Pre-Close Trading Update

RNS Number : 1463P

Iomart Group PLC

29 September 2011

 



29 September 2011

Embargoed until: 0700hrs

iomart Group plc

("iomart" or the "Company" or the "Group")

Pre-Close trading update, Board Changes and Notice of Results

iomart (AIM:IOM), the cloud computing and managed hosting company, today issues a pre-close trading update ahead of the announcement of the half yearly results for the six months to 30 September 2011.

Group trading performance

The Board is pleased to announce that the Group has performed strongly with revenues and profits significantly ahead of the comparative period last year and consequently is confident that the financial performance of the Group for the full year will be ahead of current market expectations.

The Group continues to benefit from the growing trend of organisations seeking to reduce both operational risk and IT costs by moving their mission critical business applications to a trusted supplier. iomart differentiates itself from its competitors on the basis of the Group's ownership of its datacentres and network infrastructure. As a result it is able to deliver the complete set of vertical components in the hosting arena providing end to end service level agreements supported by a decade of technological excellence and experience.

Outlook

We are encouraged by the growing pipeline of opportunities and expect our market to continue to grow significantly as businesses move their critical IT systems to the cloud. This, together with the forward visibility of revenues, underpins the medium and longer term outlook and accordingly we are confident in the long term prospects for the Group.

We continue to pursue acquisition opportunities which will accelerate our growth as we integrate their operations into the Group's infrastructure. The acquisition of Switch Media, which was completed during the period, has been integrated into the Group and is performing in line with expectations.

Board Changes

The Company also announces today that Fred Shedden will step down as Non Executive Director following the AGM to be held later today and Crawford Beveridge CBE will be appointed as a Non Executive Director.

Originally from Scotland, Mr. Beveridge has over 40 years' experience in the technology industry, including 16 years at Sun Microsystems ("Sun"), most recently as Executive Vice President and Chairman, EMEA, APAC and the Americas until retiring in January 2010. His business background also includes roles with Hewlett-Packard, Digital Equipment Corp., Analog Devices and Chief Executive of Scottish Enterprise. Current board roles include Non Executive Director of Hitachi Global Storage Technologies, a subsidiary of Hitachi Ltd, Chairman of the investment advisory board at Scottish Equity Partners and Non Executive Chairman of NASDAQ listed Autodesk.

Save as set out below, there are no further disclosures required under Rule 17 or Schedule 2 paragraph (g) of the AIM Rules for Companies in respect of Mr Crawford Beveridge.

Notice of Results

The Group expects to report its half yearly results for the six months ended 30 September 2011 on 29 November 2011.

Angus MacSween, Chief Executive of iomart, said:

"There is strong momentum in the business and our pipeline of opportunities is growing. The Group's business model continues to generate high levels of recurring revenues which provides excellent visibility of future earnings and we look forward with confidence to significant growth in the current financial year and beyond.

 "I would also like to extend the Board's thanks to Fred for his considerable support over an important period of development and growth at iomart. We wish him well in the future. I am also delighted to announce the appointment of Crawford Beveridge as Non Executive Director and welcome him to the Board. We believe that Crawford's impressive track record in growing technology companies equips him with excellent experience to provide iomart with valuable advice and support as we expand our operations."

For further information:

iomart Group plc	Tel: [phone]
Angus MacSween, Chief Executive
Richard Logan, Finance Director
Peel Hunt (Nominated Adviser and Broker)	Tel: [phone]
Richard Kauffer
Daniel Harris
Threadneedle Communications	Tel: [phone]
Caroline Evans-Jones
Hilary Millar

Additional disclosures required under AIM Rule 17 and Schedule 2 paragraph (g):

Full name and age: Crawford William Beveridge (65)

Mr Beveridge has a beneficial interest in 12,000 ordinary shares of 1p each in the Company, representing 0.012 per cent. of the Company's issued share capital.

Current directorships and partnerships	Directorships and partnerships held within the last five years
Scottish Equity Partners Ltd
eSilicon Corporation
Autodesk Inc
HGST
Bevvoe Inc

About iomart Group plc:

iomart Group plc (AIM:IOM) is one of the UK's leading providers of managed hosting and cloud computing services. From a single server through to private cloud networks, iomart specialises in the delivery and management of mission-critical hosting services, enabling customers to reduce the costs, complexity and risks associated with maintaining their own web and online applications.

By physically owning and managing its own global network infrastructure, iomart offers world-beating levels of service to its customers. The Group offers a unique 100% uptime guarantee with all hosting services being engineered to ensure no single point of failure.

iomart Group operates in its chosen markets through a number of subsidiaries: iomart Hosting, RapidSwitch, Titan Internet, Easyspace and Westcoastcloud. The group has been listed on the London Stock Exchange's Alternative Investment Market (AIM) since April 2000. 

For more information about iomart Group plc visit www.iomart.com 

 

END

 

 

TSTLPMFTMBATBPB