DevOps darling GitLab Inc. delivered fiscal fourth-quarter financial results and guidance that came in above expectations today, sending its stock higher in extended trading.

The company reported a net loss of $23.2 million for the quarter, just under the $24 million loss it posted a year ago. Its loss before certain costs such as stock compensation came to 16 cents per share, while revenue rose 69% from a year ago, to $77.8 million.

That was better than expected, with Wall Street analysts modeling a wider loss of 25 cents per share on revenue of $70.29 million. GitLab also reported full-year revenue of $252.7 million, up 66% from a year ago.

GitLab sells development and collaboration tools that help developers to share code and create new applications faster. It’s viewed as one of the pioneers of DevOps, enabling companies to adopt a modern strategy of rapid, continuous software updates by combining software development and information technology department operations staff.

GitLab Chief Executive Sid Sijbrandij (pictured) said the company was benefiting from continued strong momentum from customers.

“This growth was broad-based, driven by strong customer additions across all company sizes,” he added. “We believe these results demonstrate that the market is moving from DIY DevOps composed of different tools to a DevOps Platform. This shift enables organizations to accelerate the time-to-market of their most important software and applications, providing them with a distinct competitive advantage.

GitLab said its number of customers that deliver more than $5,000 in annualized recurring revenue rose 67%, to 4,593, at the end of the quarter. Meanwhile, customers delivering at least $100,000 in ARR jumped 74%, to 492.

The company also revealed an impressive dollar-based net retention rate of over 152% at the end of the quarter. NRR is a metric that indicates how much revenue growth or churn a company has from its existing customers. Investors like to see a number over 100% here because it shows that a company is growing even apart from acquiring new customers.

“If DevOps services were sold like consumer goods, they would be flying off the shelves,” said Constellation Research Inc. analyst Holger Mueller. “GitLab is no exception, adding $100 million-plus in revenue for the full year and growing over 60%. Remarkably, the team around Sidbrandij managed to control costs very well, effectively halving the company’s overall losses on a year-over-year basis. Another year like this and GitLab will have performed a massive turnaround.”

During the quarter, GitLab announced it had acquired the open-source observability software startup Opstrace Inc. for an undisclosed fee. Opstrace’s observability software is used by developers to collect data that can help them to troubleshoot problems with cloud-hosted applications. GitLab said it will integrate Opstrace’s software into its flagship product, the GitLab DevOps Platform.

Looking to the next quarter, GitLab said it sees a loss of 27 to 28 cents per share on revenue of $77 million to $78 million. That was also better than expected, with Wall Street forecasting a loss of 30 cents per share on sales of $72.75 million.

GitLab’s stock rose more than 9% in the after-hours session, reversing a 6% decline earlier during the regular trading.

Photo: SiliconANGLE