Amadeus on the money yet again

Amadeus IT Holding is puffing its chest out after another year of growth and strong performance in 2014.

Revenue for the twelve months ending December 31 bumped up just over 10% to €3,417.7 million, while EBITDA grew 9.9% to €1,306.0 million.

Adjusted profit for the travel industry tech partner, including M&A activities, also grew just shy of 10% to €681.1 million.

Amadeus continued to outperform the industry in 2014, with air travel agency bookings soaring 5.2% to 466.5 million, taking the market share to 40.7%, while bookings through travel agencies grew 3.2%.

“Amadeus’ results and focus clearly indicate that we remain a trusted partner at the heart of the travel industry,” president and CEO Luis Maroto said.

“Our core businesses continued to showcase strength, with market share gains in Distribution especially in North America and Asia-Pacific. Our long-term commitment to low-cost and hybrid carriers gained further momentum, with a 16% booking increase year-on-year and a landmark partnership with Ryanair.”

The agreement with Ryanair proved a breakthrough for the company, bringing with it a range of its fares and full ancillary services to Amadeus’ travel agency subscribers, including Business Plus fares, which offers business and corporate travellers a tailored package.

Additionally, distribution agreements with 15 new hybrid and low-cost airlines were also signed during the year and to date 79 low-cost carriers have become Amadeus distribution partners. Bookings from travel agencies on low-cost carriers were up by 16% year-on-year during 2014.

Asia-Pacific continued to be the main driver of growth for IT Solutions, supported by the migration of Korean Air later in the year, which Maroto said is expected to expand futher with scheduled migration of a number of Asian carriers such as Japan Airlines and All Nippon Airways.

“Our continued efforts and focus on North America led to the groundbreaking Southwest Airlines domestic contract. We now expect annual contracted PBs of close to one billion[ii] by 2017, an increase of 44% over 2014,” Maroto added.

“Furthermore, our recent strategic acquisitions – Newmarket International in the hotel IT space, UFIS in the airport IT business and i:FAO in the corporate travel IT segment – are already contributing positively.

“I am confident that in 2015, our people, our technology and the strength and resilience of our business model will allow us to make further progress and we expect continued growth for our core businesses.”

The Amadeus board of directors agreed in December to undertake a share buy-back program, in order to reduce the share capital of the company, which will remain in force until May 29 2015, with the maximum investment not to exceed 2.79% of the share capital, or 12.5 million shares.

At the same meeting, the board also proposed a 50% pay-out target ratio for 2014, with a final gross dividend of of €0.70 per share from the 2014 reported profit to be submitted in June 2015.

An interim gross dividend of €0.32 per share was paid in January 2015.

Image from Tech City.

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Image from Tech City.

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