LoopUp FY revenue and profits seen ahead of consensus

Hybrid communications platform operator LoopUp Group now expects to wrap up the first half with a year-on-year drop in profits but better-than-expected revenues, while full-year profitability and revenue were forecast to beat current market consensus estimates.

LoopUp said on Thursday that it now expects revenues of approximately £6.6m for the six months ended 30 June, at a gross margin of approximately 67%, and an underlying loss of approximately £1.5m. Net debt was approximately £8.0m on 30 June, prior to the receipt of a research and development tax credit of roughly £1.9m that it expects to receive within the next 60 days.

The AIM-listed group also said it had entered into a revenue sharing and customer transfer agreement with conferencing services provider PGi Connect, with LoopUp holding the right to take over materially all of its client's conferencing services customers, but not its webcasting customers.

LoopUp stated there was no initial or fixed consideration payable to PGi Connect for the transfer of its customers to LoopUp but stated it had agreed to pay PGi a share of revenue invoiced and received from successfully transferred customers for a period of three years.

For the twelve months from October 2022 to September 2023, LoopUp expects the agreement to generate approximately £10.0m in revenues, at a gross margin of approximately 60% after both LoopUp's cost of goods sold and payment of PGi Connect's revenue share, and provide a net cash contribution of approximately £5.0m over the period after other associated cash costs.

As of 1125 BST, LoopUp shares had surged 29.48% to 8.74p.

Reporting by Iain Gilbert at Sharecast.com