20 February 2018 – final results
The advanced surveillance technology group has announced its results for the year to 30 November which have revealed a slight fall in revenue to £70.1m (2016: £70.9m), with underlying pre-tax profits rising by 15% to £3.0m (2016: £2.6m). Underlying diluted earnings per share were over 22% higher at 15.2p (2016: 12.4p) whilst the dividend for the year was increased to 4.0p (2016: 2.0p). Net cash at the year end was £3.8m (2016: £2.2m). These are clearly good results especially bearing in mind the downturn in the oil and gas sector which is an important area for the group. The group has cut costs in this part of the business thus improving margins whilst revenue growth has been seen in other markets such as gaming, transport hubs and data management centres. The group intends to increase its R & D spend in the current financial year as it has identified a number of growth opportunities and this means that profits for the year will be at a similar level to last time. With the group set to benefit from these innovations in the future and with a strong balance sheet we believe the shares remain a BUY.