A decade ago Canonical did around $81 million in revenue (2014) with a head count of around 337 at the company behind Ubuntu Linux while their Linux desktop efforts were still gaining a footing with OEMs/ODMs pre-loads, within enterprise desktop environments, and the lucrative server/cloud space. Canonical recently filed their 2024 annual report and they are now up to almost $300 million USD in revenue and a headcount of more than 1,100.
A few days ago Canonical filed their annual report for year end 31 December 2024 with the UK Companies House for where they are based. This provides some interesting public insight to the health and overall growth of this company behind Ubuntu Linux.
Canonical’s 2024 year end statement at $292 million in revenue, which is up nicely from $251M in 2023. The year before that in 2022 they wre at $205M in revenue. They also improved their gross margins to 83% from 80% the year prior.
Canonical hired more than one hundred new employees in 2024 in growing the company from an average headcount of 1,034 to 1,175. In 2022 they had an average headcount of 858.
Of their $291M in revenue, they reported a gross profit of $258M and an operating profit of $15.5M. The $15.5M operating profit is up from $11.2M in 2023 and much better off than the earlier days of Canonical where they were typically operating at a loss each year and relying on funding from Ubuntu founder Mark Shuttleworth to sustain operations. With the growth of Ubuntu Linux, Canonical is solidly standing on its own two feet well and has been doing so for a number of years at this point.
It has been a while since hearing of any rumors/talks of Canonical potentially going for an IPO… The last time was back in 2022 when they were reportedly eyeing 2023 for an IPO. That came and passed without any initial public offering. While the markets have improved since, it will be interesting to see if they end up going for an IPO or have become content on remaining a privately held organization. In any event at least their financial health remains strong and they continue moving in the right direction and striding well for next year’s big Ubuntu 26.04 LTS release.
Those interested can find the Canonical 2024 annual report in full via UK Companies House.
