Level 2

Blue Prism sees 'significant acceleration' in sales

By Josh White

Date: Thursday 21 Nov 2019

Blue Prism sees 'significant acceleration' in sales

(Sharecast News) - Robotic process automation company Blue Prism updated the market on its full year of trading on Thursday, reporting a "significant acceleration" in sales in the second half of the year, contributing to a "very strong" full year performance.

The AIM-traded firm said sales volumes were continually high, particularly in upsells, with increased deal sizes driving material additions in the total business generated in the year.

As a result, the group was entering the 2020 financial year with a record order book.

The company said it added 685 net new customers during the year ended 31 October, while maintaining a customer retention rate of 96%, down slightly from 97% in the prior year.

Its total customer base at year-end was 1,677, which was an increase of 69% on 2018, which the board said provided a "substantially increased base" for it to upsell into in future periods.

In 2019, it demonstrated its future upsell potential with "significant success" with the existing customer base, resulting in 1,139 upsells into 544 customers.

Those upsells reportedly demonstrated the software's scalability, and the strategic nature of customer deployments.

The company also noted that the first significant cohort of 'one-year-one-Digital-Worker' deals in the fourth quarter was demonstrating good early progress, with 38% of the customers upselling during 2019.

On the financial front, Blue Prism said sales momentum resulted in a "very strong" financial performance, with total business - which measures the total contract value from new customers, upsells and renewals - over the period of £181m, up from £143m.

There was a "significant increase" in total business won in the second half, with £115m generated by strong performances in all the key geographic regions, driven by an increase in deal sizes, particularly within upsells.

The group said it expected 2019 revenues to be at least £98m, up from £55.2m, adding that it closed the year with a cash position of £74m, rising from £50.5m.

Blue Prism's board estimated that the exit monthly recurring revenue at 31 October would be at least £10.4m, or £9.7m excluding the impact of the Thoughtonomy acquisition, up from £6.2m in the prior year.

That additional monthly recurring revenue represented an underlying increase of at least £2.1m on the first half of the year and that, along with the ongoing momentum in the business, reinforced the board's confidence in its revenue expectations for the 2020 financial year.

"We have delivered an excellent performance across 2019, particularly in the second half of the year where we have seen record quarters in each of our key geographies," said executive chairman Jason Kingdon.

"We have continued to expand our enterprise customer footprint and our track record of upselling into these customers is enviable, with increases in both the volume and sizes of these upsells in the second half of the year."

Kingdon said the momentum the company had seen reflected the investments it had made across 2018, with investments in this financial year set to begin to impact 2020 and beyond.

"Robotic process automation is fast emerging as a significant software category, customers are beginning to materially scale their deployments and Blue Prism is increasingly recognised as the product that can deliver this scale."

Blue Prism said it would report its financial results for the year ended 31 October on 23 January.

At 1115 GMT, shares in Blue Prism Group were up 28/81% at 1,143.8p.

..

Email this article to a friend

or share it with one of these popular networks:


Top of Page