Chief Executive Officer’s review (BIIA excerpt focusing on revenue and product development only):   We made great progress over the course of this year, financially, operationally and strategically. The pace and range of new product innovation has increased dramatically across the business. This, plus the investments we have made in technology and our One Experian approach, position us strongly for the future.

We delivered a strong financial performance, with:

  • Total revenue growth of 8%, total revenue growth at constant currency of 7%, organic revenue growth of 5%. B2B delivered organic revenue up 8% for the year and in Consumer Services the rate of organic revenue decline moderated to (5%) overall and was flat in the fourth quarter.
  • Growth accelerated as the year progressed, with organic revenue growth of 4% in H1 and of 6% in H2.
  • Benchmark EBIT growth was 8%, with EBIT margins of 27.7%.
  • Double-digit growth in Benchmark earnings per share, which grew 11%.
  • Cash conversion of 93% of Benchmark EBIT into operating cash flow. o New sources of data. We acquired Clarity Services, Inc. (‘Clarity’), which adds non-traditional credit data assets in the US, improving visibility of over 60m consumers with traditional lenders, and extending the superiority of our datasets.

We are executing well against our strategy, and have invested in a series of initiatives to sustain growth in the future. These include:

  • New sources of data. We acquired Clarity Services, Inc. (‘Clarity’), which adds non-traditional credit data assets in the US, improving visibility of over 60m consumers with traditional lenders, and extending the superiority of our datasets.
  • New products. We launched Experian Ascend, our next-generation analytical sandbox, which has had a very strong reception since launch in the US.
  • New agreements across multiple territories for major Experian platforms, including for PowerCurve, our decisioning platform, and for CrossCore our fraud prevention platform which signed 51 client agreements in the year, and we have a pipeline of new product introductions which will launch during the forthcoming year.
  • New and extended client engagements which exploit the breadth of our capabilities as One Experian. These included major new data and decisioning contracts in the US, the UK and Brazil with large financial institutions.
  • We launched the new identity protection proposition in the US, we substantially developed our credit comparison services and we have agreed the acquisition of ClearScore, subject to UK regulatory approval, which will add a complementary credit comparison brand in the UK.
  • We have made significant additional investments in information security in order to maintain strong defences and continue to provide a secure environment for data.

We made good strategic and financial progress during the year, with 7% revenue growth from ongoing activities and a 10% increase in Benchmark EPS, both at constant currency. Benchmark EBIT margin from ongoing activities was 27.7%, up ten basis points.

We report our financial results in US dollars and therefore the strengthening of our other trading currencies, primarily the pound sterling, against the US dollar during the year increased total revenue by US$50m and Benchmark EBIT by US$14m, and improved our Benchmark EBIT margin from ongoing activities by ten basis points. Details of the principal exchange rates used are given on page 13.

Our Benchmark PBT was US$1,206m (2017: US$1,124m). Benchmark EPS of 97.8 US cents (2017: 88.4 US cents) increased by 11 % at actual exchange rates and 10% at constant currency. There has been upward pressure on interest rates over the year increasing the net interest expense included in Benchmark PBT to US$85m (2017: US$75m). The Benchmark tax rate was 25.6% (2017: 26.2%).

We continued to generate strong cash flows, with a 93% conversion of Benchmark EBIT to Benchmark operating cash flow (2017: 96%). Cash conversion reflects the changing mix of our business, as our B2B revenue has a longer cash cycle than that observed in our Consumer Services business. Investment activity in the year has been undertaken within the capital allocation framework previously outlined and includes the acquisition of Clarity Services, Inc. for US$113m and Runpath Group Limited for US$66m.

Source: Experian Earnings Release