The management consultancy group Butler Cox Plc has flourished since its public listing last May (CI No 1,184), producing pre-tax profits up 43% to just over UKP1m on turnover that rose 23% to top the UKP9m mark. As a proportion of the group’s business, consultancy, which is largely UK-based, has crept up to 54% of revenues, with the Butler Cox Foundation contributing 38%, and the Productivity Enhancement Programme yielding 7% of turnover. The group’s managing director, George Cox, does not want to see consultancy providing more than 60% of its turnover, since in his opinion this would leave Butler Cox as little more than another UK consultancy. Hence the importance of the Butler Cox Foundation, a continuous programme designed to keep major organisations aware of the trends in information technology management. Over the year membership (at a subscription rate of UKP13,500) grew to 431 members from 380 members, and 60% of this growth came from outside the UK, with Germany, Australia and France heading the subscription list. The Productivity Enhancement Programme saw membership grow from 70 to 76. Subscriptions to this three-year old Programme went up by 34% during the year to UKP11,300, and, as a consequence, the Programme made a significant contribution to the group’s results for the first time. Revenue from outside the UK now accounts for 37% of the group’s total and is dominated by subscriptions to the Foundation. Butler Cox is actively pursuing a number of acquisitions. The first of these was the Cranfield IT Institute which was bought in February on an earnout basis and which, consequently, will remain an autonomous business unit until the end of 1991. Cox says he will be more than happy if Cranfield breaks even by the end of the year, as it is possible that it may make a small loss. Cox is also warning that the group’s next interims may show a halt in the group’s profitable growth. This is because Butler Cox argues that it needs time to get up to speed – over the past six months it has recruited six new managers and acquired Cranfield. As a relatively small company it says that it can’t manage growth at the bottom line in neat six monthly packages. It is, however, cash-rich with healthy capital reserves and Cox predicts a stronger second half performance. He added that no acquisitive approaches have been made since the flotation, and he sees no possibility of a hostile takeover.
