Results first half 2020: Ctac records stable revenue

Key figures

Highlights

• Net revenue up 2.7% at € 42.5 million due to acquisition Purple Square; revenue growth pressured by reluctance among clients in the retail sector to invest
• Operating result before depreciation 9.4% higher at € 3.5 million; including € 0.8 million in restructuring costs (H1 2019: € 0.9 million)
• Net result up slightly at € 0.6 million (H1 2019: nil)
• Stronger focus on cash and working capital due to Covid-19 results in net cash flow of € 7.2 million positive (H1 2019: € 1.8 million negative)
• In the retail and wholesale sectors the investment readiness is restrained
• Outlook 2020: barring extraordinary exogenous circumstances and on the basis of the size and quality of its order book, Ctac expects to record slightly higher revenue and EBITDA in the full year 2020.

“We are proud of our employees who, frequently working from home, have been highly flexible and who are working hard to support our clients in these unprecedented times. Thanks to their efforts, we have been able to serve our clients well, is our revenue slightly increased and has profitability improved. 

Our secondment and cloud activities delivered a stable performance. Due to the exponential increase in working from home, we saw an increase in demand for the safeguarding of effective, secure and efficient IT infrastructure. At the same time, clients were also more reluctant to invest in IT, especially in the retail sector. If we had not acquired Purple Square, our revenue would have come in slightly lower. In the meantime, we are seeing a cautious recovery in retail sector sales towards normal levels. 

The situation in Belgium is more or less the same as in the Netherlands. Here too, revenue and result were lower in the second quarter, while we are also seeing a recovery in revenue levels. However, the course of the virus and the economic impact of this on the various sectors in which we are active remains uncertain at this point.
In an effort to improve our positioning even further, in the second half of this year we made a start on the streamlining of our product portfolio, putting additional focus on our main products and services. In line with our planning, we will complete this streamlining operation in the course of the second half of this year. On top of this, we are making solid progress with our micro-services-driven hybrid channel platform, which we are using to convert IT services into solutions to make these more scalable. We will also continue to invest in our own IP products. 
In view of the resilience we have shown in the very challenging first half of the year and given the size and quality of our current order book, barring unforeseen circumstances, we expect to record higher revenue and higher EBITDA in 2020 than in 2019.”
Henny Hilgerdenaar, Chief Executive Officer Ctac

“Immediately after the Covid-19 outbreak, we took measures to safeguard the health and safety of our employees and to enable us to assist our clients in what was an extremely challenging time for them as well. We also immediately initiated a number of measures with a focus on cash levels and working capital, including deferred tax payments and cost savings. In the first half of this year, these measures resulted, among other things, in a reduction in the number of indirect employees, a strongly positive net cash flow and the strengthening of our financial buffers, which gives us more flexibility in these uncertain circumstances. By the end of this financial year, Ctac expects a reduction in deferred tax payments and a positive cash flow for the full financial year.”
Pieter-Paul Saasen, Chief Financial Officer Ctac

Financial developments 
 
PROFIT AND LOSS ACCOUNT 

General 
In 2020 Ctac has not applied any new IFRS standards.

Revenue in the first half of 2020 increased by € 1.1 million, or 2.7%, to € 42.5 million (H1 2019: € 41.4 million). Secondment activities showed a strong increase, which was partly driven by the acquisition of Purple Square. We expect to see continued growth in this part of our activities, partly on the back of the aforementioned acquisition. In Cloud Services, we are seeing stable revenue with a growing number of clients migrating from a private to a public cloud environment. In Maintenance, a number of contracts that expired were not renewed.
In Consulting we are seeing reluctance among clients to launch innovative IT projects, as a result of the Covid-19 outbreak. In addition, we incurred additional development costs for Fit4RealEstate to align this optimally with the needs of new clients in the real estate sector. We expect clients who have closed a contract for this IP product to go live in the third quarter of the year.
Licences revenues declined due to the ongoing transition to pay-per-use contracts and overall reluctance to invest in new licences as a result of the Covid-19 outbreak.

Operating expenses
Operating expenses came in 1.5% higher on balance in the first half of 2020, at € 41.5 million (H1 2019: € 40.9 million).

The expenses related to outsourced work increased by 14.4% to € 10.3 million as a result of the higher revenue in Secondment. The purchase value of hardware, software and other was up 5.3% at € 4.0 million due to the increase in public cloud-related services.

Personnel costs declined by 4.4% to € 19.4 million on the back of lower reservations for bonuses and lower severance package expenses. The average number of FTEs was 389 FTEs in the first half of 2020 (H1 2019: 388 FTEs).

Other operating expenses rose by 4.0% to € 5.2 million. On balance, this was due to cost-saving measures (marketing, travel and accommodation costs, housing costs), higher costs for licences and higher consultancy costs due in part to the acquisition of Purple Square. As in the first half of 2019, Ctac did not capitalise any development costs in the first half of 2020.

Operating result before depreciations (EBITDA)
EBITDA increased by 9.4% to € 3.5 million (H1 2019: € 3.2 million). This result includes around € 0.8 million in one-off expenses (H1 2019: € 0.9 million. These one-off expenses were related with the acquisition of Purple Square (consultancy costs) and the rationalisation of the ratio direct/indirect staff (severance packages). We expect the first effects of this rationalisation to be visible from the third quarter of this year.

Net result
The net result accruing to group shareholders came in at € 0.6 million in the first half of 2020 (H1 2019: nil). On the basis of the weighted average number of outstanding ordinary shares of 12,931,401 (H1 2019: 12,827,802), this implies net earnings per ordinary share of € 0.04 (2019: € 0.00).

BALANCE SHEET AND NET DEBT 
The balance sheet total increased by 36.1% or € 16.4 million to € 61.8 million at end-H1 2020, from € 45.4 million at end-H1 2019. This was partly the result of an increase in the capitalisation of rights of use under IFRS 16, related to the extension of a lease contract, and of the acquisition of Purple Square (total: € 8.4 million). The deferred payments following the Covid-19 outbreak also contributed to this increase. The exact amount of the acquisition goodwill has yet to be determined and this will be determined in the second half of this financial year, in accordance with IFRS 3.
Ctac reduced its net bank debt by € 2.7 million compared with year-end 2019, to a positive balance of € 4.2 million. Solvency (equity/balance sheet total) came in at 32.4% (year-end 2019: 42.9%).

NET CASH FLOW AND CASH POSITION 
Ctac recorded a positive net cash flow of € 7.2 million in the first half of 2020 (H1 2019:
€ 1.8 million negative) as a result of tighter receivables management, deferred payments, the payment of a stock dividend of € 0.08 per share and deferred bonus payments.
The increased focus on cash management and costs strengthened our cash position, which stood at € 8.7 million positive at end-June 2020 (end-June 2019: € 2.1 million negative).