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Keywords half-year pre-tax profits up 66% to $18.43m

All 7 acquisitions made in 2018 so far are performing "in line with expectations"

Keywords half-year pre-tax profits up 66% to $18.43m

Services provider Keywords' half-year pre-tax profits were up 66 per cent to $18.43m (€15.9m), according to its latest financial report.

Preliminary revenues for the six-month period ending June 30th came to $127.34m (€109.9m), a year-on-year increase of 72 per cent.

Acquired tastes

Keywords Studios acquired 11 studios last year and has brought on another eight in 2018 so far. The company said all are “performing in line with expectations.”

The most recent acquisition was a $1.5 million deal to snag predictive analytics outfit Yokozuna Data from former owner Silicon Studio.

"Our progress so far this year has been very encouraging,” said Keywords CEO Andrew Day.

“We have made significant investments, most notably in enlarged facilities and senior and mid-level management, which are further supporting our organic growth in the second half and beyond.

“Despite the incorporation of the lower growth and margin VMC business, our largest acquisition to date, and a weaker US dollar, we have delivered a first half in line with our expectations while also strengthening the business for the future.

“With the benefits of a full six months contribution from first half acquisitions, a strengthening dollar, a healthy pipeline of activity and expanded capacity to deliver it, we anticipate a strong second half performance in line with current market expectations for the full year.”


Staff Writer

Natalie Clayton is an Edinburgh-based freelance writer and game developer. Besides PCGamesInsider and Pocketgamer.biz, she's written across the games media landscape and was named in the 2018 GamesIndustry.biz 100 Rising Star list.