IT firms perform well on growing service demand

The Covid-19 pandemic came to tech entrepreneurs as a boon with the widespread use of IT-enabled services globally, and the services are still continuing to grow at a faster pace because they have eased people’s daily lives in numerous ways.

And riding on the growing demands for IT-enabled services, almost all publicly traded IT firms witnessed a jump in their profits in the July-December period of the current fiscal year.

IT-enabled services, industry insiders say, expanded vigorously during the pandemic which later made ways to flourish further, the reason behind the prosperity of IT firms.

Besides, the government has been implementing massive tech initiatives such as establishing IT and software technology parks, and local data centre, promoting the semi-conductor industry, and many others, which are also helping local tech firms in many ways to get involved in large-scale service-providing operations.

Out of the 11 IT sector companies listed on the Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE), 10 firms or 90 per cent registered a year-on-year rise in their net profits in the first half of the fiscal year 2022-23, according to the DSE data.

ADN telecom Limited, aamra networks limited, aamra technologies limited, Agni Systems, Bdcom online Limited, Daffodil computers Ltd, e-Generation Limited, Genex Infosys Limited, Intech Limited, Infofmation Services Limited, and IT Consultants Limited are the listed firms from the IT sector.

Among these companies, only aamra technologies limited witnessed a profit fall in July-December of FY23.

Meanwhile, aamra networks limited surpassed the peers in terms of profit with making a first-half yearly profit rise of over 161 per cent in the current fiscal.

The company which is also the country’s largest internet service provider registered Tk 14.57 crore in net profit in H1 of the current fiscal against Tk 5.58 crore in H1 of the last fiscal.

The listed firm’s earnings per share (EPS) jumped to Tk 2.35 for July-December of the current fiscal from Tk 0.90 for July-December of the last fiscal.

On the other hand, aamra technologies limited reported a net profit of Tk 3.49 crore in H1 of FY23 down 50.98 per cent from the profit of Tk 7.12 crore for the same half of FY22.

The bulk internet bandwidth provider in its first half-yearly financial report said its H1 profit dropped this fiscal year due mainly to a fall in revenue and a rise in its financial costs.

Besides, Agni Systems’ profit surged by 21 per cent to 5.01 crore in the first half of the fiscal year 2022-23 against Tk 4.14 crore in the same period of the fiscal 2021-22.

Enamul Haque, company secretary of Agni Systems Ltd told The Business Post, “The people’s dependency on the internet and tech-related services increased on a large scale during the pandemic. Besides, the government has implemented several initiatives to realise the dream of Digital Bangladesh which helped IT firms reach even the grass root level.”

“Due to these reasons, the demand for internet service equipment has also risen exponentially across the country in recent years, and all the above reasons have become a boon for the sector’s companies, scaling up their profits,” he added.

Moreover, ADN telecom’s net profit grew to Tk 12.99 crore in the July-December half of FY23 from Tk 7.95 crore in the July-December period of FY22.

The ISP, MPLS, IPLC, and IP Telephony service provider’s earnings per share (EPS) stood at Tk 2.1 for H1 of the current fiscal which was Tk 1.23 for H1 of the last fiscal.