ITE sales jump 43% in 'important' quarter

19th Jul 2011 11:30

Exhibitions and conferences firm ITE Group benefited from the first time contributions from new events and a softer comparator last year to boost revenues by nearly 43% in the third quarter.Revenue for the three months ended 30 June grew to £79.4m, from £55.6m last year, helped by the biennial Moscow International Oil & Gas exhibition along with a first time contribution from the spring events of the recently acquired MVK and Krasnodar exhibition portfolios, the group said. Like-for-like sales were 20% ahead of the previous year.The 1 April to 30 June period, the group's "most important in revenue and profit terms", includes six of its ten largest events each year and account for over half of full-year revenues.As at 15 July, ITE had £146.8m of sales booked for the current financial year, compared with £106.9m at the same time the previous year, representing 98% of the market's revenue expectations for the full-year.Nevertheless, shares fell 2.7% lower to 227.6p as of 11:39 on Tuesday morning.BC