Centaur Media plc
Incorporated in England and
Wales
Registration number:
04948078
LEI: 2138005WK87G7DQRQI62
ISIN: GB0034291418
10 October 2024
Centaur Media Plc
("Centaur" or "the Company")
Trading Update
Centaur, an international provider of
business intelligence, learning and specialist consultancy,
provides a trading update.
As highlighted in the interim results in July, the
marketing sector headwinds caused by macro-economic challenges have
continued to drive restructurings in the marketing functions of
many blue-chip customers of Xeim. This has led to the curtailment
of marketing budgets and, although we have retained most of these
customers, their spend has reduced. The prolonged impact of these
challenges is materially reducing revenue and profit during the
second half of 2024.
These headwinds are having a significant impact on
Xeim's Econsultancy and Oystercatchers brands, and Xeim's
non-strategic advertising revenue. More positively, revenue from
our future growth drivers, The Lawyer, MW Mini MBA, Festival of
Marketing's October event and Marketing Week's subscriptions, has
continued to improve in the second half.
EBITDA in 2024 will decline as a result of the impact
of the high operational gearing on Xeim's lower revenue and a
change in revenue mix. EBITDA will also be lower than last
year due to the 2024 planned £1.3m investment in product,
marketing and resources set out in our BIG27 strategy. This will
accelerate the growth of our strategically valuable revenue
over the next three years, in particular from The Lawyer, MW Mini
MBA and Marketing Week's subscriptions.
The Board now expects the Company
to achieve revenue of at least £34m in 2024, at an adjusted
EBITDA margin of approximately 15%, which is significantly below
the current analyst consensus range. This revised expectation will
also impact our revenue and profit expectations in 2025.
Outlook
We continue to review our go-to-market plans and
maintain a focus on robust cost management. We retain a cautious
outlook and do not anticipate that trading conditions for the
affected parts of our business will improve in the near
term.
Nonetheless, Centaur's strong balance sheet,
with £9.5m of net cash at 30 September 2024, and reliable cash
conversion from our strategically valuable revenue streams, means
that we are well positioned to manage this uncertainty. We will
also continue to invest behind our strategy, as this will generate
long-term value, while maintaining our progressive dividend policy
which, as previously announced, is paying an interim ordinary
dividend of 0.6 pence per share later this month.
Enquiries
Centaur Media plc
020 7970 4000
Swag Mukerji, Chief Executive
Officer
Simon Longfield, Chief Financial
Officer
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Teneo
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Zoë Watt / Oliver
Bell
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07713 157561 / 07917
221748
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