While investors in Rebus Group Plc have seen their shares comfortably outperform the market since it was spun out of insurance brokers CE Heath Plc in April 1996, the company has never enjoyed the same exalted rating of high-flyers in the sector. In fact, the first year as a public company was bound to be a difficult slog as it sought to define its role as an independent organization. Now that work is starting to pay off with revenues up 32 percent to 87.7m pounds and margins fattening to boost net income by 47.5% to 5.3m pounds. What is impressive is that a company with roots in human resources and the insurance industry has diversified with a range of products tailored for particular sectors. It has four divisions aimed at specific markets – human resources, insurance, local government and media – plus a computer services division to provide the others with a range of IT services. The Rebus philosophy is to adapt third party software for the markets it services. It has great hopes for the media division which has cut its development losses from 1.6m pounds to 0.39m pounds with contract wins from three UK TV companies and should be making a profit in the current financial year. Only 10% of revenues currently come from overseas and this is an area where expansion can be expected.
