Good progress made by Serco
Outsourcing group Serco, which runs leisure centres in Shropshire and waste services in Sandwell, says it made good progress in the first half of its financial year.
In the six months to the end of June total revenue was down fiver per cent to £2.35 billion for the group which also runs the West Midlands cycle hire scheme on behalf of Transport for West Midlands.
Pre-tax profit for the period was £114 million with operating profit down 31 per cent at £130m.
The group's order intake in the half year was £1.9bn and the order book remains strong at £13.5bn.
Chief executive Mark Irwin said: "Our focus on productivity and driving improvement across our portfolio has seen good progress at this early stage. As a result, we were able to increase our guidance for profit, cash and net debt with our trading update in June. In a year where revenue is expected to be slightly down, we will grow underlying operating profit by approximately nine per cent to £270m."
He added: "As we enter the second six months of the year, we continue to work on enhancing the performance of the business. While mindful of a potential impact internationally from elections in 2024, we are confident about the quality of our pipeline of potential new work to achieve our medium-term growth targets."
