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accesso going global with best-in-class technology

Last updated: 19:00 21 Mar 2017 GMT, First published: 08:09 21 Mar 2017 GMT

Legoland characters
Denmark's Legoland was among the flagship contract wins in 2016

Virtual queuing and ticketing group accesso Technology Group PLC (LON:ACSO) is expecting to move up a gear after a year of heavy investment.

Its full-year results confirmed another strong year in what was considered an “investment phase” for accesso.

Revenue rose 10% to US$102.5mln in 2016 from US$93.2mln in 2015, slightly ahead of the US$102mln that had been forecast by Cantor Fitzgerald.

WATCH: 'Another strong year for accesso' ...

Growth was driven by a combination of new contract awards and long-term contract extensions. The group managed to bag 51 customer wins during the course of 2016.

Adjusted underlying earnings (EBITDA) jumped 25.7% to US$19.1mln from US$15.2mln, while good old profit before tax surged 40.3% to US$10.1mln from US$7.2mln.

Adjusted earnings per share climbed 25.7% to 51.48 cents from 40.96 cents the previous year.

Speaking to Proactive Investors, executive chairman Tom Burnet said it was “all good from a financial point of view” but stressed it was a particularly pleasing performance as the group had put in a lot of work in the background preparing for global expansion.

"2016 has been the year in which I believe Accesso has achieved meaningful scale. As a result, we are now beginning to see the positive impact this step-change in activity can have on our financial performance,” Burnet said in a stock exchange statement.

Picking up on that in his conversation with Proactive Investors, Burnet said: “We’ve made some really big strides in globalising our platform, and this is particularly to serve our client Merlin.”

London-listed Merlin Entertainments PLC (LON:MERL) operates scores of attractions in more than 20 countries across the globe, and accesso is rolling out its Passport technology across the Merlin global estate, adapting it for local language, currency and regulations.

“We don’t earn any money until we start selling tickets, so we have to make large investments ahead of the revenues starting to flow,” Burnet explained.

That big push on the investment side will start to tail off, which is good news for a company that earns a lot, most of which converts to cash.

Cash generated from operations clocked in at US$18.6mln in 2016 from US$14.7mln the previous year as the cash conversion rate improved to 97.4% from 96.7%.

Net debt tumbled to US$3.4mln by the end of the year from US$9.4mln at the end of 2015.

“In the winter months, when our customers are less busy, we tend to consume a bit of cash but when the operators are open for business in the summer season we throw off a lot of cash,” Burnet said.

The accesso boss said that as well as doing work so Merlin’s Legoland park in Japan (to take one example) can “sell in Japanese”, the company has been working on the accesso Prism device, a wearable gizmo that is being trialled in a water park – so presumably it is water proof.

“We see this as the next exciting evolution of our hardware technology,” Burnet said.

Steve Brown, chief executive officer of accesso, said: “A range of enhancements across our platforms along with the launch of Accesso Prism earlier in the year demonstrates the extent of our commitment to improving our product offering on an ongoing basis,” said

“Accesso continues to invest to ensure we are at the forefront of product functionality, customer relationship management and internal talent acquisition. Beyond these investments to prepare us for long term growth, these efforts are already delivering results for our customers and our business today," Brown said.

Shares in accesso were up 2.4% at 1,605p in mid-afternoon trading.

Shares in accesso rose 17.5p to 1,585p on the results.

 

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