5th Nov 2020 09:47
(Alliance News) - AVEVA Group PLC on Thursday posted a loss for the first half of its financial year, as revenue declined considerably through a reduction in both perpetual and subscription licences.
For the six months to the end of September, the Cambridge-headquartered information technology firm reported a pretax loss of GBP24.2 million, swinging from a profit of GBP24.0 million the year before.
There was an increase in exceptional items at GBP80.5 million from GBP66.6 million, as a result of costs from the acquisition of OSIsoft at an enterprise value of USD5.0 billion, which is expected to be complete between December and February 2021.
On an adjusted basis, pretax profit dropped by 38% to GBP55.3 million from GBP89.1 million the prior year.
Revenue declined by 15% year-on-year to GBP332.6 million from GBP391.9 million. The drop in perpetual licences reflected the challenging market environment, while a fall in subscription licences was attributed to a tough comparator the prior year and delayed customer decision making.
AVEVA declared an interim dividend of 15.5 pence per share, in line with the year before.
Looking ahead,the group's order pipeline for the rest of the year remains strong, with a higher volume of contract renewals. As a result, AVEVA expects solid revenue growth in the second half, leading to confidence for its full year performance.
"Given the Covid-19 disruption, AVEVA has performed creditably in what has been a relatively tough trading environment in the first half, and against very tough comparatives. We continue to see solid demand from our customers for AVEVA's software to help them digitalise and the long-term trend towards digitalisation of the industrial world remains very exciting," said Chief Executive Officer Craig Hayman.
"Our order pipeline for the remainder of the year is strong and we expect the group to achieve year-on-year revenue growth in the second half of the financial year. Despite the challenging market conditions, we have continued to make significant investments and progress in strengthening AVEVA's position as a global leader in industrial software, including agreeing the proposed acquisition of OSIsoft," Hayman added.
Shares in AVEVA were down 4.0% at 4,241.00 pence on Thursday in London.
By Dayo Laniyan; [email protected]
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