. The cost in revenue has come from an increase in hosting costs as the company transitions to AWS, as well as personnel costs as the company takes on more staff.

Xero's sales and marketing efforts reached $86.2 million, which went into gaining new subscribers. The marketing costs were spread mostly in the international markets, particularly the UK and Asia. Overall, sales and marketing costs dropped from 75% to 63% compared to the previous period.

The company's product design and development costs hit $58.1 million in the last six months, $8.5 million higher than the previous period. The company categorises these costs as personnel and related expenses, including salaries, benefits, bonuses and share-based payments associated with product design and development employees. A bigger headcount accounted for the increase in costs.

Administration and general costs accounted for $19.1 million a 35% increase from the previous period. Again, the company attributes this to increased headcount growth. General administration costs dropped 1% since the same period last year.

The company's investment in new employees has contributed to a staff headcount increase of 223, bringing the total number of full time employees to 1513. The slower growth in headcount compared to subscriber increases and operating revenue increases is an indication of economy of scale benefits and operating efficiencies.