Rm Regulatory News (RM.)

6 February 2018

RM plc

Final Results for the period ending 30 November 2017

RM plc ("RM"), a leading supplier of technology and resources to the education sector, reports its final results for the year ending 30 November 2017.

HIGHLIGHTS

Commenting on the results, David Brooks, Chief Executive of RM, said:

"2017 was a significant year for the Group and it was encouraging to see the improvement in underlying operating margins and strong cash generation. The Group increased revenues following the acquisition of The Consortium, which we are now confident will deliver synergies that are approximately double our initial estimate.

Going forward, despite the continued subdued UK Education market, 2018 has started in line with our expectations and we are confident of a year of good progress."

* Adjusted operating profit is before the amortisation of acquisition related intangible assets; costs associated with the acquisition of The Consortium and subsequent costs related with the delivery of synergies; share-based payment charges; and changes in the provision for onerous lease contracts.

** The expected timetable for the final dividend and Annual General Meeting is as follows:

Chairman's Statement

2017 was a positive year for RM with revenue, adjusted operating profits and margins improved compared with the prior year. The Group completed the acquisition in June 2017 of the Education and Care business of Connect plc (The Consortium) which is being combined with TTS. Cash generation was strong and the Company finished the year with modest net debt of £13.4m.

RM Resources increased revenues and profits, driven by the acquisition. The first few months of ownership have seen good progress in integrating The Consortium and TTS. The Board expects the annual synergies from this acquisition to be broadly double the original estimates of £2m. Excluding the effect of the acquisition, RM Resources saw a decline in revenues compared with the prior year, with international growth more than offset by declines in the UK. After a difficult first half, the RM Resources business stabilised in the second half of the year.

RM Results revenues were unchanged from the prior year but profits grew strongly. The Division's future was strengthened by the renewal of a number of long-term contracts and winning several deals with new customers in both the e-testing and e-marking areas.

RM Education revenues declined as expected, following a reshaping of the lower margin elements of the business in late 2016. Profitability and operating margins improved on the prior year, as did cash generation.

The strong cash performance in all three divisions resulted in a profit to cash conversion rate of over 100%. The Group's defined benefit pension schemes deficit, including a small effect from The Consortium schemes, decreased to £20.2m (2016: £34.8m).

The Board is recommending a final dividend of 4.95 pence per share which would constitute, at 6.60 pence per share in total, an increase of 10% over the prior year.

The outlook for 2018 is still affected by continued pressure on UK school budgets. However, management is focused on delivering the synergies from the acquisition in RM Resources, while delivering continued good operating performance and developing strategies for top-line growth.

John Poulter

Chairman

5 February 2018

Extract from Strategic Report

RM plc is a leading supplier of technology and resources to the education sector. Our products and services are used in most parts of UK education from early years settings, primary and secondary schools and colleges to major exam boards and central government. The Company's focus continues to be on delivering sustainable shareholder returns with a resilient and efficient operating model. RM is increasing its revenues and adjusted operating margins and delivering a high return on capital employed.

Operating Review

The Group is structured in three operating divisions, each with its own managing director and management team, with corporate services functions provided centrally. Approximately 32% (2016: 36%) of Group headcount is based in India, providing support services and software development to the operating divisions.

RM Resources

The RM Resources Division now consists of the brands TTS, The Consortium and West Mercia Supplies.

At the beginning of 2017, the Division comprised TTS only. On 30 June 2017, the Company completed the acquisition of the Education and Care business of Connect plc, which added The Consortium and West Mercia Supplies ("The Consortium") brands to RM Resources.

RM Resources provides education resources and supplies used in UK and international schools and early years establishments. Products supplied are a mix of commodity, third party branded, own brand equivalents and TTS own designed items manufactured by a network of third party suppliers with a focus on specialist curriculum resources.

The Division's strategy is to grow its market share in the provision of resources to schools, early years and special educational needs markets via online sales, a direct sales force and direct catalogue, both in the UK and internationally.

RM Resources revenues increased by 42% to £83.6m following the acquisition of The Consortium and the inclusion of revenues from that business from July onwards. Organic TTS revenues declined by 5% to £55.9m (2016: £58.8m), with UK revenues declining by 12% to £41.1m (2016: £46.8m), partially offset by strong growth of 23% in international revenues to £14.8m (2016: £12.1m). International revenues now represent 26% of revenue in TTS. In the five months since being acquired, The Consortium delivered £27.8m of revenues, of which £1.0m was from international sales and £1.7m was from non-Education resources sectors.

Divisional adjusted operating profit increased to £11.6m (2016: £10.2m) as the Division's profitability benefited from the acquisition of The Consortium outlined above. However, operating margins decreased to 13.9% (2016: 17.3% - TTS only). This reduction was driven by a reduction in TTS's margins to 15.1% (2016: 17.3%), resulting from a reduction in revenues combined with a more competitive pricing market and exchange rate impacts which reduced profits by £0.9m. The Consortium (11.3% operating margins) further diluted the margin of the Division as a whole.

UK

UK revenues increased by 45% to £67.8m (2016: £46.8m) driven by the acquisition of The Consortium. Organic TTS UK revenues decreased by 12% as primary schools and nurseries focussed their resources budgets more on commodity items. This was due to discretionary budgets being negatively impacted by unfunded increases in staff pension and national insurance costs. The decline in TTS in the UK was more pronounced in the first half of the year (-20%) than in the second half of the year (-2%). This reflected some improvement in the market, although we continue to expect that tight budgets will keep the UK market subdued.

The Company continues to invest in its online channels. Online orders now make up broadly half of UK direct education sales. We expect the proportional growth in online sales to continue in future years, as more customers use it as their preferred method of ordering.

International

The international business is made up of sales of own designed products through resellers and distributors to over 70 countries and sales of a wider portfolio of education supplies directly to international English curriculum schools. Organic TTS revenues from international sales to overseas resellers and international schools increased by 23% to £14.8m (2016: £12.1m). This was driven by strong growth of our own designed products through reseller channels (+32%) and growth in sales to international schools (+14%). We expect international revenues to continue to grow in the coming year. The acquisition of The Consortium delivered an additional increase in sales to international schools (£1.0m in the five months since the acquisition completed). The increased product range will significantly add to the combined proposition of the Division going forward.

Integration

The integration of the TTS and The Consortium businesses is progressing well. A single senior management team consisting of members from both organisations has been appointed and has started to rationalise the distribution storage footprint, move to a combined operating model for the business and develop the go to market strategy for the UK and internationally. In addition, supply chain savings and organisational restructuring is in progress. Better synergies coupled with more scope for operational efficiencies are now expected, in time, to realise benefits of approximately double our initial expectations of £2m pa. This outlook assumes no changes to the estate and distribution network or the potential benefits of delivering a unified set of systems and processes where beneficial.

The Board is currently not expecting a significant uplift from revenue synergies in its outlook due to the subdued nature of the UK market and the increased risks of new online entrants. However, combined purchasing contracts with aggregated buying groups, the inclusion of TTS own designed products into The Consortium's sales channels and a joint approach to maximising the opportunity in English curriculum international schools are just three of the initial initiatives being worked on.

RM Results

The RM Results Division provides IT software and services to exam boards and professional awarding bodies to help them digitise exams in the UK and internationally through the use of e-assessment. In addition, the Division manages and analyses educational data on behalf of the UK central government, which was part of a 'Data' division.

The strategy is to grow the e-assessment business through expanding the scope of solutions to existing customers and to win new customers in both the UK and overseas markets. The target markets for e-assessment are general qualifications, language testing, professional awarding bodies and higher education. Software and services are provided through a combination of proprietary and third party, in-house and outsourced arrangements. Internationally, the business is largely expected to develop through partnerships and software licensing.

Revenue remained stable at £31.6m. The e-assessment part of the business grew by 7%, which offset the planned exit of a number of contracts in the Data business (-21%). Adjusted operating profit increased strongly by 14% on the prior year to £7.8m (2016: £6.8m).

Adjusted operating margins increased to 24.5% (2016: 21.5%).

RM Results signed a five year agreement in 2017 for the provision of a Global Assessment Platform to Oxford University Press (OUP). The contract provides item and test authoring, online test delivery and online marking of a range of OUP English Language testing products through an integrated technology platform.

The Division has also successfully secured several key contract renewals and extensions with existing customers including:

A three year contract extension to continue to provide e-marking services until 2021 to the education charity, AQA, the UK's largest schools exam awarding body.

A two year extension with the Department of Education for the National Pupil Database contract.

An extended e-marking contract with the Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC).

Following the planned exit of a number of contracts the Data business now consists of a contract to deliver the National Pupil Database contract to the Department for Education.

The Board is targeting the growth opportunities in e-assessment whilst maintaining good operating margins and sees RM Results as being very well placed to respond to the ever increasing digitisation of high stakes exams in the UK and internationally. Organic and non-organic growth options will be considered in this promising, technology driven area.

RM Education

RM Education is a UK focused business supplying IT software and services to schools and colleges. In recent years the strategy has been to improve operating margins and the proportion of annuity revenue whilst transitioning from its large legacy hardware manufacturing operations. This should create a more stable software and services platform from which it can grow.

Revenues in the Division declined by 8% to £70.6m (2016: £77.0m) with the planned contract completion of several Building Schools for the Future (BSF) contracts and the decline of some of the lower margin legacy infrastructure business. Adjusted operating profit margins continued to improve, increasing to 9.3% (2016: 7.6%), benefitting from a 12% reduction in the cost base. Adjusted operating profit increased to £6.6m (2016: £5.8m).

Recurring annuity revenues increased from 61% to 68% in 2017, reflecting the continued improvements over recent years since 2013 levels (37%).

The RM Education business is made up of Managed Services - IT outsourcing (40% of revenue), Digital Platforms (10%) - Cloud-based software offerings and Infrastructure (50%) - aimed at schools who want to run their own IT. The primary focus for this business going forward is increasing its annuity revenues.

Managed Services

The Managed Services offering is primarily the provision of IT outsourcing services to UK schools and colleges. Managed Services revenues decreased by 15% to £28.1m (2016: £33.1m) with several large BSF contracts coming to an end resulting in lower levels of project spend and revenues associated with BSF contracts falling to £11m from £19m in the prior year. Retention rates of existing customers during the year was 94% and, in addition, 49 new schools signed managed services contracts in the year. The proportion of revenues coming from contracts outside BSF programmes grew from 43% in 2016 to 60% in 2017.

A proportion of the Division's managed service contracts are subject to long-term project accounting policies, in particular those relating to BSF. Consequently, as these contracts complete in the year or progress towards completion, profits benefit from the effects of good operational performance, risk mitigation at completion and wider reductions in the RM Education Division cost base.

Digital Platforms

The Digital Platform offering covers key products such as RM Integris (RM's cloud-based school management system) and RM Unify, our cloud-based authentication and portal system, as well as certain other legacy content offerings. Digital Platforms revenues increased by 5% to £7.3m (2016: £7.0m) as growth in these key products more than offset declines in those legacy products. Customer retention rates of core Digital Platform products were 97% in the year.

The Division also signed a new contract for five years with Education Scotland to continue to provide RM Unify to all schools in Scotland.

Infrastructure

Infrastructure is a very tight margin business including the tools, products and services to help schools manage their own IT. Revenues decreased by 5% to £35.2m (2016: £37.0m) as the Division continues to move away from lower margin transactional business. As highlighted before, at the end of 2016, the Division restructured this area and reduced the UK workforce. The retention rate across the core annuity products of Connectivity and Network Support within the Infrastructure business was 94%.

A significant new three year contract was tendered for and won in this Division in 2017 to provide connectivity services to over 500 schools in Hertfordshire.

RM India

As at 30 November 2017, RM's operation in Trivandrum accounted for 32% of Group headcount (2016: 36%).

The Indian operation provides services solely to RM Group companies. Activities include software development, customer and operational support, back office shared service support (e.g. customer order entry, IT, finance and HR) and administration.

Employees

Average Group headcount for the year was 1,787 (2016: 1,822), which is comprised of 1,633 (2016: 1,634) permanent and 154 (2016: 188) temporary or contract staff, of which 1,172 (2016: 1,173) were located in the UK and 615 (2016: 649) in India. At 30 November 2017 headcount was 1,907 (2016: 1,731).

The following table sets out a more detailed summary of the permanent staff employed as at 30 November 2017:

The Group is committed to offering equal employment opportunities and its policies are designed to attract, retain and motivate the best staff regardless of gender, sexual orientation, race, religion, age, disability or educational background. The Group gives proper consideration to applications for employment when these are received from disabled persons and will employ them in posts whenever suitable vacancies arise. Employees who become disabled are retained whenever possible through retraining, use of appropriate technology and making available suitable alternative employment.

The Group encourages the participation of all employees in the operation and development of the business and has a policy of regular communications. The Group incentivises employees and senior management through the payment of bonuses linked to performance objectives, together with the other components of remuneration detailed in the Remuneration Report.

The Group has a wide range of other written policies, designed to ensure that it operates in a legal and ethical manner. These include policies related to health and safety, 'whistle blowing', anti-bribery and corruption, business gifts, grievance, career planning, parental leave, systems and network security. All of RM's employment policies are published internally.

The Corporate Governance Report sets out the Company's Diversity Policy.

Acquisition

As noted above, the Company completed the acquisition of The Consortium on 30 June 2017 for a purchase price of £56.5m (on a cash free, debt free basis). The acquisition complements the Company's already existing TTS business and has been accretive to the Company's adjusted earnings per share.

The final net cash consideration paid was £59.0m including £0.5m of cash in the business. The difference between the headline price of £56.5m noted above and the final consideration paid reflected the positive net working capital position of the balance sheet of the acquired business as at the date of completion. Intangible assets of £18.1m have been identified reflecting value associated with the distribution and product brands acquired, together with a further £31.1m of goodwill alongside £9.8m of net assets.

The acquisition was satisfied entirely in cash at completion and was funded through existing cash reserves and a new £75m revolving credit facility. Further details in relation to that facility are given in the Directors' Report.

Group Financial Performance

Group revenue grew by 11% to £185.9m (2016: £167.6m) supported by the acquisition of The Consortium, which contributed £27.8m. Organic revenues, excluding the benefit of the acquisition, declined 6% to £158.1m (2016: £167.6m).

Adjusted operating profit margins increased again this year from 11.2% in 2016 to 11.9%. Adjusted operating profit increased to £22.1m (2016: £18.8m).

To provide a better understanding of underlying business performance, amortisation charges relating to acquisition related intangible assets, share-based payment charges, restructuring provision movements, acquisition costs and other items of an exceptional nature have been disclosed in an adjustments column in the Income Statement to give 'Adjusted' results. Note 2 to the financial statements identifies these adjustments highlighting recurring and non-recurring items.

On a statutory basis, operating profit was £16.2m (2016: £15.9m), with adjustments principally being £2.6m of acquisition related costs, £1.6m for costs associated with delivering acquisition synergies, share-based payments charges of £0.8m, £0.5m of amortisation of acquisition related intangible assets and a £0.4m movement in provisions for onerous lease contracts.

The Group generated a statutory profit before tax of £14.6m (2016: £15.1m) with a net interest charge of £1.6m.

The total tax charge within the Income Statement for the year was £1.7m (2016: £3.5m). The Group's tax charge for the period, measured as a percentage of profit before tax, was 12% (2016: 23%). The reduction is principally due to a reduction of £1.2m in the transfer pricing provision associated with cross border intra-group transactions between the UK and India which has been agreed with the relevant tax authorities and a reduction in the UK corporate tax rate. Statutory profit after tax increased to £12.9m (2016: £11.6m).

Adjusted basic earnings per share were 22.0 pence (2016: 17.4 pence). Statutory basic earnings per share were 15.8 pence (2016: 14.4 pence) and statutory diluted earnings per share were 15.7 pence (2016: 14.4 pence).

RM generated cash from operations for the year of £20.5m (2016: £13.4m), which represents a cash conversion from operating profit in excess of 100%. Net debt was £13.4m, compared to cash and short-term deposits of £40m in 2016, reflecting the impact of the acquisition which was satisfied entirely in cash at completion.

Cash generated from operations is expected to be broadly in line with operating profit in the year ahead.

Dividends

The total dividend paid and proposed for the year has been increased by 10% to 6.60 pence per share (2016: 6.00 pence). This is comprised of the interim dividend of 1.65 pence per share paid in September 2017 and, subject to shareholder approval, a proposed final dividend of 4.95 pence per share. The estimated total cost of normal dividends paid and proposed for 2017 is £5.4m (2016: £4.9m). Dividend cover for the year is 3.3 times, as compared to a figure of 2.9 times in 2016. This reflects the 26% growth in adjusted basic earnings per share and the 10% growth in dividend proposed.

The Board is committed to a long-term sustainable dividend policy with the objective of a dividend cover of between two to three times adjusted earnings per share over the medium-term. RM plc has £28.6m of distributable reserves as at 30 November 2017 available to support the dividend policy.

RM plc is a non-trading investment holding company and derives its profits from dividends paid by subsidiary companies. The Directors consider the Group's capital structure and dividend policy at least twice a year, ahead of announcing results and during the annual budgeting process, looking at longer-term sustainability. The Directors do so in the context of the Company's ability to execute the strategy and to invest in opportunities to grow the business and enhance shareholder value.

The dividend policy is influenced by a number of the principal risks identified in the table of 'Principal Risks and Uncertainties' set out below and which could have a negative impact on the performance of the Group or its ability to distribute profits.

Defined Benefit Pension Schemes ("Schemes")

Prior to the acquisition of The Consortium, the Company operated one defined benefit pension scheme (the "RM Education Scheme"). As part of the acquisition of The Consortium, the Company now operates a further defined benefit pension scheme (the "CARE Scheme") and participates in a third, multi-employer, defined benefit pension scheme (the "Platinum Scheme"). Both of the RM Education Scheme and the CARE Scheme are closed to future accrual of benefits. While the Platinum Scheme remains open to future accrual of benefits, the number of Group employees participating in that Scheme is very small and so the impact of that Scheme on the Group is limited.

Despite the introduction of the two new defined benefit schemes outlined above, the IAS19 deficit (pre-tax) across the Group decreased by £14.6m to £20.2m (Nov 2016: £34.8m). This reduction was primarily driven by an increase in the scheme assets of the RM Education Scheme of £15.6m and a decrease in the liabilities of that Scheme of £2.4m, driven by updated mortality assumptions. As at 30 November 2017 the net deficit associated with the CARE Scheme and Platinum Scheme combined was £3.7m.

Following a change in actuary during the year the discount methodology applied under IAS19 for all three Schemes was revised to better reflect the long dated credit risk of the cashflows for those Schemes.

Since the acquisition of The Consortium, agreement has been reached with the Trustees of the CARE Scheme with regards to the triennial valuation as at 31 December 2016 at a deficit of £4.2m, with recovery payments of £379,000 pa over the next ten years. As a result, the total Group deficit recovery plan cashflow requirements across all of the above schemes are £4.4m pa. The triennial review for the RM Education Scheme is due in May 2018. The next review date for the Platinum Scheme is in December 2018.

Impact of the EU Referendum vote

The Company continues to monitor the evolving impacts of the referendum decision on UK's membership of the EU. The referendum result has not changed the UK Government's policy of ring fencing funding for priority areas and, therefore, there is no foreseen impact on education funding as a whole.

The Group has European sales of £11.3m, primarily driven by the sale of own designed products from the RM Resources Division. The Group will monitor the nature of the Brexit arrangements as they influence the trading relationship between the UK and the EU. It is not expected at this stage that they will fundamentally change demand for these products which have been growing strongly in recent years.

The Group has foreign currency denominated costs that outweigh foreign currency denominated revenues and therefore increased currency volatility creates an exposure. Exchange rates have been more stable in 2017 following the post referendum adjustment in 2016 but the Company continues to monitor these closely. This risk is managed through currency hedging against exchange rate movements, typically 9-12 months into the future. The Group is also working to rebalance its exposure by growing its foreign denominated sales ahead of its costs to reduce the currency imbalance and more naturally hedge this risk.

Going Concern

The financial position, cashflows and liquidity position are described in the financial statements and the associated notes. In addition, the notes to the financial statements include RM's objectives, policies and processes for managing its capital, its financial risk management objectives, and its exposure to credit and liquidity risk. During the year, the Group completed the acquisition of The Consortium which was supported by an increase in its revolving credit facility from £30m to £75m and resulted in the Group moving to a net current liability position of £13.4m. The maximum net debt position during the period following the acquisition was £37.7m. Having reviewed the future budgets and projections for the business, the principal risks that could impact on the Group's liquidity and solvency over the next 12 months and its current financial position, the Board believes that RM is well placed to manage its business risks successfully and remain in compliance with the financial covenants associated with its borrowings. Therefore, the Board has a reasonable expectation that the Group and Company have adequate resources to continue in operational existence for the foreseeable future, a period of not less than 12 months from the date of this report. For this reason, the Company continues to adopt the going concern basis of accounting in preparing the annual financial statements.

Financial Viability Statement

In accordance with the UK Corporate Governance code, in addition to an assessment of going concern, the Directors have also considered the prospects of the Group and Company over a longer time period. The period of assessment chosen is three years, which is consistent with the time period over which the Group's medium-term financial budgets are prepared. These financial budgets include Income Statements, Balance Sheets and Cash Flow Statements. They have been assessed by the Board in conjunction with the principal risks of the Group, which are documented within the Principal Risks and Uncertainties section below, along with their mitigating actions.

The Board considers that the principal risks which have the potential to threaten the Group's business models, future performance, solvency or liquidity over the three year period are:

1. Public policy risk - UK education policy priority changes or restrictions in government funding due to fiscal policy.

2. Operational execution - including:

a. Significantly increased working capital requirements within the RM Education and RM Results long-term contract portfolios and requirements in evolving RM Education business models.

b. Major adverse performance in a key contract or product which results in negative publicity and which damages the Group's brand.

c. RM Results operational performance over peak examination marking periods.

3. Business continuity - an event impacting the Group's major buildings, systems or infrastructure components. This would include a major incident at one of the RM Resources main warehouses.

4. Strategic risks - loss of a significant contract which underpins an element of a Division's activity.

5. Defined Benefit Pension Schemes - funding of Scheme deficits in adverse market conditions.

6. Inability to deliver, or a significant delay in implementation of, the synergies planned alongside the acquisition of The Consortium whilst still incurring the costs of delivery.

Having assessed the above risks, singularly and in combination, and via sensitivity analysis, the Directors have a reasonable expectation that the Company will be able to continue in operation and meet its liabilities as they fall due over the three year period of assessment and are not aware of any reason that viability would be an issue for the foreseeable period after this.

Environmental Matters

The Group's impact on the environment, and its policy in relation to such matters, are noted in the Directors' Report.

Principal Risks and Uncertainties

The management of the business and the execution of the Company's strategy are subject to a number of risks. The Company has a structured approach to the assessment and management of risks. A detailed risk register is maintained, in which risks are categorised under the following categories: political, strategic, operational and financial. The full register is reviewed at least annually by each Division to ensure that the risks that could potentially affect each Division are properly captured. The register also includes a summary of the steps taken to manage or mitigate against those risks and the person or people responsible for the relevant actions. This register is then consolidated and Group-wide risks added, to ensure that the risk covers the entire Group's operations. This is then reviewed by the Executive Committee, the Audit Committee and the Board. As such, the Board confirms that it has carried out a robust assessment of the principal risks facing the Group and appropriate processes have been put in place to monitor and mitigate them. Further details are also set out in the Corporate Governance Report.

The key business risks for the Group are set out in the table below.

David Brooks

Chief Executive Officer

5 February 2018

Directors' responsibilities statement

The responsibility statement below has been prepared in connection with the Company's full Annual Report and Accounts for the year ended 30 November 2017. Certain parts are not included within this announcement.

Each of the Directors, whose names and functions are listed at the front of the Annual Report, confirm that, to the best of their knowledge:

· the financial statements, prepared in accordance with the applicable set of accounting standards, give a true and fair view of the assets, liabilities, financial position and profit or loss of the Company and the Group taken as a whole; and

· the Strategic Report includes a fair review of the development and performance of the business and the position of the Company and the Group taken as a whole, together with a description of the principal risks and uncertainties that they face.

The responsibility statement was approved by the Board of Directors on 5 February 2018.

Greg Davidson

Company Secretary

5 February 2018

CONSOLIDATED STATEMENT OF CHANGES IN EQUITY

1. Preliminary announcement

The preliminary results for the year ended 30 November 2017 have been prepared in accordance with those International Accounting Standards (IAS) and International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) issued by the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) and adopted for use in the EU and therefore comply with Article 4 of the EU IAS Regulation applied in accordance with the provisions of the Companies Act 2006. However, this announcement does not contain sufficient information to comply with IFRS. The Group expects to publish a full Strategic Report, Directors' Report and financial statements which will be delivered before the Company's annual general meeting on 21 March 2018. The full Strategic Report and Directors' Report and financial statements will be published on the Group's website at www.rmplc.com.

The financial information set out in this preliminary announcement does not constitute the Group's statutory accounts for the year ended 30 November 2017. Statutory accounts for 2016 have been delivered to the Registrar of Companies and those for 2017 will be delivered following the Company's annual general meeting. The auditor's reports on both the 2017 and 2016 accounts were unqualified, did not draw attention to any matters by way of emphasis without qualifying their report and did not contain statements under s498(2) or (3) of the Companies Act 2006 or equivalent preceding legislation. This Preliminary announcement was approved by the Board of Directors on 5 February 2018.

Consolidated Income Statement presentation

The Directors assess the performance of the Group using an adjusted operating profit and profit before tax. The Directors use this measurement basis as it excludes the effect of transactions that could distort the understanding of the Group's performance for the year and comparability between periods. This includes making certain adjustments for income and expense which are one-off in nature, or non-cash items and those with potential variability year on year which might mask underlying performance. Further details are provided in Note 2.

Basis of preparation

The financial statements have been prepared on the historical cost basis except for certain financial instruments, share-based payments and pension assets and liabilities which are measured at fair value. The preparation of financial statements, in conformity with generally accepted accounting principles, requires the use of estimates and assumptions that affect the reported amounts of assets and liabilities and disclosure of contingent assets and liabilities at the date of the financial statements and the reported amounts of revenues and expenses during the reporting period. Although these estimates are based on the Directors' best knowledge of current events and actions, actual results ultimately may differ from those estimates.

Significant accounting policies

The accounting policies used for the preparation of this announcement have been applied consistently.

2. Operating segments

The Group's business is supplying products, services and solutions to the UK and international education markets. Information reported to the Group's Chief Executive for the purposes of resource allocation and assessment of segmental performance is focussed on the nature of each type of activity.

The Group is structured into three operating divisions: RM Resources, RM Results and RM Education. The exited business in the year relates to SpaceKraft.

A full description of each division, together with comments on its performance and outlook, is given in the Strategic Report. Corporate Services consists of central business costs associated with being a listed company and non-specific pension costs.

This Segmental analysis shows the results and assets of these divisions. Revenue is that earned by the Group from third parties.

Net financing costs and tax are not allocated to segments as the funding, cash and tax management of the Group are activities carried out by the central treasury and tax functions.

Recurring items:

These are items which occur regularly but which management judge to have a distorting effect on the underlying results of the Group or are not regularly monitored for the purpose of determining business performance. These items include the amortisation of acquisition related intangible assets and share-based payment charges.

Recurring items are adjusted each year irrespective of materiality to ensure consistent treatment.

Highlighted items:

These are items which are non-recurring and are identified by virtue of either their size or their nature. These items can include, but are not restricted to, impairment of held for sale assets and related transaction costs; changes in the provision for onerous lease contracts; the gain/loss on sale of operations and restructuring and acquisition costs. As these items are one-off or non-operational in nature, management considers that they would distort the Group's underlying business performance.

During the year an onerous provision was created for the top floor of the head office property and an onerous provision release was made for the continued sub-letting of one of the Group's properties. For further details see Note 10.

During the year, the Group incurred professional advisor costs relating to the acquisition and integration of The Consortium, see Note 13 for further details. Restructuring costs were incurred during the year which also relate to the integration of The Consortium.

In the prior year, the restructuring of the Infrastructure part of the RM Education division was undertaken to move away from some of the lowest margin transactional elements such as network infrastructures, network installation and third-party hardware sales. This lead to a reduction of broadly 10% of the RM Education UK staff and a one-off exceptional charge of £1.6m.

Certain deferred tax assets and liabilities have been offset above.