CI&T (NYSE:CINT) reported record second-quarter 2026 revenue of $142.8 million, with management citing continued enterprise demand for artificial intelligence deployment and the early benefits of value-based commercial models.
Revenue rose 21.9% year over year on an organic basis and increased 14.1% at constant currency, exceeding the company’s guidance of at least $140 million, CFO Stanley Rodrigues said. The quarter marked CI&T’s seventh consecutive quarter of double-digit organic growth, according to Founder and CEO Cesar Gon.
Value-Based Pricing Supports Gross Margin
CI&T has been shifting portions of its work away from traditional time-and-materials arrangements toward commercial models tied to outputs, consumption or client outcomes. Gon said 30% of new engagements in the first six months of 2026 used the newer value-based models, while he later clarified during the question-and-answer session that 40% of new sales booked during the first half used those models.
Rodrigues said adjusted gross margin expanded sequentially to 32.4% in the second quarter from 30.6% in the first quarter. However, adjusted gross margin declined from the prior-year period due to foreign-exchange pressure, even as productivity improvements offset the resumption of payroll taxes in Brazil.
Gon said the newer pricing approaches can generate contribution margins that are 3 to 15 percentage points higher than traditional time-and-materials work, depending on the mix of services. He said the company expects it could take about 18 months to reprice and renew much of its existing contract base, though certain work will remain appropriately billed on a time-and-materials basis.
- Adjusted EBITDA was $19 million, representing a 13.3% margin.
- On an FX-neutral basis, adjusted EBITDA would have been $20.8 million, or a 15.6% margin, Rodrigues said.
- Adjusted profit was $8.7 million, or a 6.1% margin.
- Adjusted diluted earnings per share were $0.07, compared with $0.09 a year earlier.
Commercial Investments Pressure EBITDA Margin
The company said its EBITDA margin was affected by the appreciation of the Brazilian real against the U.S. dollar and by deliberate investment in sales and commercial capabilities. Rodrigues said the investments include a temporary 2026 component related to scaling CI&T’s agentic software development life cycle, or agentic SDLC, initiative, as well as structural spending on sales teams, new offerings, practices, vertical initiatives and commissions.
Management said its commercial pipeline was 40% larger than it was in the first half of 2025, with improved conversion rates. Gon said roughly 35% to 40% of demand is being articulated as agentic SDLC work, including efforts to transform existing digital engagements into AI-enabled projects with different commercial models.
Sales expense rose from roughly 8% of revenue last year to 12% in the second quarter, management said. Looking ahead, executives said they expect the long-term level to settle around 10% of revenue as temporary investment associated with the agentic SDLC rollout subsides. CI&T expects gross-margin expansion and operating leverage to support sequential EBITDA-margin improvement in the second half.
AI Partnerships and Talent Strategy
CI&T said it closed the quarter with approximately 8,100 professionals and voluntary attrition of 10.1%. President for North America and Europe Bruno Guicardi said the company has reskilled its workforce for AI-native work and has 6,700 “AI builders.” Revenue per AI builder exceeded $80,000 on a trailing-12-month basis, up 7% year over year.
During the quarter, CI&T joined Anthropic’s Claude Partner Network and certified more than 1,000 AI engineers on Claude, Guicardi said. The company said it is using Claude Code within its CI&T Flow platform and plans to work with Anthropic on industry solutions in financial services, retail and consumer goods. CI&T also announced a partnership with Mistral AI and said its Flow platform is model-agnostic, connected to more than 37 models.
Management characterized AI deployment demand as encompassing software-engineering transformation, modernization of legacy systems and data infrastructure, and industry-specific applications focused on efficiency and customer experience. Gon said about 30% of the AI deployment opportunity relates to legacy and data modernization needed to support broader AI adoption.
Outlook Raised for Full Year
For the third quarter, CI&T expects revenue of at least $145.7 million, representing 14.4% growth from the third quarter of 2025, or 12.3% growth at constant currency.
For the full year, the company raised its revenue outlook to $566 million to $578 million, implying organic growth of 15.5% to 18%. The revised revenue outlook includes an anticipated positive foreign-exchange impact of approximately 400 basis points.
CI&T now expects adjusted EBITDA margin of 15% to 17% for 2026. Gon said the forecast reflects continued investment in the commercial engine and anticipated sequential margin improvement in the second half as newer pricing models become more broadly adopted.
The company also repurchased $2.8 million of shares during the quarter. Rodrigues said the weighted average diluted share count was down 3.6% year over year.
About CI&T (NYSE:CINT)
CI&T Inc (NYSE:CINT) is a global digital solutions and technology services provider specializing in end-to-end digital transformation. The company partners with clients across industries such as financial services, retail, healthcare and technology to deliver tailored software products, agile development practices and customer-centric design. Its core offerings include digital strategy consulting, user experience and interface design, cloud-native application development, data engineering and full-cycle product lifecycle management.
Leveraging a proprietary agile framework, CI&T helps organizations accelerate time-to-market and improve operational efficiency through continuous delivery and DevOps automation.
