Kainos shares lift as revenue surges on bumper NHS contract wins
One of Northern Ireland’s biggest technology firms has posted a surge in revenue on the back of a spate of NHS contract wins.
Belfast-based IT services provider Kainos reported a 17 per cent rise in revenue to £431.1m for the year to end March, led by a 55 per cent jump in turnover from healthcare clients.
That included fresh contracts with the NHS including involvement in its “digital health checks” project, which is aimed at improving access to vaccinations and screenings through the NHS app.
“This has led to renewed focus and investment in a number of areas, as the Government looks to shift the NHS focus from treatment to prevention, and from analogue to digital,” Kainos said.
“Kainos is well positioned to win work in these areas of investment, such as preventative healthcare, genomics, health data and AI.”
Kainos added that the deeper ties with the NHS had not been hindered by the government’s plans to bring NHS England back under direct control.
The FTSE 250 business reported pre-tax profit of £58.1m, up 19 per cent, and declared a final dividend of 19.8p.
Kainos turned to using contractors to keep pace with demand, with around 200 extra contractors on its books, representing a quadrupling of its spend on contractors to £18.5m.
“The frustration in FY26 was that revenue upgrades didn’t translate into material beats on the bottom line, due to margin dilution from the use of contractors and partners on large Digital contracts where Kainos is prime,” analysts at Peel Hunt said.
“This remains the challenge.”
Kainos shares rose as much as 1.8 per cent to 829.2p in the opening minutes of trade on Monday. The stock is up by 10 per cent over the past year.