21 Nov 2019 07:00
21 November 2019
Blue Prism Group plc
('Blue Prism' or 'the Company' or 'the Group')
TRADING UPDATE
Blue Prism (AIM: PRSM), a global leader in Robotic Process Automation ("RPA"), today provides a trading update, following the close of its financial year ended 31 October 2019.
The Group has seen a significant acceleration in sales in the second half of the year, contributing to a very strong full year performance. Sales volumes have continued to be high, particularly in upsells, and increased deal sizes have driven material additions in the total business generated in the year. As a result, the Group enters 2020 with a record order book.
Sales progress
The Group added 685 net new customers during 2019 while maintaining a customer retention rate of 96% (2018: 97%).
The total customer base at 31 October 2019 was 1,677, an increase of 69% on 2018 (2018: 992), providing a substantially increased base for the Group to upsell into in future periods.
In 2019 the Group demonstrated its future upsell potential with significant success with the existing customer base resulting in 1,139 upsells into 544 customers. These upsells demonstrate the software's scalability and the strategic nature of customer deployments.
The Group is also very pleased to note that the first significant cohort of one-year-one-Digital-Worker deals in the fourth quarter of 2018 is demonstrating good early progress with 38% of the customers upselling during 2019.
Financial progress
Sales momentum has resulted in a very strong financial performance with total business (which measures the total contract value from new customers, upsells and renewals) over the period of £181m (2018: £143m). There was a significant increase in total business won in the second half of the year, with £115m generated by strong performances in all the key geographic regions, driven by an increase in deal sizes, particularly within upsells.
The Group expects 2019 revenues to be at least £98m (2018: £55.2m). The Group closed the year with a cash position of £74m (2018: £50.5m).
The Board estimates that the exit monthly recurring revenue (MRR) at 31 October 2019 will be at least £10.4m (£9.7m excluding the impact of the Thoughtonomy acquisition) (2018: £6.2m). This additional MRR represents an underlying increase of at least £2.1m on the first half of the year and this, along with the ongoing momentum in the business reinforces the Board's confidence in its revenue expectations for FY20.
Jason Kingdon, Executive Chairman, commented:
"We have delivered an excellent performance across 2019, particularly in the second half of the year where we have seen record quarters in each of our key geographies. We have continued to expand our enterprise customer footprint and our track record of upselling into these customers is enviable, with increases in both the volume and sizes of these upsells in the second half of the year.
The momentum we have seen this year begins to reflect the investments we made across 2018 and investments we have made in this financial year will now begin to impact 2020 and beyond. RPA is fast emerging as a significant software category, customers are beginning to materially scale their deployments and Blue Prism is increasingly recognised as the product that can deliver this scale."
Full Year results
Blue Prism will report its financial results for the year ended 31 October 2019 on Thursday, 23 January 2020. Conference call details for analysts and investors will be made available in due course.
Contact details
For further information please contact:
Blue Prism Group plc
Tom Hull, Head of Investor Relations +44 (0)77 3670 7407
Investec Bank plc +44 (0)20 7597 5970
Andrew Pinder
Sebastian Lawrence
Carlton Nelson
FTI Consulting +44 (0)20 3727 1000
Matt Dixon
Dwight Burden