Spectris, an instrumentation and controls company, was firing on all cylinders in the first half of 2012, with performance boosted by recent acquisitions.
Sales increased from £507.2m to £596.7m year-on-year (y/y), although on a like-for-like (LFL) basis this was just 4.0%, brought lower by a negative impact from currency exchange.
While statutory pre-tax profit (PTP) came in at £75.4m (2011: £70.8m), adjusted PTP was up 18% from £77.7m to £92m. Adjusted earnings per share increased from 50.2p to 58.2p.
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The dividend was significantly increased from 8.2p per share to 13.5p, up 65%, to rebalance the weighting between the interim and final payments; stripping out the rebalancing effect, the interim dividend is still up 15%.
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John O'Higgins, Chief Executive, said: "Spectris delivered a good first half performance, particularly in the context of a challenging macro-economic climate, with recent acquisitions making an important contribution.
"Notwithstanding the current business environment, we maintain the focus on our strategic initiatives which will continue to enhance our broad geographic and end market exposure and further increase the proportion of revenues from more resilient customer operating budgets. We therefore remain confident in our ability to continue to make progress in the remainder of the year."
Sales grew in all four segments on a reported basis. On a LFL basis, the decline in the Industrial Controls segment of 1.0% was due to exceptional one-time sales in 2011. Operating margins were up in Test and Measurement and Industrial Controls (an accretive effect of acquisitions), but down in both Materials Analysis, due to higher investment in research and development and In-line Instrumentation, an adverse mix effect from higher systems and project sales and slower growth in after-sales.
Regionally, there was strong LFL growth of 8.0% in North America, which accounts for 33% of group sales. Sales to Asia Pacific (31% of sales) increased by 6.0%, while Europe (30%) was weaker with sales slightly down by 1.0%. Overall, after-market and consumables declined as a percentage of total reported sales from 27% to 24%.
This was due to higher sales of products and systems, particularly in the In-line Instrumentation segment, and the dilutive effect of acquisitions in the Industrial Controls segment which do not carry after-market revenue. The firm's overall exposure to resilient customer operating budgets has increased as these account for the majority of sales in the Industrial Controls segment.
Net debt was £329m at 30 June 2012, 1.4 times 2011's EBITDA (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation), compared with £356.2m at the end of December 2011.
The share price rose 0.46% to 1,516p by 09:22.
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