The latest financial reports from retail fit-out specialist contractor Styles & Wood show that its StoreData division, which competes in the UK construction collaboration technology (aka ‘extranet’) field, did not have a good first six months in 2007.
While overall group revenues and profits were up, StoreData “as expected … had a slower first half than last year, although in revenue terms was ahead of plan at £0.6m (2006: £0.9m) and operating profit of £0.1m (2006: £0.2m).” The operational review continues:
“We extended the Tesco My Property system increasing the number of licensed users as well as the areas of data we manage on behalf of Tesco including a new Design Standards Library and Health and Safety Compliance Records. We are clear that StoreData must secure new clients in 2007 to achieve our full year expectations for this division and towards the end of the period we secured B&Q, The Co-operative and Nationwide all of which should now contribute in the second half.”
StoreData revenues for the six months ending 30 June 2007 were £618k (compared to £880k for the same period in 2006, ie: down 30%), delivering a profit of £74k (£175k in 2006, down 58%). It will have to improve its financial performance significantly in the second half of the year if it is to achieve the kind of turnover (£1.594m) and operating profit (£0.425m) it achieved in 2006 (see 2006: OK for StoreData).
Clients: a couple of notes
B&Q was an existing StoreData client; presumably it signed a new deal or an extension to the previous contract (announced December 2004, deployed in 2005). The mention of Nationwide is notable as this UK financial institution has been a long-term loyal customer of Business Collaborator (see BC case study) – has S&W wrested Nationwide away from BC or is StoreData being used in addition to BC?
