26th Sep 2013 10:22
LONDON (Alliance News) - Keywords Studios PLC, a company that provides testing and localisation services for the video-games industry, announced Thursday its first interim dividend after seeing an increase in revenue in its first half, in spite of concerns over the geographic scope and timing of the launch of the next generation of games consoles.
The company announced a maiden interim dividend of 0.33 pence per share, and it said in a statement that it expects to declare a final dividend of 0.67 pence per share in 2014.
For the 27 weeks ended July 8, Keywords posted revenues of EUR7.2 million, up from EUR6.4 million in the previous year. The company swung into pretax loss of EUR247,887, from a pretax profit of GBP1.2 million the previous year. The company said the loss was due to one-time costs associated with its transition to AIM in July, accounting for EUR64,000, and foreign-exchange losses of EUR17,000, as well as investment in expansion.
Overall revenues were boosted by growth in its localisation business, where revenues grew 24%. The company says it is working on many next-generation titles ahead of the launch of the new Playstation 4 and Xbox One, and it had seen marked increases in utilisation across its Localisation Testing division, which it expects to produce significantly strong margins in the second half of the year.
However, the company cautioned that due to the scaling back of the number of next-generation launch territories by games manufacturers and delays in earlier-generation game releases, it expects its full-year profits to be roughly in line with 2012.
"Notwithstanding the hiatus caused by the timing of the simultaneous launch of two new consoles in an unprecedented launch cycle, we have made considerable progress in strengthening our market share," said Chief Executive Andrew Day in a statement. " While it has proven difficult to predict the exact timetable of forthcoming launches, 2014 is expects to be a year of significant activity for the games industry leading us well placed for substantial growth in the market."
Shares in Keywords were trading up 4.5% at 118.00 pence Thursday morning.
By Hana Stewart-Smith; [email protected]; @HanaSSAllNews
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