School closures deal blow to RM's revenues

Tech arm RM Education sees reduced impact from pandemic due to demand for remote learning services

RM has seen its overall revenue tumble 16 per cent as lockdown restrictions impacted school openings and exams.

Turnover for its year ending 30 November 2020 dropped by 16 per cent to £189m as cancelled exams and rolling school closures impacted its numbers in its RM Resources and RM Results units. Adjusted operating profit dropped 48 per cent to £14.4m and statutory profit after tax tumbled 56 per cent to £8.4m.

However, its tech arm RM Education was less impacted by the ongoing pandemic as tech support and devices were still required to support remote learning. The firm stated in its unaudited financial report that there was a "strong focus" from schools to move their learning materials to the cloud and RM sees this as an ongoing opportunity for its education unit.

Though its business took a hammering in H1 as a result of the first national lockdown, business improved throughout the year. However, the tech specialist remained cautious in its outlook for 2021, though it remarked that so far business in the current school shutdowns has fallen "less precipitously".

"2020 was a year in which RM showed good resilience and I'd like to pay tribute to our people and our customers who showed real innovation and ingenuity through testing times," stated outgoing CEO David Brooks.

"In the first half of 2021 we expect some uncertainty to continue with school closures and the cancellation of UK exams. However, the actions taken over the last year put us in a stronger financial and operational position to meet these challenges.

"Looking further out, RM is well placed to capitalise on the longer-term trends in our markets, in particular the shift to digital enablement in education."