MongoDB Inc. shares rose sharply in extended trading after the database company posted third-quarter revenue growth of better than 50% and a loss that crushed analysts’ expectations for the second straight quarter.

In after-hours trading, MongoDB shares soared more than 14%. The stock is still down 12% from its all-time high of three weeks ago amid a general sell-off in tech shares during that time.

Growth at the New York-based firm was led by Atlas, a distributed multicloud database that now accounts for 58% of the company’s revenue following 84% growth in the quarter. Customer growth was also strong, with 2,000 more coming on board in the quarter to bring the total to more than 31,000. That growth was driven largely by Atlas, which finished the quarter with 29,000 customers, according to Chief Financial Officer Michael Gordon.

The results are an “indication of the success of our land-and-expand strategy and that we are increasingly becoming a strategic partner for our customers,” Gordon said. He noted that more than 1,200 customers now spend at least $100,000 annually with the company, up from 898 a year ago, and that MongoDB has seen a “meaningful sequential increase in deferred revenue,” indicating that more customers are making long-term commitments.

The third-quarter adjusted net loss of 11 cents a share came in far lower than consensus estimates of a loss of 38 cents a share. Revenue rose 51% ,to $226.9 million, from $150.8 million in the same quarter last year and was also well ahead of estimates of $205.18 million.

The company increased its guidance for the fourth quarter, saying it expects a loss of between 21 and 24 cents compared with the 34-cent loss analysts were forecasting. Executives said fourth-quarter revenue should come in at between $239 million and $242 million, beating estimates of $227.5 million.

Chief Executive Dev Ittycheria (pictured) said that, as a general-purpose NoSQL database, Mongo is benefiting from the profusion of new competitors. “We hear loudly from customers that they can’t use a net new technology for every new use case,” he said. “They’re gravitating to more of a modern platform where they can run most workloads, simplify operational issues and make the life of the developer that much easier. That’s why we’re winning.”

MongoDB’s heritage as a distributed system has also been a virtue, the CEO said, amid a spate of new competitors that are touting those capabilities. “As customers scale out their environments and deal with massive amounts of data and high-performance requirements the existing relational technologies just can’t handle it,” he said.

The company has also seen broad adoption by startups, Ittycheria said, indicating that MongoDB is now perceived as both a safe and cost-effective choice. “How many startups use Oracle?” he quipped.

Photo: MongoDB