Pushpay chief shoved aside

Specialist payments company Pushpay Holdings, which operates in the "faith sector", has made a leadership change, with the resignation of chief executive Chris Heaslip. The company's chair Bruce Gordon will take up the CEO role next month.

Non-executive director Graham Shaw will be the new chair. Heaslip will remain a director.

In a statement yesterday, the company said it was growing into a "business of a significant size and scale" and Gordon "has the operational experience and competencies required to build on the success that [Heaslip] has helped create."

Gordon's CV includes stints as chair of Paymark, chief manager electronic payments and banking at Bank of New Zealand and senior roles at Eco-Products Group and Farmers Credit.

Pushpay operates in the US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, where is provides "donor management systems, finance tools and community apps" to the faith sector, non-profits and education providers. More than 90 per cent of the business is done in North America.

The company reported a net profit of US$18.8 million for the year to March, on revenue of $98.4 million.

Revenue was up from US$70.2 million and the profit was a turnaround from a loss of US$23.3 million in 2017/18.

The business suffered a cash outflow of US$2.7 million from operating activities, compared with a net outflow of US$17.1 million in 2017/18. The reported profit was thanks to tax benefit of US$20.2 million.

The volume of payments processed when up from US$3 billion to US$4.2 billion. Customer numbers rose from 7276 to 7649.