Experian sees revenue up and plans programme of cuts

8th Nov 2012 07:22

Information services company Experian has hiked its dividend after reporting strong revenue growth in the first half.The company also announced an efficiency programme designed to save the firm $75m a year.Total group revenue for the six months to the end of September was $2.3bn, with revenue from continuing activities up 12% at constant exchange rate.This fell to 6% at actual rates, principally due to the depreciation of the Brazilian real against the US dollar. Experian announced a first interim dividend of 10.75c per share, up 5% on the previous year.Pre-tax profits took a hit, dropping from $351m half way through its 2011 financial year, to $76m in 2012.The company put this down to an accounting charge of $403m against Brazilian credit checker Seresa, of which it owns 99.6%Chief Executive Officer, Don Robert, said looking ahead, the business faced a tough comparable in the third quarter."For the full year, we expect high-single digit organic revenue growth, modest margin improvement (at constant currency) and to convert at least 90% of EBIT into operating cash," he said.The firm plans to impose a programme of operational changes over the next 18 to 24 months, designed to make Experian 'more nimble'.Examples will include re-engineering fixed costs, reducing exposure to lower growth markets, further near and off-shoring, and rationalisation of lower growth 'legacy' products.It said one-off restructuring costs associated with this plan would be around $110m, the majority of which would be cash.About $9m of costs came in the first half in connection with this programme.Of this charge, $6m related to redundancy costs and $3m related to asset write-offs, the company said.