CRT Group Plc bounced back from last year’s figures, which were hit by losses from discontinued activities (CI No 2,472). With no such worries this time, the Eastham, Wirral-based recruitment and training company reported annual pre-tax profits of ú6.0m, up from ú532,000 profits last time. There was a ú536,000 reorganisation charge this time, which arose from the acquisition of Software Personnel and the subsequent reshuffle in the group. Software Personnel Plc, the result of a merger between Software Personnel Ltd and the professional services division of System Resources, recently relocated to headquarters in Coventry (CI No 2,603) . The other part of the recruitment division, Link Recruitment Services, opened two new offices in the year, and the division now operates out of 17 centres. It placed 675 people in permanent employment in the year, up from 521 last time. Recruitment turnover was up 123% to ú47.5m and operating profits rose 145% to ú2.7m. The training division, made up of Link Training, Pitman Training and The Training Corporation saw its margins reduced slightly by the cost of establishing Link Northern Ireland, offering Link Multimedia Learning Centres in secondary schools. Pitman increased its number of centres training, or committed to training as Pitman from 18 to 57 this time. The Multimedia Publishing division was established in March 1994 to exploit the potential for CD-ROM-based training products. The division’s first title, appropriately enough, was an Introduction to Computing. It is now available in German, French and American-English, as well as its mother tongue. The second title is Easy Tutor Learn Windows95. The division made an operating loss of ú400,000 from turnover of ú600,000. The company believes that the financial performance will improve this time, but weighted towards the second half, due to the scheduling of product releases and investment in distribution programmes. Net cash was ú1.0m at the year-end. With orders up on last year, the directors are looking forward with cautious optimism, emphasising the group’s second half bias, further exacerbated by the multimedia division this time. The final dividend of 2.9 pence gives a total up by 15% at 3.75 pence.
