Software Development Stocks Q2 Teardown: Akamai (NASDAQ:AKAM) Vs The Rest

Let’s dig into the relative performance of Akamai (NASDAQ:AKAM) and its peers as we unravel the now-completed Q2 software development earnings season.

As legendary VC investor Marc Andreessen says, "Software is eating the world", and it touches virtually every industry. That drives increasing demand for tools helping software developers do their jobs, whether it be monitoring critical cloud infrastructure, integrating audio and video functionality, or ensuring smooth content streaming.

The 11 software development stocks we track reported a mixed Q2. As a group, revenues beat analysts’ consensus estimates by 1.6% while next quarter’s revenue guidance was in line.

Inflation progressed towards the Fed's 2% goal recently, leading the Fed to reduce its policy rate by 50bps (half a percent or 0.5%) in September 2024. This is the first cut in four years. While CPI (inflation) readings have been supportive lately, employment measures have bordered on worrisome. The markets will be debating whether this rate cut's timing (and more potential ones in 2024 and 2025) is ideal for supporting the economy or a bit too late for a macro that has already cooled too much.

Thankfully, software development stocks have been resilient with share prices up 6.9% on average since the latest earnings results.

Akamai (NASDAQ:AKAM)

Founded in 1999 by two engineers from MIT, Akamai (NASDAQ:AKAM) provides software for organizations to efficiently deliver web content to their customers.

Akamai reported revenues of $979.6 million, up 4.7% year on year. This print was in line with analysts’ expectations, but overall, it was a mixed quarter for the company with in-line revenue guidance for the next quarter.

Interestingly, the stock is up 11.3% since reporting and currently trades at $101.84.

Read our full report on Akamai here, it’s free.

Best Q2: GitLab (NASDAQ:GTLB)

Founded as an open-source project in 2011, GitLab (NASDAQ:GTLB) is a leading software development tools platform.

GitLab reported revenues of $182.6 million, up 30.8% year on year, outperforming analysts’ expectations by 3.1%. The business had a strong quarter with an impressive beat of analysts’ billings estimates and a narrow beat of analysts’ ARR (annual recurring revenue) estimates.

GitLab scored the fastest revenue growth and highest full-year guidance raise among its peers. The market seems happy with the results as the stock is up 19.6% since reporting. It currently trades at $53.46.

Is now the time to buy GitLab? Access our full analysis of the earnings results here, it’s free.

Weakest Q2: PagerDuty (NYSE:PD)

Started by three former Amazon engineers, PagerDuty (NYSE:PD) is a software-as-a-service platform that helps companies respond to IT incidents fast and make sure that any downtime is minimized.

PagerDuty reported revenues of $115.9 million, up 7.7% year on year, in line with analysts’ expectations. It was a softer quarter as it posted underwhelming revenue guidance for the next quarter and decelerating customer growth.

PagerDuty delivered the weakest full-year guidance update in the group. The company lost 76 customers and ended up with a total of 15,044. As expected, the stock is down 4% since the results and currently trades at $17.54.

Read our full analysis of PagerDuty’s results here.

HashiCorp (NASDAQ:HCP)

Initially created as a research project at the University of Washington, HashiCorp (NASDAQ:HCP) provides software that helps companies operate their own applications in a multi-cloud environment.

HashiCorp reported revenues of $165.1 million, up 15.3% year on year. This number beat analysts’ expectations by 5.1%. More broadly, it was a mixed quarter with decelerating growth in large customers.

HashiCorp achieved the biggest analyst estimates beat among its peers. The company added 16 enterprise customers paying more than $100,000 annually to reach a total of 934. The stock is flat since reporting and currently trades at $33.83.

Read our full, actionable report on HashiCorp here, it’s free.

Cloudflare (NYSE:NET)

Founded by two grad students of Harvard Business School, Cloudflare (NYSE:NET) is a software as a service platform that helps improve security, reliability and loading times of internet applications and websites.

Cloudflare reported revenues of $401 million, up 30% year on year. This print beat analysts’ expectations by 1.6%. Zooming out, it was a mixed quarter as it logged a miss of analysts’ billings estimates.

The stock is up 14.7% since reporting and currently trades at $85.30.

Read our full, actionable report on Cloudflare here, it’s free.

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