Irish payments software and services group Trintech has reported second-quarter revenues of $8.9 million (€6.6 million), up 48 per cent from a year ago, but had a pre-tax loss of $226,000.

Trintech's spend on research and development, sales and marketing, and administration all increased significantly due to the inclusion of costs related to its healthcare business.

The Nasdaq-quoted firm acquired Concuity, which specialises in payment recovery software for the US health service, for $9 million last December.

"Our strong year-over-year growth of 48 per cent in revenue, primarily driven by organic growth, reflects the success of the investments we have made, and will continue to make, in our sales force and marketing campaigns to generate demand for our products and services," said Paul Byrne, president of Trintech.

Mr Byrne said he expected the firm to return to pre-tax profitability in the second half of its current financial year.

Trintech's gross margin for the quarter was $6 million, or 68 per cent of revenue, compared to $4.6 million or 76 per cent in the same quarter last year.

The company said the drop was "primarily due to lower margins from the healthcare business".

Trintech exited its original core business of providing payment-processing hardware through the sale of that division to VeriFone in the third quarter of its last financial year.

The company now focuses on providing software and services for reconciliation, revenue enhancement and transaction management.

Trintech's revenues were split almost evenly between software licences and services.

These contributed $4.5 million and $4.4 million respectively.

Chief executive Cyril McGuire said the company was continuing to invest in new products and markets.

He said it saw significant growth opportunities in financial services and healthcare.