Communisis PLC Regulatory News (CMS)

22 Dec 2008 15:30



22 December 2008

Communisis plc

("Communisis" or the "Company")

Acquisition of Absolute Intuistic Limited ("Absolute Intuistic" or "Ai")

The Board of Communisis plc (the "Board") (RIC: CMS.L), the leading provider of print and marketing communication services, announces that it has acquired the share capital of Absolute Intuistic, a value-added data services company, for a total consideration of up to £12.6 million in cash.

For the past two years Communisis has been following a strategy to develop and increase its range of value-added services for customer communication. Technology and Services are providing strong growing profit streams, increasing competitive advantage and replacing more commoditised offerings associated with traditional print. This acquisition is a logical step in this investment stream, bringing extensive, high quality data services into the Company.

Ai's proprietary technology enhances clients' direct marketing, helping them to target the most attractive prospects and build relationships with the most profitable and lowest credit risk customers. Ai's services include customer list creation, combination and cleansing, analysis of campaign effectiveness and credit checking. Its clients, including RBS, BT and Lloyds TSB, choose Ai because its services improve the quality and return on investment from marketing activities. Ai's founders and senior management will remain with the Company.

Ai has grown rapidly in the past few years, and has now begun to win large long-term contracts with key customers to provide all their data analysis requirements. The group reported revenue of £6.7 million, EBITDA of £0.9m and profit before tax of £0.75 million in its audited accounts for the financial year ended 31 August 2008. As at that date, Ai had gross assets of £2.8 million, and nil net debt.

Communisis is paying a consideration of up to £12.6 million in cash, consisting of up to £4.6 million at or shortly after completion, (subject to downwards adjustment in respect of working capital) and deferred consideration of up to a maximum of £8.0 million payable based on Ai's financial performance over the period from 1 September 2008 to 31 August 2010. Any deferred consideration is expected to be paid in early 2011. The consideration is being funded from a combination of cash balances and existing debt facilities. Communisis expects the acquisition to be earnings accretive for the financial year to 31 December 2009 and beyond.

Commenting on the acquisition, Steve Vaughan, Chief Executive Officer of Communisis, stated: 

"We are delighted to be acquiring Ai. It is an attractive and high quality business, with strong management that has a track record of building long-term contractual relationships with clients. 

Customer data is the thread that runs through all of our services. The team at Ai is excellent at providing high quality analysis and segmentation to drive smarter campaigns. These services will be a great fit with our recent investments in sophisticated campaign delivery and will complement our scale in direct marketing. We share lots of customers, and expect to be able to begin cross-selling between our client bases once integration is complete. 

In the past six months we have disposed of the Bath Business Forms business, the most commoditised of our offerings, and recycled some of the proceeds into the very top end of our value proposition - data intelligence. It's a perfect fit with our strategy."