Informa growth accelerates in B2B Events division as group makes more acquisitions

Revenue for the period increased 53% to £1,520.5m, Adjusted Operating Profit increased 102.9% to £413.5m, and Free Cash Flow grew 62.8% to £224.6m.

The largest owner/operator of B2B Events also continues to see strong demand from B2B customers.

Stephen Carter (pictured), Informa Group’s chief executive, said: “We are focused on building a better, broader and more scalable business, which is reflected in a very strong first half performance, putting us on track to meet or beat our guidance for 2023, with further momentum visible into 2024 and 2025.”

Informa posted underlying revenue growth of 31.9% and an increase in underlying adjusted operating profit of 56.5% in H1 2023, reflecting, it said, an improved performance in academic markets, strong growth in B2B Events and further progress in B2B Digital Services.

Strong H1 trading and forward bookings, the company said, put it on track for the top-end of guidance on both Revenue (£2.95bn to £3.05bn) and Adjusted Operating Profit (£750m to £790m), implying 30%+ growth in revenue and 50%+ growth in adjusted operating profit.

The group noted growth in adjusted operating profit, high cash conversion and strong forward bookings for events and subscriptions.

The company also announced the acquisitions of Canalys within its specialist Tech research business, and HIMSS within its Healthcare technology offering. The group said the deals further enhance the long-term growth opportunities captured through acquisitions of Tarsus and Winsight in the first half.

The strong underlying growth in Informa Markets, the company said, reflected the full return of Live & On-Demand B2B Event brands in all regions and markets. There is also accelerated expansion through the Tahaluf partnership in the Middle East, and enhanced customer value via smart technology and data.

At Informa Connect there was continuing double-digit underlying expansion (+18.5%) reported, reflecting strong demand for content-rich live experiences providing high value networking, specialist content and accredited training. Expected revenue of $600m+ in 2023, with major strength in Finance, Life Sciences and Foodservice, the latter boosted by recently acquired Winsight.

The group reported a growing use of artificial intelligence. AI technology is deployed across the group in areas such as content indexing and classification, video to text transcription and B2B recommendation and matchmaking.

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2023-08-01 Source: exhibitionnews.uk

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