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Full Year Results For the Year Ended 31 December 2011

Strong operating and financial performance demonstrating resilience and delivering growth

Key Highlights

Financial

  • Revenue increased - £1.28bn (2010: £1.23bn); organic revenue growth of 3.9% (excluding IPEX)
  • Profit increased - adjusted operating profit up 7.3% to £336.2m (2010: £313.2m); organic growth of 7.9% (excluding IPEX)
  • Margin increased - adjusted operating margin of 26.4% (2010: 25.5%)
  • Adjusted profit before tax of £295.9m up 7% (2010: £276.4m)
  • Statutory profit before tax decreased to £88.6m (2010: £125.0m) because of non-cash impairment
  • Earnings increased - adjusted diluted earnings per share up 8.6% to 37.8p (2010: 34.8p)
  • Strong cash generation - operating cash flow of £311.2m (2010: £319.8m)
  • Balance sheet strengthened - net debt/EBITDA ratio of 2.1 times (2010: 2.3 times)
  • Full year dividend increased by 20% reflecting strong performance and confidence in the business - second interim dividend of 11.8p giving a total 2011 dividend of 16.8p (2010:14.0p)

Operational

  • 67% of publishing revenues from subscriptions (2010: 65%)
  • 74% of publishing revenues fully digitised (2010: 74%)
  • Recent acquisitions performing well
  • Datamonitor integration into IBI delivering cost savings
  • Successful launch of new digital platforms within AI and PCI
  • Emerging market growth continues – now 14% of Group revenue (2010: 12%)

Outlook
Peter Rigby, Chief Executive, said:

            “Informa has delivered another set of strong results, in line with the expectations we set at the beginning of 2011 despite the challenging macro economic backdrop. These results further underline the Group’s resilient and high quality earnings streams.

            This performance has been achieved through our clear strategy of focusing on growth in the Group’s subscription income, improving product reach and quality through digital delivery, increasing the number of higher quality, resilient and larger scale events and driving growth through geo-cloning and expanding in emerging markets.  We have continued to deliver on all of these objectives.  We are pleased with how they have driven the financial performance in each of our three divisions. 

            Our academic division has again displayed resilience and growth, outperforming expectations.   It is encouraging to see both the books and the journals continuing to make significant contributions with good organic growth and more progress in emerging markets.  The long standing nature and depth of our client relationships, combined with the quality of our product portfolio are central to the consistent performance of this business.

            The professional and commercial division has performed well with good progress made in content delivery and we look forward to reaping the rewards of the integration of Datamonitor and IBI which is now largely complete.

            Our efforts to grow our events business organically have paid off with a number of exhibition launches which along with the acquisitions in 2011 have further strengthened our events platform. In particular, the acquisitions we completed in Brazil last year are already benefitting from being part of a broader group.

            This progress made across the Group, combined with strong underlying cash flows, visibility of earnings and a robust financial position has allowed us to increase our 2011 dividend by 20%, while also providing sufficient flexibility for us to continue investing for future growth.

            2012 has started in line with our expectations, with a number of our large events showing strong forward bookings and the journal renewal in the Academic business largely complete. Given the continued uncertainty in the macro environment we will continue to manage the business carefully.  However we believe that the strong foundations we have already built, supplemented by a combination of targeted investment and selective acquisitions, will support yet another year of growth.”

 Financial Highlights

  2011 2010 Actual Organic Organic(ex IPEX)4
  £m £m % % %
Revenue 1,275.3 1,226.5 4.0 2.5 3.9
Operating profit 130.3 164.0      
Adjusted operating profit ¹ 336.2 313.2 7.3 5.7 7.9
Operating cash flow ² 311.2 319.8      
Profit before tax 88.6 125.0      
Adjusted profit before tax ¹ 295.9 276.4      
Profit for year 74.3 98.9      
Adjusted profit for year ¹ 226.7  209.0
   
Basic earnings per share (p) 12.5 16.5      
Diluted earnings per share (p) 12.5 16.5      
Adjusted diluted earnings per share (p) ¹ 37.8 34.8      
Dividend per share (p) 16.8 14.0      
Free cash flow ² 203.4 231.4      
Net debt 3 784.0 779.1      

Notes:
In this document 'organic' refers to numbers adjusted for material acquisitions and disposals and the effects of changes in foreign currency exchange rates.
1 Adjusted results exclude adjusting items as set out in the Consolidated Income Statement and detailed in Note 2.
2 Operating cash flow and free cash flow are as calculated in the Financial Review.
3 Net debt as calculated in Note 12.
4 IPEX is a quadrennial printing show that occurred in 2010

Enquiries

Peter Rigby, Chief Executive     +41 (0) 41 444 1341

Adam Walker, Finance Director  +41 (0) 41 444 1343

James Gareh, Investor Relations            +44 (0) 78 341 92961

FTI Consulting 

Charles Palmer  +44 (0) 20 7269 7112

Read Full Year Results 2011 Press Release