Lightspeed Focuses on ‘Unified Payments’ as Revenues Climb 20%

With revenues on the rise, digital commerce firm Lightspeed is focused on Unified Payments.

That’s the name of the combined point-of-sale (POS) and payments platform which rolled out in May. During an earnings call Thursday (Aug. 3) discussing its first-quarter results for fiscal year 2024, CEO JP Chauvet said the Montreal-based company is “heavily focused” on the unified payment initiative.

Where Lightspeed had once allowed customers to integrate its POS system with any payment terminal brand, it now requires new customers to sign up for its in-house payment platform along with its POS tech. Customers who chose not to must pay transaction fees.

“Now we’re going to hone in and do whatever it takes to bring customers onto payments,” Lightspeed Chauvet told Yahoo Finance Canada in May. “We’re doubling down on payments.”

Lightspeed has offered businesses free payment terminals when they make the switch, contract buyouts to cover early termination fees, and free on-site installation, per the report.

“We’ve reached a point where if we want to provide our customers the best possible experience to scale their businesses, it is important for us to think about payments and [the point-of-sale] platform as one unified product,” Chauvet told analysts earlier this year.

Lightspeed’s “doubling down” was expected to affect adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) for the quarter with the company projecting a loss of approximately $10 million, the Yahoo Finance report said.

Thursday’s earnings report showed the company coming in under that figure, with a $7 million adjusted EBITDA loss in the first quarter and a softer subscription revenue growth in the first half of the year.

Revenues rose 20% year over year, with Lightspeed seeing transaction-based revenue of $121 million, an increase of 32%, and $78.7 million in subscription revenue, up 7%.

Management said Thursday that it believes performance could pick up significantly in the second half of the year due to its commitment to become adjusted EBITDA breakeven or better. The company is also expecting improvements in this quarter and beyond from unified payments, transaction-based gross margins and overall gross margins.

Last year, Lightspeed launched Lightspeed Retail, an offering that combines POS, payments and eCommerce into one platform.

Chauvet became CEO last year, replacing former chief executive and company founder Dax Dasilva after Lightspeed saw its stock and valuation fall 75% in four months.