Learning Technologies Group plc
FULL YEAR RESULTS 2021
Strong organic revenue growth
Transformational GP Strategies acquisition progressing ahead of plan
Learning Technologies Group plc (“LTG” or the “Company”), a market leader in digital learning and talent management, announces full year results for the twelve months ended 31 December 2021.
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Strategic and operational highlights |
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Sustained momentum and organic growth across the business, with high quality earnings from SaaS and long-term contracts |
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Transformational GP Strategies acquisition significantly broadens scale, offering and cross-selling opportunities – delivering earlier than anticipated with EBIT margin expected to be 12% in FY 2022 |
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New go-to-market strategy to support greater breadth and depth of offering and geographical reach and faster growing markets |
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Q1 2021 acquisitions (Reflektive, PDT Global and Bridge) fully integrated and achieving substantially improved profit margins |
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Financial highlights and summary |
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Strong organic revenue growth, up 8% |
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Content & Services recovered strongly, organic growth of 25%, and now back to 2019 levels, as expected |
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Software & Platforms organic growth of 2% and 17% excluding PeopleFluent, continuing its track record of high-margin growth; PeopleFluent decline more than offset by organic growth in the remainder of the segment including strong contributions from Rustici and Breezy |
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Excellent profit growth, as a result of strong organic revenue growth, contribution from recent acquisitions and a continued focus on EBIT margin improvement as the Group expands |
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As expected, Group margins have reduced driven by a change in revenue mix from acquisitions |
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Net debt of £141.4m and good cash generation; on target for leverage c.1.0x by FY2022 |
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17% increase in adjusted diluted EPS driven by organic growth and contribution from acquisitions |
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The Board is proposing a final dividend of 0.7p, an increase of 40%, leading to a full year dividend of 1.0p, an increase of 33% |
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£m unless otherwise stated |
2021 |
2020 |
Change |
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Revenue |
258.2 |
132.3 |
+95% |
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Adjusted EBIT |
54.8 |
40.3 |
+36% |
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Adjusted EBIT margin |
21.2% |
30.5% |
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Adjusted diluted EPS (pence) |
5.01 |
4.29 |
+17% |
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Proposed final dividend per share (pence) |
0.7 |
0.5 |
+40% |
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Net debt/(cash) |
141.4 |
(70.2) |
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Statutory results |
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Profit before tax |
9.3 |
13.5 |
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Basic EPS (pence) |
1.96 |
2.45 |
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Current trading and outlook |
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Current trading in Q1 2022 is strong, in line with management expectations |
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Upgrade to FY 2022 margin expectations following progress ahead of plan with GP Strategies' integration |
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Following the transformational GP Strategies acquisition, LTG has: |
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Opportunities for significant margin enhancement and cross-selling, as a global business |
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Increased reach in the c.$100bn addressable market in digital learning and talent management |
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While mindful of the current macro environment, strong business momentum continuing into the new financial year and a robust balance sheet that supports further software company acquisitions in due course, underpinning the Board's confidence of significant progress in FY 2022. |
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Jonathan Satchell, Chief Executive of LTG, said:
“2021 was another exciting and successful year for LTG. Our strong organic revenue growth reflects the pressing and growing need for organisations to recruit, train, motivate and retain talent and LTG's ability to meet these demands. We have also continued our track record of improving the operating model and performance of businesses we acquire.
Our transformational GP Strategies' acquisition is progressing ahead of plan and enables us to upgrade our margin expectation for FY 2022. The enlarged Group provides a platform to capture a greater proportion of the circa $100 billion and growing addressable market in digital learning and talent management. Following the acquisition we have a deeper offering to serve a global customer base facing greater complexity and change, creating further margin enhancement and cross-sell opportunities for LTG.
While mindful of the current macro environment, strong business momentum has continued into the new financial year and we have a robust balance sheet that will support further software company acquisitions in due course, underpinning the Board's confidence of significant progress in FY 2022.”