- In January, February, and April, Finland had one less working day than in the comparison period
- In March, one more working day than in the comparison period
→ April’s decrease is in line with January and February.
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An interesting intro in an article from Helsingin Sanomat about co-determination negotiations;
“According to the CEO of IT service company Gofore, customer demand has been weak for two years already.”
I haven’t seen such a comment myself; rather, growth has been praised, which is also correlated with an increase in headcount.
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Here are Joni’s thoughts on Gofore’s April. 
Gofore’s April revenue continued to decline slightly, which was in line with our expectations. Billing rates were at March’s level. However, total capacity grew relatively well and exceeded our forecasts for the comparison period. The company commented that the sales pipeline is good. The company also announced on Friday that it had concluded its change negotiations, which supports profitability development in the latter half of the year. The market is two-tiered; there are areas that are performing even relatively well, and then there are areas where demand is weaker.
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May Business Review, please
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Here are the references if anyone is interested in comparing, for example, how the 5/2025 revenue of 15.5 MEUR and 12-month revenue of 180.5 MEUR relate to last year’s corresponding figures.
2024:
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Revenue (May) in a steady decline. The stock price is holding surprisingly well. Apparently, there is still belief in a turnaround. Yet.
2025 - 15.5 m€
2024 - 16.8 m€
2023 - 17.2 m€
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Gofore’s Growth Targets - are they achievable? Gofore states in its investor communications that it has set a target of 500 million euros in revenue by 2030, which would mean significant growth from the current level of approximately 180 million euros. According to the strategy, growth is divided equally between organic growth and acquisitions.
The target is ambitious and raises a few questions, at least for me as a shareholder, having followed this industry for over 30 years:
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How does the company intend to recruit over 2000 new specialists in approximately six years? This is about 30 or more new employees every month.
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How will it be ensured that the acquisitions, presumably targeted annually based on investor communications, are actually found and successfully integrated? Based on my calculations, each acquired company should have a turnover of 20 million euros or more per year.
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How will the balance between growth and profitability be maintained when expanding so rapidly?
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Here are Joni’s comments on Gofore’s May.
Gofore’s revenue in May decreased slightly, which was in line with our expectations. Billing rates were at April’s level. However, total capacity grew relatively well and exceeded our forecasts for the comparison period. In addition, the company reported several new contracts and high customer satisfaction. Overall, May was well in line with our expectations.
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Here are Joni’s comments on Gofore’s big contract with the Digital and Population Data Services Agency.
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This caught my eye, unfortunately I couldn’t find the correct press release with a quick Google search. This is behind a paywall.
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It’s a five-million-euro deal covering five years.
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Great M&A news for Friday!
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Analyst’s comments regarding the news. 
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Absolutely fantastic news for today! I significantly increased my holdings today.
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Laimea Siilikin has written about Gofore’s latest acquisition.
Gofore announced today that it is acquiring Huld. Almost three years had passed since the previous acquisition, eMundo. In my opinion, this is one more sign that the ICT sector cycle is starting to turn. Or rather, has turned. Acquisitions were on hold for Gofore for almost three years, and thus during this weak cycle. Gofore’s track record in acquisitions has been excellent, and I expect that this time too will be a success.
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A small factual correction to Laimea Siili’s good writing; we bought Creanex 2 years ago, on July 3, 2023.
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A comprehensive article about the stock market’s IT services sector is available on Kauppalehti’s website (behind a paywall): 2010-luvun hypesektori valahti pörssin alelaariin – ”Aletaan olla käänteen korvilla” | Kauppalehti
Tommy Hellström interviewed me, and @Frans-Mikael_Rostedt got to provide an analyst’s perspective. It turned out to be quite a nice piece, covering the past 15 years and, on the other hand, the future of the industry.
Here are some of my key claims presented in the article, which I will elaborate on slightly:
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The IT services sector as we now understand it, has only emerged within this review period. Organizations’ comprehensive digital transformation accelerated agile, incremental development, which led to over a decade of strong market growth.
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Companies that were relatively young but already operational, with a good organizational culture and employee reputation, were in the best position heading into the 2010s.
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The last five years have been difficult to predict and like a roller coaster. Corona came as a shock, changed operating methods, but at the same time accelerated demand and slowed down employee turnover. Until then, people started changing jobs across the entire industry. And at the same time, the market acceleration ended in a hangover, from which no significant recovery has yet been seen.
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As an industry, we are dependent on customers’ willingness and courage to invest. We cannot escape the macroeconomy.
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The public sector will continue to invest heavily in digital transformation, but at the same time, bad projects are being dismantled and belts are being tightened in general. In its own way, a perfectly sensible phase is underway.
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Artificial intelligence (AI) qualitatively improves and streamlines the development of information systems, across all work phases, which is an excellent thing.
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AI widens the gap between what is technologically possible and how organizations currently operate. The sea of possibilities for digital transformation was already vast. AI further expands it. Organizations are shifting from digital transformation to AI transformation. This creates demand for the industry.
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Too much is said about coding in relation to our industry. Less than 25% of Gofore’s revenue comes from coding or similar services. The development of generative AI will reduce that share.
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Consulting as a business model is not disappearing, but new types of pricing and operating models will likely emerge in the industry, driven by AI transformation, with the aim of generating better value for both customers and suppliers.
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Among the “new wave” service companies operating in Finland, i.e., those that experienced a growth spurt in previous years, there will likely be one company that truly grows into a large and internationally significant company. I, of course, assume that to be Gofore. But this development also requires consolidation. I also assume that the separation of wheat from chaff will continue, and companies in the industry should not be carelessly lumped together when evaluating their businesses.
There’s a lot more in the article, but here I’m only referring to my own quotes from the article. I’d be happy to elaborate on my views further if there’s interest. It’s also fine to disagree. 
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Here are Joni’s comments on Gofore’s June performance.
Gofore’s June revenue decreased significantly more than we expected, which was due to a write-down of one client project. Billing rates improved from May’s level. Headcount decreased as expected, driven by change negotiations, but total capacity decreased less than we expected. The company once again announced several new contracts. Overall, May was in line with our expectations, and our revenue forecasts are practically unchanged despite the write-down, because total capacity exceeded our forecasts.
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I am indeed looking forward to the day when an analyst figures out at what prices contracts are currently being won. The company, of course, doesn’t disclose that. My own feeling is that prices are still at most in the 60e/h (approx. 9500e/month) range. It’s difficult to make a profitable business out of that when the person doing the work also has to be paid half of that as gross salary. A good one is paid close to two-thirds. Plus overhead costs, of course.
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Sixty euros an hour plus VAT is really very little. I would guess that only the cheapest projects have gone for that price. Such a price level is not sustainable or profitable with a listed company’s cost structure.
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