Tribal Group plc
Trading update,
significant contract win in Australia,
and second major university customer secured in Canada
Tribal Group plc ("Tribal"), a leading provider of systems and solutions to the education, learning and training markets in the UK and internationally, confirms that it has signed two important contracts for the delivery of its student management systems in Australia and Canada, and provides an update on current trading.
Trading update
In our Interim Management Statement of 14 November we highlighted that the outturn for the year depended on contract completions and the achievement of key contract milestones before the end of the year. Given the timing of a number of contracts, including those announced today, we now believe it unlikely that certain key milestones and completions will be achieved before our year end. As a result, we anticipate that our profits for 2014 will be below the Board's previous expectations. The Board expects the benefit of these deferred contract milestones and completions will be recognised early next year, which will underpin our expectations for 2015.
Student management system for all Technical and Further Education (TAFE) Institutes across Queensland, Australia
Tribal has signed a contract to deliver a student management system across all Technical and Further Education Institutes in the state of Queensland in Australia. TAFEs in Queensland provide vocational education and training to over 170,000 students annually, operating through 48 campuses with approximately 5,300 staff. The contract has a value in excess of AUD 19 million over an initial 5 year period.
The contract complements our work under the Student Administration and Learning Management ("SALM") programme in New South Wales, under which Tribal's student management system is now deployed in 138 TAFE college campuses.
Following implementation of our system across TAFEs in Queensland, Tribal will be the leading provider of student management systems to the vocational education and training sector in Australia, with more than 50% of TAFE Institutes using Tribal software.
University of Alberta - second university customer in Canada
Tribal has also now secured its second major student management system customer in Canada. Following our initial market entry contract with the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, we are now proceeding on a similar programme with the University of Alberta in Edmonton. The University of Alberta is one of Canada's largest research universities, and a top five Canadian university with over 39,000 students.
Keith Evans, Chief Executive, said "We are pleased with our new contract wins, which continue to extend our international credentials. Although our trading update highlights the nature of our sales cycle, where contract award timelines can sometimes extend, our international education markets continue to offer attractive growth prospects."
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Tribal Group plc |
Tel: +44 (0)117 311 5293 |
Keith Evans, Chief Executive |
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Steve Breach, Group Finance Director |
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Weber Shandwick Financial Nick Oborne |
Tel: +44 (0)20 7067 0700 |
Editors' note:
Tribal is a leading provider of technology-enabled solutions to the education management market. We build world-leading education management software, and provide performance improvement and quality assurance solutions across universities, colleges and schools, in the UK and internationally.
We work in partnership with a wide range of organisations, including schools, colleges and universities, government agencies and large and small employers.
Tribal has around 1,400 staff and our work spans five continents across the world. More information about Tribal is available online at www.tribalgroup.com.
This Statement has been prepared for and is addressed only to our shareholders as a whole and should not be relied on by any other party or for any other purpose. Tribal, its directors, employees, agents or advisers do not accept or assume responsibility to any other person to whom this Statement is shown or into whose hands it may come and any such responsibility or liability is expressly disclaimed. This Statement may contain forward-looking statements and the financial information is unaudited. Any forward-looking statement has been made by the directors in good faith based on the information available to them up to the time of approval of this Statement and should be treated with caution due to the inherent uncertainties, including both economic and business risk factors, underlying such forward-looking information. To the extent that this Statement contains any statement dealing with any time after the date of its preparation, such statement is merely predictive and speculative as it relates to events and circumstances which are yet to occur and therefore the facts stated and views expressed may change. Tribal undertakes no obligation to update these forward-looking statements.
