Medical IT and technology company Sectra has announced its earnings for the first quarter of the 2015/2016 fiscal year, including $26.8 million in net sales, up almost 6 percent from the previous year.  

According to Torbjörn Kronander, Sectra president and CEO, the jump in sales from last year to this year would be even greater if not for one technicality.

“During the first quarter of the preceding year, Sectra reported a relatively large nonrecurring item pertaining to the sale of patent rights,” Kronander said in a statement. “If we compare our performance excluding this nonrecurring item, the Group’s operating profit increased 29.8 percent and sales rose 14.7 percent. This is a trend that we are proud of. This improvement during the quarter is partly attributable to the large number of long-term contracts we have signed in recent years, which are now helping to counterbalance seasonal variations in the Group’s net sales.”

Sectra also reported $35.7 million in order bookings, which represents a 22.7 percent drop compared to 2014/2015. Kronander addressed this number as well, saying the drop was expected.

“While order bookings remained favorable and well above our net sales, we experienced a decline compared with the year-earlier period,” Kronander said. “As anticipated, order bookings were not as high in the UK, the market in which Sectra’s order bookings increased most in the preceding fiscal year. While the variation in sales between quarters has declined somewhat as a result of long-term managed-services agreements, the variation in order bookings has increased.”

Sectra’s report also shows that its workforce has increased in the last year. There are currently 583 Sectra employees, up 9.2 percent.

The report is available here. Information about Sectra’s big acquisition earlier in the year can be found here.