France-based Sopra Steria Group has posted its Q1 revenue at €872m which shows a significant growth, fuelled by the synergy effects from the recent merger of Steria and Sopra and a consolidation of HR Access Service, and translated into a 2.4% organic growth in this period, it says.
During the first quarter of 2015 the biggest chunk of business was conducted in France, with a French market accounting for €333.3m in revenue and with organic growth at 1.2%. The business in France was driven by strong momentum in the consulting and systems integration segment and was positively affected by the synergy from the recent merger which translated directly into commercial benefits. However, the infrastructure and security services business saw a 4.1% organic drop.
The UK market, despite of its potential in the long-term, was subdued by the upcoming election in May which meant a greater caution in the public sector spending. Nevertheless, the company says it will manage to deliver organic growth for the full-year, with sights set on the UK financial services sector. At the end of Q1 the revenue in the UK market stood at €251.6m, representing organic growth of 1.5%, it says.
As far as the other European markets are concerned, Germany was struggling with the continued tough market trend in 2014, but saw some improvements and stabilisation thanks to restructure of operations and an implementation of a specific assistance programme for the local management team. This all helped to limit the decline to 4.2% in Q1 against an 11.2% fall in full-year in 2014.
The businesses in Spain and Italy both experienced a double-digit growth while the Nordic markets saw organic revenue increase of 3.1% with a focus on profitability.
The outlook for 2015 remains positive with a full-year target for operating margin on business activity to stand at around 6%, it says.
In 2014 Sopra announced it merger with Steria, another specialist in IT business consulting and outsourcing, to create what it hopes will be a major European force.