RNS Number : 2791W
Keywords Studios PLC
08 February 2017

8 February 2017

Keywords Studios plc ("Keywords Studios" or "the Group")
Full year trading update
Sales and profits ahead of expectations for the year ended 31
December 2016
Continued strong organic growth complemented
by successful acquisitions
Keywords Studios, the international technical services provider to theglobal video games industry today provides an update on trading
following a year of further strong organic growth and geographic
expansion, complemented by a number of successful acquisitions.
The Group is pleased to announce preliminary unaudited revenues forthe year ended 31 December 2016 of €96.6m and adjusted PBT* of€14.8m, both of which are comfortably ahead of consensus market
expectations. This performance has been driven by strong like-forlike growth, due to the continued growth of the established businessas well as the contribution of the eight acquisitions completed during
the year.
The Group continues to deliver on its strategy of growing organicallyand through acquisition in order to become the "go to" supplier oftechnical services to the video games industry globally. To this end,
the Group is now comprised of six globally managed service lines
operating from 27 production studios in 16 countries. During the year,
the Group welcomed seven new businesses through acquisition;
Ankama, Synthesis, Mindwalk, Volta, Player Research, Enzyme andSonox have all contributed positively in further extending our client
penetration, our geographic reach and the talent we have within theGroup. Also acquired during the year was the 50% of Kite Team notalready owned by the Group.
The Group invested cash of €20.7m for the eight acquisitions
completed in 2016. These acquired businesses performed well and as
previously reported, Synthesis, our largest investment to date,delivered an excellent performance. Following these acquisitions, theGroup had €17m in cash at the year end and had utilised €8m of its€15m rolling credit facility. Its strong cash generation, coupled withavailable debt facilities, provides the Group with good headroom forfurther acquisitions in 2017.
Andrew Day, Chief Executive of Keywords, commented:

"Our Group continues to grow revenues and proﬁts whilst also
growing a talent pool that is increasingly recognised as a resourcethat enables clients around the world to reduce complexity and focus
on their core business of designing and publishing great video
games. The development of new Virtual and Augmented Reality
platforms only adds to that complexity and, whilst we have notassumed stronger demand for our services in this area in 2017
compared to 2016, it's an exciting new form of content delivery thatbrings greater interactivity to many content types and requires theskills and services that we have developed over many years at theforefront of interactive content.
"We have structured the management of the Group in order tosupport both further organic growth and the continued consolidationof our highly fragmented markets around the world.
"Our cross-selling eﬀorts continue to bear fruit and we begin 2017with a global sales and sales support team of 14 compared to 9 in2016, which will help drive further organic growth. We also remain
well-funded and continue to review a healthy pipeline ofcomplementary acquisition opportunities, which will add to the talentpool, range of services, production capacity and the choice we canoﬀer our clients. Although it's early in 2017, we are therefore
confident of making continued progress in the year ahead."* The Group reports adjusted PBT before acquisition and integration
expenses, share option charges, amortisation of intangibles andforeign currency gains
Ends
For further information, please contact:
Keywords
Studios(www.keywordsstudios.com)
Andrew Day, Chief Executive Officer
David Broderick, Chief Financial Officer+353 190 22 730

Numis (Financial Adviser)
Stuart Skinner / Kevin Cruickshank(Nominated Adviser)
James Black / Tom Ballard (CorporateBroker)

020 7260 1000

MHP Communications (Financial PR)
Katie Hunt / Ollie Hoare / Nessyah Hart020 3128 8771 / 8156

Certain information contained in this announcement would haveconstituted inside information (as deﬁned by Article 7 of Regulation(EU) No 596/2014) prior to its release as part of this announcement.
About Keywords Studios (www.keywordsstudios.com)
Keywords Studios is an international technical services provider to theglobal video games industry. Established in 1998, and now withfacilities in Dublin, Rio de Janeiro, Montreal, Quebec City, Portland,
Mexico City, Los Angeles, Seattle, Tokyo, Singapore, New Delhi, Pune,Rome, Milan, Barcelona, Madrid, Taipei, Shanghai, Beijing, Manila,Hamburg, Paris and London, it provides integrated art creation,localisation, testing, audio and customer care services across 50
languages and 14 games platforms to a blue chip client base in morethan 15 countries.
It has a strong market position, providing services to 21 of the top 25
most prominent games companies, including Activision Blizzard,
Bandai Namco, Bethesda, Electronic Arts, Konami, Riot Games, Sony,
Square Enix, Supercell, TakeTwo, and Ubisoft. Recent titles worked on
include Uncharted 4: A Thief's End, Call of Duty: Inﬁnite Warfare,Mortal Combat X, Assassin's Creed Syndicate, Battleﬁeld 1, World of
Warcraft: Legion, Hearthstone, Clash Royale, and Mobile Strike.
Keywords is listed on AIM, the London Stock Exchange regulated
market (KWS.L).

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