- Revenue climbs by 18% to £473 million
- Eighteen consecutive years of revenue growth
- Underlying operating profit of £59.5 million, an increase of 19%
BSI, the business improvement company, has announced its results for the year ended 31 December 2017. Global revenue has risen for the eighteenth year in a row to £473 million – an increase of 18% - while underlying operating profit has grown by 19% to its highest ever mark of £59.5 million.
Key points:
- Revenue increased by 18% to £473m (2016: £401.8m)
- Organic revenue at constant exchange grew by 9%
- New sales orders grew organically by 16%
- Average revenue per account increased by 11%
- Record underlying profit up by 19% to £59.5m (2016: £50.1m)
- Profit growth was 16% organic, 2% inorganic and 1% exchange
- Growing revenues in all three regions globally
- Revenue in Americas increased by 29%, in Asia Pacific by 17% and EMEA by 11%
Howard Kerr, Chief Executive, commented: “Our commitment to Organizational Resilience has enabled us to adapt and thrive despite economic, social and political headwinds across the globe. We have delivered record results as we unlock the benefits of our evolution as an integrated global enterprise. Our financial expansion is mirrored in the growth of our offering and our team, as our products and services reflect the needs of an ever-changing business landscape.”
BSI has also secured a record number of clients, working with over 86,000 businesses over the last twelve months – an annual increase of 6% - in more than 190 countries. The total client base includes 75% of the FTSE 100, 49% of the Fortune 500 and 77% of the Nikkei Index. BSI’s global employees grew to 4,333, an increase of 13%.
Expansion of BSI’s range of products and services helped increase average revenue per account by 11% in 2017. BSI’s products and services span three areas; Knowledge, Assurance and Compliance. Knowledge is made up of standards development and publishing and grew 2%, to revenues of £60.7m. Assurance, covering systems certification, product certification including the internationally renowned BSI KitemarkTM and training, grew 14% to £337.7m. Compliance, which includes two consultancy businesses and supply chain services, saw 59% growth, of which the majority was inorganic, to revenues of £74.6m.
The company continued to implement its strategic acquisition plans, acquiring the Neville Clarke Group of companies in December 2017. With offices in Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines, its team of 150 experts provide organizational training and capacity building services across the Asia Pacific region, perfectly complementing BSI’s focus sectors and offering. It also marks the first BSI acquisition in the region since 2013 and first presence in the Philippines.
Over the last year, BSI has focused on strengthening the capacity of the national standards system to support industry, society and government. The business has continued to grow, with 2,452 new or revised standards published, while the 1,754 withdrawn standards signifies a sustained commitment to simplifying the standards landscape for businesses and consumers alike. In line with both current and future business needs, the focus of the standards team has been placed on topics such as ageing society, connected and autonomous vehicles, smart cities, Internet of Things, blockchain, occupational health and safety, circular economy, digital manufacturing and big data.
As the UK’s National Standards Body, BSI has been working closely with the government ahead of Britain’s exit from the European Union. Working with a range of departments (Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, the Department for Exiting the European Union and the Department for International Trade), as well as industry and consumers, BSI remains optimistic that the UK’s membership in European Standards Organizations (CEN and CENELEC) will continue after 29th March 2019.
Kerr continued: “As political negotiations continue, it is vital that the UK, through BSI, remains active in the European single standard system after Britain’s exit from the EU. The European Standards Organizations sit outside of the EU, so we are confident that this will be the case.
“We have also closely monitored the negotiations in Brussels with regards to Notified Bodies. To ensure we can continue to provide our important conformity assessment role for our clients, we are in the process of establishing a Notified Body in the Netherlands.”
Since BSI’s launch of its Organizational Resilience principle in 2014, this has evolved to underpin all business streams and client services, culminating in the world’s first Organizational Resilience Index published last year. The Index equips business leaders worldwide with a benchmark against which to assess their resilience strengths across four key categories; Leadership, People, Process and Product. The Index has led to more growth across all regions and will pave the way for further developments in Organizational Resilience in 2018 and beyond.
Kerr concluded: “Our successes over the past year are best summarized by our new financial objectives. Such was our strong performance in 2017 that we have now set ourselves a revenue target of £625 million by 2020 – a target that we are confident we will achieve.”
The full online edition of our annual report and financial statements 2017 can be found at here.
