-          Headline revenue growth of 9.1% or 12.7% at constant currency (“CC”)

-          Underlying^(a) revenue growth of 6.4%

-          Adjusted operating profit^(b) up 10.5% to £91.9m with margin^(c) of 19.4% (H1 2010: 19.2%)

-          Diluted adjusted EPS^(d) of 25.1p per share (H1 2010: 24.7p)

-          Interim dividend of 6.3p (H1 2010: 6.0p) up 5.0%

-          Adjusted EBITDA up 10.4% to £100.6m (H1 2010: £91.1m) – cash conversion ratio^(e) of 119.7%

-          Four acquisitions completed in H1 for maximum consideration of £21.2m

-          Further print disposals of 12 titles during the period generated £14.6m of proceeds

-          Today announce acquisition of Ecobuild for £31.2m cash consideration and up to £20.0m earn out

 

	Business performance	H1 2011 £m	H1 2010 £m	Change %		Change at CC %	Underlying Change(a) %
	Revenue	474.0	434.3	9.1		12.7	6.4
	Adjusted operating profit(b)	91.9	83.2	10.5		14.6	-4.1
	Adjusted operating profit margin(c)	19.4%	19.2%	0.2%pt
	Adjusted EBITDA	100.6	91.1	10.4
	Adjusted PBT	79.8	76.1	4.9
	Diluted adjusted EPS(d)	25.1p	24.7p	1.6
	Dividend per share	6.3p	6.0p	5.0
	Cash generated from Operations	112.4	76.9	46.2
IFRS Statutory results H1 2011 £m H1 2010 £m Change % Revenue 474.0 434.3 9.1 Operating profit 72.6 67.0 8.4 Profit after tax 55.8 49.6 12.5 EPS 20.5 18.7 9.6 Weighted av. no. of shares 243.4 243.5   Net Debt 482.2 302.8

 

David Levin, UBM’s Chief Executive Officer, commented:

“We have had a good first half with the business trading in line with our guidance.  We’re pleased with the 6.4% underlying revenue growth, and particularly the 16% headline growth in Emerging Markets^(f) where we now generate almost 20% of our total operating profit.  These positive revenue trends have driven healthy 10.5% growth in adjusted operating profit, an increase in our Group margin to 19.4% and were accompanied by strong cash generation.

“We continue to build our platform for profitable growth, developing market-leading products for attractive business communities in growth markets.  During the first half of the year, we acquired four events businesses and launched nine new and geo-adapted tradeshows.  We’ve continued our targeted investment in online, social media and workflow products, particularly in our Data Services and Targeting, Distribution & Monitoring businesses, and completed the sale of a number of our legacy print activities. 

“Today we’ve announced the acquisition of Ecobuild, the world’s largest tradeshow for the fast-growing sustainable construction market.  It complements our other businesses in the UK built environment sector and we see good opportunities to develop Ecobuild events in new geographies outside the UK, taking advantage of our worldwide events infrastructure and existing events portfolio.

“Overall our outlook for the full year has improved modestly since we now expect our events business to outperform the guidance we gave in March.”

Footnote references are to definitions provided at the end of the Outlook section

 

Operational Highlights

£m	H1	H1	Change	Change at CC	Underlying Change(a)
	2011	2010	%	%	%
Revenue
Events	177.1	139.3	27.1	31.5	13.6
Targeting, Distribution & Monitoring	95.2	91.2	4.4	9.3	5.6
Data Services	100.2	98.6	1.6	4.5	3.9
Online – Marketing Services	41.8	30.9	35.3	41.7	18.9
Print – Magazines	59.7	74.3	-19.7	-18.8	-13.6
Total Revenue	474.0	434.3	9.1	12.7	6.4
Adjusted Operating Profit(b)
Events	57.7	40.7	41.8	47.6	9.9
Targeting, Distribution & Monitoring	20.1	23.4	-14.1	-9.9	-10.0
Data Services	17.4	20.3	-14.3	-13.4	-14.6
Online – Marketing Services	0.7	(0.5)	n/m	n/m	5.3
Print – Magazines	3.1	3.7	-16.2	-16.2	-16.9
Net Corporate costs	(7.1)	(4.4)	61.4	61.4	61.4
Total Adjusted Operating Profit(b)	91.9	83.2	10.5	14.6	-4.1
Adjusted Operating Profit Margin(c)
Events	32.6%	29.2%	3.4%pt
Targeting, Distribution & Monitoring	21.1%	25.7%	-4.6%pt
Data Services	17.4%	20.6%	-3.2%pt
Online – Marketing Services	1.7%	(1.6)%	3.3%pt
Print – Magazines	5.2%	5.0%	0.2%pt
Total Adjusted Operating Profit Margin(c)	19.4%	19.2%	0.2%pt

 

Events

-          Reported revenue growth of 27.1% partially reflects the positive contribution from acquired Canon events

-          Underlying annual revenues up 13.6% Emerging Markets^(f) events grew 24.5%, particularly in China (+17.4%) and India, and accounted for 30.2% of the H1 annual events revenues

-          Forward bookings for 2010 Top 20 events up 12.9% – as expected, the distortion associated with the Hong Kong Jewellery show floor plan reorganisation is unwinding

-          Biennial revenues of £9.4m (H1 2010: £10.8m) – underlying biennial revenues up 3.5% over their previous 2009 editions

-          Strong margin^(c) of 32.6% (H1 2010: 29.2%) reflects the high margin acquisitions, higher margin biennials and growth in our larger annual events partially offset by the launch costs

-          Robust stand revenue performance combined with continued positive attendee and sponsorship trends, particularly in US technology events

-          Nine new launches during the period – of which 7 are geo-adaptations – breakeven in aggregate

-          Four acquisitions contributing £4.1m to H1 revenues – £8.6m LTM pro forma

-          Market leading Ecobuild acquisition announced –  generated revenues of £9.4m at the event in March 2011

 

Targeting, Distribution & Monitoring (“TD&M”)

-          Reported revenue growth of 4.4% or 9.3% at CC, with underlying revenues up 5.6%

-          Resilient US wire performance (+2.5% at CC) with consistent strong margins, driven by growth in the volume

-          US non-wire revenues up 10.1% at CC – including a good performance at Vintage (+7.1% at CC)

-          International revenues up 18.3% at CC

-          Margin^(c) of 21.1% (H1 2010: 25.7%) reflecting, previously announced, step up in IT infrastructure costs, sales force investment, dilution from growth in Vintage and international expansion, partially offset by margin enhancement from US Wire and other US non-wire products

 

Data Services (“DS”)

-          Reported revenue growth of 1.6% or 4.5% at CC – underlying revenues up 3.9%

-          Mix of revenues improving – continue to manage the migration from print to digital and services

-          Underlying revenue growth of 30% in Technology & IP community was the key driver. A robust performance from the Health, Built Environment and Pulp & Paper sectors partially offset by continued weakness in Trade & Transport

-          As anticipated the DS margin^(c) was 17.4% (H1 2010: 20.6%) primarily reflecting the continued decline in advertising in our print directories but also targeted investment to develop the online and workflow products

 

Online & Print – Marketing Services

-          Combined reported revenues declined 3.5% driven by continued print portfolio disposals and continued organic print decline partly offset by good growth in Online – Marketing Services. 

-          The combined margin^(c) improved 0.7%pt to 3.7% (H1 2010: 3.0%)

Online – Marketing Services (“Online”)

-          Reported revenue growth of 35.3% driven by: contribution of acquired assets (most notably Canon), continued improvements in advertising trends and new product developments. 

-          Underlying growth of 18.9%

-          Margin^(c) of 1.7% (H1 2010: (1.6)%) helped by good performance in banner advertising partially offsetting investment in new products: 74 new virtual events hosted in H1 2011 (H1 2010: 29), nine Community-in-a-box (“CiaB”) websites

-          Investment of £5m during the period on virtual events and CiaB (H1 2010: £1m)

Print – Magazines (“Print”)

-          Underlying revenues remain weak – down 13.6%

-          Reported revenues declined 19.7% – driven by the disposal of four print businesses (12 titles), closure of ten titles and continuing organic print decline.

-          Slight margin^(c) improvement to 5.2% (H1 2010: 5.0%)

-          Systematic portfolio review continues

 

Outlook

Overall the outlook for our businesses remains in line with the guidance we have previously provided, except that we now expect slightly higher revenue growth and profits in Events, as described in the detailed guidance below. As a result, we now expect underlying consolidated revenue growth for 2011 of around 5.5-6%, broadly in line with 2010’s rate. We anticipate continued growth in consolidated operating profit largely driven by a full year of contribution from acquisitions and continued momentum in our Events business, tempered by the effects of print disposals, lower margins in Data Services and TD&M, and higher net corporate costs.

-          Events: Following the excellent trading performance in H1 combined with positive forward booking trends we now expect full year underlying revenue growth similar to that enjoyed last year (about 12%), with full year margins in the range of 32-32.5%. We continue to expect good contribution from biennials, particularly in Q4. However their impact on the margin will be partially offset by the phasing impact of the acquired Canon and Ecobuild portfolios (which are margin dilutive to H2) and further investment in new launches and geo-adaptations

-          TD&M: Our guidance is unchanged: we expect solid underlying revenue growth similar to 2010 (c 5.6%), with overall margins slightly ahead of the second half of 2010 (H2 2010: 20.8%). TD&M revenues reflect seasonal variations with relative weakness in the first and third quarters. 

-          Data Services: We retain our guidance of revenue growth similar to 2010 (c.3%), and we expect comparatives to become progressively more challenging as the year continues. Our margin outlook of approximately 16% for the full year remains the same

-          Online: Our guidance remains unchanged. We continue to expect good growth in revenues, although there is likely to be some moderation in underlying rates as the year progresses. As before, we do not currently anticipate margins being much higher than 2010 (FY 2010: 1.9%)

-          Print: After taking into account all the announced disposals  (which contributed £47.3m of revenues in 2010) and the £9.7m pro-forma 2010 acquisitions, we continue to expect the underlying revenues of the outstanding portfolio to decline at about 12% p.a. with a margin similar to that of 2010 (c7%)

-          Net Corporate Costs for the full year are currently expected to be approximately £14m

-          Net interest expense, taking into account the Ecobuild acquisition, is currently expected to be £29-30m  

-          Pension credit is expected to be £2.9m

-          Tax: The corporate tax accrual rate of 14.8% reflects our expected tax charge for the full year

 

Throughout this announcement:

(a)   Where quoted, underlying growth rates exclude currency movements, discontinued revenues, revenues from acquisitions, disposals and biennial events.

(b)   Adjusted operating profit represents operating profit excluding amortisation of intangible assets arising on acquisitions, exceptional items and share of taxation on profit from joint ventures and associates. 

(c)    Adjusted operating margin relates to our adjusted operating profit. It is adjusted operating profit expressed as a percentage of revenues.

(d)   Adjusted earnings per share is before amortisation of intangible assets arising on acquisitions, certain exceptional items, deferred tax on intangible assets, taxation relating to exceptional items and net financing expense – other.

(e)   Cash conversion is the ratio of adjusted cash generated from operations to adjusted operating profit. Adjusted cash generated from operations represents adjusted operating profit, before depreciation and profit from associates and joint ventures, after capital expenditure, movement in working capital, dividends from associates and joint ventures and non cash movements.

(f)     Emerging Markets constituents are the non-G10 countries – most notably for UBM: China, Brazil, India, Thailand, Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Mexico and UAE.