Dermot Desmond-backed elearning firm sees 36% hike in profits

The Dermot Desmond-backed elearning company Intuition Publishing reported a 36 per cent rise in profits last year with further profitable growth forecast for 2016.

The company, which sells web-based training tools to banks and other institutions, grew pretax profits from €5.6 million to €7.6 million over the 12 months to the end of December last.

Revenues rose 13 per cent to €28.2 million from €24.8 million, while shareholders’ funds increased to €39.6 million from €32.7 million a year earlier.

The company grew its cash from €30.6 million to €34.1 million.

Established in 1985 to develop elearning courses for the financial markets, the company has since expanded to target markets in a number of other sectors, including health, life sciences, energy and pharma.

Chaired by Mr Desmond, Intuition is headquartered in Dublin and has offices in nine other locations, including New York, Sydney, Abu Dhabi and Singapore.

Turnover

The group generates revenue from the sale of software licences as well as implementation, maintenance, support and consulting services.

A breakdown of turnover shows that less than 2 per cent of turnover was derived from Ireland from last year.

In 2015, some €14.7 million in revenues came from North America, up from €11.1 million a year earlier. A further €5.6 million derived from the UK with €3 million from mainland Europe and €4 million from other markets.

Intuition said it “re-aligned its employee base in overseas markets last year and is using significantly more contractors”.

The company employed 118 people at the end of 2015, down from 138 a year earlier. Staff-related costs rose to €10.9 million from €10.1 million.

“The group will continue to invest and plans to grow the scale and depth of its offering into new and existing markets. The growth will continue to be managed judiciously with customer and user experience a key priority at the same time as continuing strong financial controls and operating margins,” the company said.