Tarsus Regulatory News (TRS)

30 June 2011  

Tarsus Group plc 

Pre-Close Trading Update

Group trading in-line with expectations; forward bookings remain strong

Tarsus Group Plc. ('Tarsus' or 'the Group') (LSE:TRS), the international business-to-business media group, is today providing investors with a pre-close update on trading since our IMS of 5 May 2011.

Trading for the period has been in line with the Board's expectations. Forward bookings remain strong, with bookings for the Group as a whole continuing to accelerate and now stand at 85% of anticipated full year revenues compared with 75% at the same time in 2010 (as adjusted for biennial events).

Revenues for Tarsus' two largest biennial exhibitions, the Dubai Air Show (in November 2011) and Labelexpo Europe (in September 2011), remain ahead of the comparable events in 2009 and both are on track to be record events. Bookings for Labelexpo Europe are already ahead of the actual 2009 result and are now tracking over 10% up on its previous edition. The Dubai Airshow bookings, as a result of strong orders received at the Paris Airshow last week, are now tracking ahead of its previous edition.

From a strategic perspective, we are also seeing good progress with our "Project 50/13" initiative which is targeting a significant increase in our scale in Emerging Markets. On 7 June we completed the acquisition of 75% of the issued share capital of Istanbul based IFO, one of the largest independent exhibition businesses in Turkey, for up to £10 million in aggregate payable in cash. REW, the waste recycling exhibition, has been the first Turkish event to take place under our ownership and was in-line with our expectations.

In addition, we placed 11,347,517 new Ordinary Shares with new and existing institutional investors at the placing price of 141 pence per share to raise approximately £16 million (approximately £15 million net of expenses) for the Company.

Douglas Emslie, Group Managing Director, commented:

"We are very pleased with the progress we are making; trading in the US, Middle and Far East continues to develop well and there are signs of economic recovery in France. The acquisition of IFO was an important step in the realisation of our 50/13 strategy to increase Tarsus' revenues from fast growing, emerging markets to 50% of our total by 2013.

"We continue to see more interesting M&A opportunities in our market. The additional capital raised will also mean that a short term reduction in the Group's debt levels will provide additional flexibility, allowing us to continue with our growth strategy and take advantage of further potential opportunities."

Our next update on performance will be provided at the interim results on 27 July 2011 which will cover the six month period to 30 June 2011.

 For further information, please contact:

 Tarsus Group plc

 Douglas Emslie, Group Managing Director 020 8846 2700

 Ashley Milton, Group Finance Director 020 8846 2700

 Media

 Matthew Moth, Madano Partnership 020 7593 4000