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UK maker of accounting, payroll and business-management software for small and medium-sized businesses.
UK maker of accounting, payroll and business-management software for small and medium-sized businesses.
Sells subscriptions rather than one-off licences, so revenue builds from customers who renew each year, and it has been moving older customers from boxed desktop software to cloud plans. Accountants advise and often resell, so they influence which package a small business buys. Sage Intacct, bought in 2017, targets mid-sized firms; the UK and Ireland and North America are its largest regions.
In one line: A UK version of Intuit (QuickBooks) for small/mid-size business accounting software.
Moat: narrow (switching costs, installed base, distribution). Businesses embed accounting software deeply into operations, making migration costly once adopted.
Headquarters: Newcastle upon Tyne, UK · Founded: 1981 · Employees: 11,094
Size Sage (SGE.L) is a United Kingdom Information Technology company (Packaged Software) with a market value of $14.1B, the 42nd largest of 363 United Kingdom companies the cockpit tracks. Shares closed at £1,165 on 6 Nov 2026.
Performance Over six months the shares gained 32.6%, against +28.8% for the median peer and +3.6% for the United Kingdom market (cap-weighted) — 10th highest of 21 in its peer set.
Growth Revenue grew 8.8% over the last twelve months (peer median +17.6%); the operating margin is 22.6% (peer median 19.9%).
Valuation It trades at 23.1× forward earnings against a peer median of 27.0× (10th cheapest of 20).
Price implies For today's price to make sense, revenue must grow about 3% a year for seven years (Req g). Recent delivered growth is +6%, so the hurdle is -3 pp: the price already allows for a slowdown.
Capital Return on invested capital runs 18.5 points above its cost of capital (7.4% WACC).
Credit Sage has 5 bonds outstanding ($2.52B), rated BBB+ by the agencies and trading like BBB- at a weighted spread of 133 bp.
Next results Next results expected around 19 Nov 2026 (exchange calendar; dates can move).
| TTM | FY2025 | FY2024 | FY2023 | FY2022 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Revenue | £2.63B | £2.51B | £2.33B | £2.18B | £1.95B |
| Revenue growth | — | +8% | +7% | +12% | — |
| Gross profit | £2.35B | £2.24B | £2.07B | £1.92B | £1.71B |
| EBITDA | £685M | £650M | £577M | £523M | £432M |
| Net income | £385M | £369M | £323M | £211M | £260M |
| Free cash flow | £507M | £498M | £490M | £394M | £274M |
| Capital expenditure | £51.0M | £59.0M | £37.0M | £22.0M | £52.0M |
| Total debt | n/a | £1.58B | £1.25B | £1.26B | £1.22B |
The default views of Competitor Analysis ▸ Charts, drawn from the same data. Open them in the cockpit to change the axes, pin companies and read every value.
| Company | Market cap | 6M return | Revenue growth | Op. margin | Forward P/E | Req g |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sage SGE.L | $14.1B | +33% | +9% | 23% | 23.1× | 3.1% |
| Intuit INTU | $91.3B | -14% | +14% | 29% | 14.8× | 3.1% |
| Xero XRO.AX | $8.36B | -13% | +27% | 13% | 66.7× | 25.9% |
| Sap SAP.DE | $276B | +49% | +8% | 29% | 29.8× | 14.9% |
| Oracle ORCL | $351B | -41% | +22% | 34% | 13.6× | n/a |
| Workday WDAY | $46.5B | +51% | +14% | 13% | 16.0× | 19.7% |
Peer set: Industry: the same industry and sector in any market, nearest in size. This is the same default set the interactive Competitor Analysis opens with.
| Measure | SGE.L | Peer median | Rank in peer set |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1-month return | +13.4% | +3.5% | 5th highest of 21 |
| 6-month return | +32.6% | +28.8% | 10th highest of 21 |
| Distance from 52-week high | -3.6% | -14.2% | highest of 21 |
| Revenue growth (TTM) | +8.8% | +17.6% | 6th lowest of 21 |
| Operating margin | 22.6% | 19.9% | 9th highest of 21 |
| Forward P/E | 23.1× | 27.0× | 10th cheapest of 20 |
| Growth the price implies (Req g, 7 yrs) | 3.1% | 18.2% | 5th least demanding of 20 |
| Growth delivered (Del g) | +5.7% | +21.3% | 3rd lowest of 20 |
| Hurdle (Req g minus delivered) | -2.6 pp | -4.7 pp | 9th most demanding of 20 |
| ROIC minus cost of capital | +18.5 pp | +0.7 pp | 6th highest of 18 |
| EV / EBITDA | 17.5× | 15.7× | 6th most expensive of 13 |
| Net debt / EBITDA | 2.2× | -0.8× | 4th most indebted of 15 |
| Bond spread | 133 bp | 112 bp | 2nd widest of 4 |
| Company | Market | Market cap | 6M return | Revenue growth | Op. margin | Forward P/E | Req g | Delivered g |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sage SGE.L | United Kingdom | $14.1B | +33% | +9% | 23% | 23.1× | 3.1% | +5.7% |
| Zhejiang Century Huatong 002602.SZ | China | $14.0B | -20% | +28% | 21% | 11.1× | -0.2% | +20.4% |
| Tempus AI TEM | United States | $13.9B | +53% | +37% | -18% | n/a | n/a | n/a |
| DocuSign DOCU | United States | $14.5B | +62% | +9% | 12% | 15.9× | 12.9% | +17.2% |
| Manhattan Associates MANH | United States | $14.7B | +77% | +8% | 25% | 42.0× | 29.4% | +13.0% |
| Trimble TRMB | United States | $12.6B | -11% | +7% | 18% | 13.6× | 15.3% | +2.6% |
| Evolution EVO.ST | Sweden | $15.8B | +33% | -3% | 57% | 14.4× | -0.3% | +31.2% |
| Dynatrace DT | United States | $12.5B | +7% | +18% | 14% | 22.6× | 18.8% | +23.5% |
| JFrog FROG | United States | $12.5B | +43% | +26% | -13% | 89.6× | 37.7% | +28.7% |
| Beijing Kingsoft Office Software 688111.SS | China | $16.1B | -8% | +20% | 22% | 35.6× | 32.7% | +21.3% |
| Chime Financial CHYM | United States | $11.9B | +70% | +18% | -1% | 35.2× | 18.2% | +24.8% |
| Circle Internet CRCL | United States | $17.3B | -40% | +26% | 13% | 68.1× | 23.2% | +52.7% |
| Procore Technologies PCOR | United States | $11.4B | +41% | +16% | -1% | 33.8× | 19.9% | +27.0% |
| F5, Inc. FFIV | United States | $17.7B | -12% | +11% | 24% | 17.1× | 9.7% | +5.6% |
| Gen Digital GEN | United States | $17.7B | +32% | +17% | 43% | 9.6× | 1.8% | +14.4% |
| Capcom 9697.T | Japan | $11.0B | +25% | +21% | 41% | 27.0× | -2.2% | +15.4% |
| SailPoint SAIL | United States | $11.0B | +57% | +20% | -19% | 53.5× | 42.0% | +24.7% |
| SS&C Technologies SSNC | United States | $18.2B | +13% | +9% | 24% | 10.2× | 6.9% | +6.1% |
| Paycom Software PAYC | United States | $10.5B | +73% | +9% | 30% | 15.9× | 3.3% | +19.5% |
| Wisetech Global WTC.AX | Australia | $10.3B | +15% | +71% | 31% | 32.6× | 30.1% | +32.3% |
| Figma FIG | United States | $10.0B | -9% | +43% | -124% | 54.8× | 22.2% | +43.4% |
Sage has 5 bonds outstanding with $2.52B face value. The agencies rate it BBB+; its bonds trade like BBB-. Weighted yield 5.44%, a spread of 133 bp over government bonds.