5th Jul 2005 11:45
Huntsworth PLC05 July 2005 Huntsworth PLC AGM Statement At today's Annual General Meeting of Huntsworth PLC, Lord Chadlington, ExecutiveChairman of the Company, made the following statement: Our 2004 financial year and the first half of 2005 have heralded unprecedentedchange for your company. During the period to which the Annual Report refers, we continued to trade welland completed the largest acquisitions which we have made since the newHuntsworth Board was elected nearly five years ago. These companies have, as our2004 results show, settled in well and, together with the longer establishedHuntsworth companies, continue to make good - and sometimes excellent -progress. Our expansion has culminated, since the year end, with the merger of ourbusiness with that of Incepta - the international public relations, marketingservices and advertising group. I am particularly pleased to welcome some of the original Incepta shareholdersand employees here this morning. Such has been the speed and thoroughness of the integration process, we nolonger think of "Huntsworth" and "Incepta" as two separate businesses. We areincreasingly one business with one emerging culture - a culture of co-operationand willingness to embrace radical change. We are now a £200 million group with global reach, outstanding brands, blue chipclients and exceptionally talented people. The executive team have set themselves the task of completing, within 100working days, a Strategic Review of the composition, structure, management andpolicies of this new Group. If our work continues as it has begun, I expect toannounce our conclusions when we publish our half-year numbers in the Autumn. We have established a five point grid against which to evaluate the strategicoptions available to us. First, we must create focus and commercial logic for the enlarged group and itsconstituent parts: Second, we must improve operating margins - before central and financing costs -to an average of 20%. Several of our businesses already exceed this target yearon year: others need investment to raise them to the required level. ButHuntsworth is a portfolio of companies and we should be able to reach thistarget within our short term planning cycle: Third, we must reduce costs - particularly at the Centre. We expect to reducecentral and back office costs by at least £2.5 million per annum. There isnothing more demotivating than to exceed your subsidiary company budget butbelieve that those profits are being squandered in the Centre. So it is not justabout reducing absolute levels of cost - it is also about transparency ofpurpose: Fourth, by achieving these first three objectives, we will reduce our debt anddevelop a partnership relationship with our bankers based on trust and meetingor exceeding our budgets: Fifth, none of this is possible without a motivated and incentivised work force.We must retain our best people and also attract the most talented professionalsin the market place. Watson Wyatt, the international remuneration consultancy,is already working with us in this all-important sphere. If we can make real progress in these five areas then we will quickly become oneof the strongest specialist communications groups in the world. Early indications of our combined trading are encouraging. Continued growth inthe public relations businesses and a noticeable uptick in the trading ofmarketing services in May - our first month together as a combined Group - givesthe Board confidence that when we produce our trading statement in the nextmonth or so, we will confirm continued strong performance in line with marketexpectations. Our companies have continued to produce great work for clients and successfullyto handle some of the most important assignments in the industry - including the$90 billion Mitsubishi Tokyo Financial Group merger with UFJ Holdings to createone of the largest banks in the world and the $7.5 billion Pernod Ricard offerfor Allied Domecq. Other important mandates include work for Carmen Media, theDTI, Foreign & Commonwealth Office, Nikon and The Office of Fair Trading. This has been a period of exceptional change. I would therefore like to thankall our constituencies - shareholders, clients, employees, advisors and bankers- for their continuing support and help. Date: 5 July 2005 For further information contact: Huntsworth PLC 020 7408 2232Lord Chadlington, Executive ChairmanRoger Selman, Finance Director This information is provided by RNS The company news service from the London Stock ExchangeRelated Shares:
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