This announcement contains inside information for the purposes of Regulation 11 of the Market Abuse (amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019/310.

27 January 2022

Newmark Security plc

("Newmark", the "Company" or the "Group")

Interim Results

for the six months ended 31 October 2021

Newmark Security plc (AIM: NWT), a leading provider of electronic and physical security systems, is pleased to announce its unaudited interim results for the six months ended 31 October 2021 ("H1 FY22").

HIGHLIGHTS

Financials

·          Revenue increased by 23% to £9.7m (H1 FY21: £7.9m)

·          Loss from operations of £0.8m (H1 FY21: loss of £0.2m)

·          Loss before tax of £0.9m (H1 FY21: loss of £0.3m)

·          Loss per share of 0.17 pence (H1 FY21: loss of £0.05 pence)

·          Cash outflow from operating activities was £0.9m (H1 FY21: inflow of £0.4m)

People and Data Management division

·          Revenue increased by 28% to £7.13m (H1 FY21: £5.56m)

·          Human capital management revenue increased by 32% to £5.5m (H1 FY21: £4.1m)

·          Access control revenue increased by 18% to £1.7m (H1 FY21: £1.4m)

Physical Security Solutions division

·          Revenue increased by 12% to £2.57m (H1 FY21: £2.30m)

Commenting on the results, Maurice Dwek, Chairman of Newmark, said:

"The Group has continued to be proactive at finding solutions for its customers despite the continued COVID issues and the global supply chain challenges. This client focussed approach has resulted in higher revenues across both divisions, with the strongest performance being from Human Capital Management sales in the US. We continue to invest in new products and services to meet current and future customer needs. For the full year, the Board expects the Group to show an increase in revenue compared to last year, although at a lower margin due to increases in componentry and freight costs. On behalf of the Board, I would like to extend my thanks for all the hard work and resilience shown from the team throughout this period."

Copies of the interim results for the six months ended 31 October 2021 will be made available on the Company's website www.newmarksecurity.com 

For further information:

Newmark Security plc

Marie-Claire Dwek, Chief Executive Officer                                          Tel: +44 (0) 20 7355 0070

Paul Campbell-White, Chief Financial Officer                                       www.newmarksecurity.com

Allenby Capital Limited                                                                            Tel: +44 (0) 20 3328 5656              

(Nominated Adviser and Broker)

James Reeve / Liz Kirchner (Corporate Finance)

Amrit Nahal (Sales & Corporate broking)

   CHAIRMAN'S STATEMENT

I am pleased to announce the Group's unaudited interim results for the six months ended 31 October 2021 ("H1 FY22").

Both Grosvenor and Safetell have seen year on year revenue growth in the first six months of the year. In Grosvenor, our People and Data Management Division, there have been increases in both the Human Capital Management (HCM) and Access Control (AC) businesses. Easing of lockdown and travel restrictions have made it easier for our teams to attend sites in both a sales and installation capacity and we have been able to meet with key customers and suppliers in person again to continue to foster our strong relationships. In Safetell, our Physical Security Solutions division, there has been growth in projects and supply work as we continue to reduce our reliance on our legacy banking sector products.

The Group has continued to be proactive at finding solutions for its customers despite the continued COVID issues and the global supply chain challenges pushing up componentry and freight prices. These underlying factors, along with strategic projects taken at lower margins, have meant that the first half has been a loss-making period. We expect to finish the year ahead of last year in terms of revenue but expect that the loss position will be increased against the prior year.  However, we have instigated a number of initiatives to improve profitability and cashflows which have already resulted in reduced losses for Q2 versus Q1.

In September 2021 we welcomed our new Chief Financial Officer, Paul Campbell-White, into the business and Paul has already begun to add value to the Group in this short space of time.

Post the half year, at our AGM in November, the shareholders approved a share reorganisation of the business which resulted in a fifty-fold reduction in the number of shares in circulation.

Group performance

There was an overall increase in Group revenue of 23.4% to £9,697,000 (H1 FY21: £7,857,000). Revenue has been strong throughout the first half, led by the growth in the US HCM business which was especially good against the back drop of continued COVID restrictions and the global supply chain issues resulting in longer product lead times. Gross profit in value terms is also up year on year although the gross profit percentage has fallen by four points to 33.2% (H1 FY21: 37.2%). This is predominantly driven by two large HCM contracts at the start of the year which had lower margins, combined with an increase in the Access Control sales which are at a lower percentage profit. The two HCM projects undertaken at reduced margins were seen as strong strategic projects to build long-term relationships with both the software house and the end user.

Administrative expenses have increased by 29.4% to £3,855,000 (H1 FY21: £3,143,000). This is as a result of two main themes, 1) the cost saving initiatives actioned in the first half of last year during the worst part of the COVID pandemic including furloughing staff and a 10% pay cut among the staff not being replicated in the first half of this year and 2) the first six months of this year has seen administrative costs increase as the business is gearing up for increased future activity in line with its business plan. The Group has made an H1 FY22 operating loss before exceptional items of £637,000 (H1 FY21: loss of £50,000). For H1 FY22, the Group made a loss per share of 0.17 pence (H1 2020: loss per share of 0.05p).

People and Data Management Division - Grosvenor Technology

HCM revenue increased by 32% to £5,458,000 (H1 FY21: £4,139,000)

It has been a strong first half of the year in the HCM business, with the US market being particularly successful with revenue of £4,209,000 (H1 FY21: £2,605,000), a 62% increase. This has been driven by contracts with large US software providers.

We have continued to build on our strong relationships with our existing customers and are engaging with several Tier 1 target HCM software providers and potential clients. They are speaking to us about the possibility of GT Clocks (the Company's trading name in the US) providing its next generation hardware and, due to the easing in the travel restrictions, we have completed more face to face meetings again.  We also delivered the first orders for our newest Clock (GT8), which launched in April 2021.

In our Rest of World HCM business, we have also continued negotiations with several Tier 1 clients for both products and services. Whilst we have seen a 19% reduction in revenue in this area, we have onboarded some key staff to lead the growth of this sector moving forwards.

Product Development - Hardware and Software

We continue to invest in development of both hardware and software platforms to support our anticipated further growth in the HCM market globally. Our hardware, electronics, and embedded software teams have been working on updates to our facial recognition and temperature detection software and our next clock. Additionally, focus remained on developing added-value services, intended to be provisioned on an 'as a service' basis, increasingly cloud-based, aiding software vendors to reap additional value from their hardware post-deployment.

We continue to see growth in the HCM market being facilitated through the technology 'drivers' of high-speed internet availability and the subsequent mass shift to Cloud based computing. We are developing our HCM software platforms with a Cloud and Application Programming Interface ("API") first approach. A Cloud and API first approach prioritises utilising a Cloud infrastructure along with APIs to provide seamless connectivity and integration between back-end and front-end systems for customers.

During the period, three of our longstanding US HCM clients agreed to subscribe to our Cloud provisioned software, remotely connecting new and/or existing timeclock devices with our platform. By the close of the period, c. 5,400 'edge' devices globally were connected to our platform and we expect this number to more than double by the end of the financial year. The upgraded version of our Cloud provisioning software is due to be launched in Spring 2022 which will further drive subscription growth.

Access Control

Revenue increased by 18% to £1,671,000 (H1 FY21: £1,421,000)

Revenues from our Access Control lines of business have been another success story for the first half of the year. Easing of UK lockdown restrictions have undoubtedly helped us as we are now able to attend client premises to complete project installations.

Janus C4, our Security Management System (SMS), which is still fairly new into the market, has seen continued year on year revenue growth of 197%, to £270,000. The onboarding of new partners has been driven by our ability to conduct face-to-face sales visits and conduct installations after many months of disruption.

Our legacy Janus product range has seen increased revenue of 20% to £843,000. Although this platform is no longer installed in 'new' systems as it is based on a now unsupported version of a MS Windows™ Web browser, we have seen increased need for expansion and maintenance packs from existing customers.

Sateon (our previous flagship access control platform) sales have continued to decrease during the period in line with management expectations. A reduction was always anticipated as the focus of the sales and business development activity has been on Janus C4. Sateon product family sales include an OEM variant of Sateon Advance hardware to third parties for non-proprietary integration with their own access control platforms. The largest of these partners is based in Belgium and has seen its business severely disrupted through the restrictions brought about because of the pandemic.

Physical Security Solutions Division - Safetell

Safetell revenue has been another positive with sales revenue 12% higher than the corresponding period last year at £2,568,000. The Safetell management team continues to transform the business and the last six months has seen the introduction of new product lines, new strategic partnerships struck, and new clients onboarded. Our traditional work of installing and maintaining rising screens has continued to be impacted by the reduction in the number of bank and post offices across the country but we have now further diversified our product offering by bringing auto door and entrance control into our product portfolio.

Our project revenue has shown 26% year on year growth at £1,540,000. In a short space of time, we have forged strong experience in the design and installation of security screens in the retail sector and have worked with most of the large supermarket chains in the year to date. We have also completed phase 1 of a large project with a major police force.

We have installed our first entrance control product during the period and have continued to grow our maintenance contract with a large petrol retailer by an additional 100 sites. We have also negotiated a new rising screen maintenance contract with a large UK bank which commenced in November 2021. Our autodoor maintenance contract with a large University has also increased, with additional sites now onboarded. We continue to build on existing relationships in this sector as well as targeting specific projects with new partners.

The company's website has been refreshed in the period and additional features added. There is increased technical information, easier product offering navigation and information along with making it mobile optimised. This will become a larger part of the sales arsenal over time as more customer interactive features are intended.

Safetell has agreed a key strategic step of appointing a new full time Managing Director to replace Paul Lovell, who left the business at the end of June 2021. Nick Shannon will commence his role in February 2022 and has strong sector experience including recent roles within G4S Secured Solutions and Chubb Fire and Safety. We would like to place on record our thanks to Bob Darke, our interim Managing Director, who has done an excellent job of guiding the management team throughout the past six months and has made significant strides to improve various areas of the business.

Balance sheet and financing

The Group utilised £448,000 of its £600,000 UK overdraft facility at the balance sheet date, although it also had £211,000 of cash in the US. Subsequent to the balance sheet date this overdraft facility has been increased to £700,000 until the end of March 2022 in order to provide additional headroom as the Company navigates the unprecedented global supply chain challenges.

Short term borrowings have risen as we drew down on our UK invoice discounting facility during the period.  This facility has recently been increased to £1.7 million.

The Group has had to utilise its invoice discounting facility along with some of the overdraft as a result of the losses incurred and the increase in inventories within Grosvenor. At the balance sheet date overall Group inventory stood at £3.7 million, a £1.3 million increase from the prior year and £0.6 million more than at the 30 April 2021 balance sheet. The increase in inventory was required in order to minimize disruption to our supply chain and to fulfil our growing HCM orders.

Outlook

The outlook is still difficult to predict as we continue to deal with the effects of the COVID pandemic and the global supply chain issues that have gone hand in hand with this. However, based on current pipeline and estimates, we anticipate that revenue will be ahead of last year as we continue to grow our US HCM revenues. Unfortunately, this is not expected to be reflected in the net profit/(loss) which we are anticipating will be below last year. This is due to continued pressure on margins as the supply chain issues push up purchase and freight costs, coupled with additional administrative costs as we have setup the business for further future growth. 

We continue to manage our cash position carefully and are in regular contact with our bank. We are currently exploring setting up a US invoice discounting facility as a result of the strong US growth and are also looking at other financing options to ensure we remain well placed to deal with the uncertainties.

On behalf of the Board, I would like to extend my thanks for all the hard work and resilience shown from the team throughout this period.

M DWEK

Chairman

27 January 2022

CONSOLIDATED INCOME STATEMENT

For the six months ended 31 October 2021

CONSOLIDATED STATEMENT OF COMPREHENSIVE INCOME

For the six months ended 31 October 2021

CONSOLIDATED STATEMENT OF FINANCIAL POSITION

At 31 October 2021