2008 News Releases

Preliminary Results for the Year Ended 31 December 2007

29 February 2008

Excellent results for 2007: on track for 2008

Headline results

• Events, news distribution and data products – over 80% of operating profits – excellent results
• Acquisitions performing well above cost of capital threshold
  • £94m invested in 17 acquisitions in 2007, over £385m on 52 acquisitions since 2005
  • 13.1% average return on acquisitions 2005-2007
  • Targeting total investment of £300m-£500m in acquisitions in 2008 and 2009
  • 5 acquisitions completed so far in 2008 for total of approximately £25m
• £200m-£300m capital return by end of 2009 planned
• Underlying revenue*** up 5.0% (2006: 4.3%)
• Operating margin up to 20.7% (2006: 20.3%)
• £276m of capital returned in 2007, £438.3m since February 2006
• Net debt of £157.5m at year end
• On track for 2008
  • 2008 revenue bookings for top 20 events over 10% ahead of prior year
  • 2008 revenues for directories and subscription products substantially booked
  • Further expansion into Brazil, India and China

Statutory results

David Levin, Chief Executive Officer of United Business Media plc said:

2007 was a strong year for UBM. We launched new businesses in India, Brazil and China, made 17 acquisitions worldwide, enhanced our ability to deliver integrated media and consistently executed our successful strategy to deliver profitable growth. We achieved our 2007 target of 5% underlying revenue growth, our fully diluted earnings per share (adjusted) were up by 19.4%, dividend per share was up by 20%, our cash conversion was over 100% - and we returned £276m of capital to shareholders.

Outlook

Overall we have made a good start to the year. UBM’s events portfolio – which is our largest profit contributor – is showing strong momentum. Revenue bookings for our top twenty shows, which generated close to £100m in revenue in 2007, are running more than 10% ahead of 2007. Our recent launches – Web 2.0 Expo, the Macau Jewellery and Watch Show and P-MEC India – are performing strongly.

We continue to invest in acquisitions and in the organic development of our businesses to position them for continued profitable growth, particularly in the fast-growing emerging economies.

The substantial restructuring and development of UBM over the last three years has provided us with much greater predictability and visibility of revenues and profitability. We monitor the progress of each of our businesses extremely carefully and we have demonstrated our willingness and ability to take rapid and decisive action in response to changing circumstances or performance. UBM’s businesses are distributed across more than 30 countries worldwide (less than 15% of UBM’s profits are generated in the UK) and are active in a wide range of markets and sectors, each experiencing different economic conditions. We anticipate we will generate more than 80% of our 2008 profits from events, news distribution and intellectual property- or data-based embedded workflow information products.

As announced in November 2007, we aim to invest £150m to £250m per year in acquisitions in both 2008 and 2009. So far in 2008 we have completed five acquisitions for a total of approximately £25m (including estimated earnouts). We remain committed to maintaining our financial discipline in making acquisitions. We have seen early indicators that sellers’ pricing expectations are becoming better aligned with the realities of the current economic climate.

During 2007 we returned capital totalling £276m to shareholders by means of a £200m special dividend and through buying back 10.7m shares. In November we announced that, subject to trading conditions, we expect to return £200m-£300m to shareholders by the end of 2009. Since that announcement we have returned £30.8m through the purchase of 4.6m shares. We ended the year with net debt of £157.5m.

UBM is well placed to deliver another strong performance for our shareholders in 2008.

David Levin
29 February 2008

Contacts

A webcast of the results presentation will be made available from UBM's website from 8.30am, 29 February 2008. To access the webcast please go to www.unitedbusinessmedia.com .

A video recording of the webcast will also be accessible from UBM's website. The presentation will also be available from UBM's website as a podcast.

Notes to Editors

About United Business Media Plc
United Business Media Plc is a leading global business media company. We inform markets and bring the world’s buyers and sellers together at events, online, in print, and with the information they need to do business successfully. We focus on serving professional commercial communities, from doctors to game developers, from journalists to jewellery traders, from farmers to pharmacists around the world. Our 5,000 staff in more than 30 countries are organised into specialist teams that serve these communities, helping them to do business and their markets to work effectively and efficiently.

Download the full release in PDF format (252 KB, opens in a new window)

This page includes links to documents in Portable Document File (PDF) format. To read PDF documents you may need to download the free Adobe Acrobat Reader. For PDF accessibility help, visit Access Adobe. These links will open in a new browser window.

• Top of page