Pre-Close Update

Informa PLC 19 July 2006 19 July 2006 Informa plc Pre-close update for the six months ended 30 June 2006 Informa plc, the leading global information specialist, issues the following update for the six months ended 30 June 2006, prior to entering its close period. The interim results will be announced on 26 September 2006. The Group has performed well in the first half of the year and is currently trading comfortably in line with the Board's expectations. Informa's position of broad geographic strength combined with deep-seated local knowledge continues to deliver results. The range of international and national products and services creates a balanced portfolio with diverse and complementary revenue characteristics. Informa's ability to capture growth quickly during periods of positive market conditions is highlighted by the first half year performance of its Dubai-based Middle East business. Middle East revenues which are largely events related, are enjoying strong organic growth both from increasing the size of existing events and adding new ones. Delegate registrations there are currently 37% ahead of last year and flag ship multi-million dollar events such as Arab Health (www.arabhealthonline.com) and Middle East Electricity (www.middleeastelectricity.com) have significantly outperformed 2005. The pooling of events best practice from both IIR and Informa to create a proprietary blue print for operational success in the training and conference sector, provides a solid foundation for Informa to build these revenue streams. This organic growth is driven both geographically as evidenced by Dubai and by sector, such as Telecoms, which has also performed strongly in the half year. The Performance Improvement group of companies, Informa's newest revenue stream, is demonstrating that in addition to its durable qualities it can deliver strong growth. Forum (www.forum.com) for example, had its best performing month this May since its acquisition by IIR in 2003. Existing clients in the commercial sector such as American Express and Irving Oil continue to launch new engagements. In addition, assisted by sister company Robbins-Gioia, Forum is expanding its large government initiatives, such as Department for Homeland Security, a multi million dollar engagement. Informa's subscription-driven publishing businesses, which have minimal advertising dependency, have started the year well. Books have recovered strongly from a softer 2005 for the market as a whole and the Humanities and Social Sciences (HHS) Journals in particular continue to benefit on both sides of the Atlantic from their market leading positions and the growth in HSS research. The net effect of foreign exchange fluctuations in the Group's results in the six months has been minimal, despite the volatility of the dollar in the period. Matching costs to revenues across geographies, and spreading debt between sterling, euros and dollars, confines the effect of currency fluctuation to profit translation only. Peter Rigby, Informa's CEO, notes 'Our strategy to assemble and develop a combination of specialist, high quality information businesses with diverse but complementary revenue characteristics, from the very dynamic to the strongly resilient is working well. Events, Performance Improvement and Publishing are all delivering the organic growth we targeted. We move into the second half confident of another good financial performance in 2006.' ENDS For further information please contact: Enquiries: Informa plc 020 7017 5000 Peter Rigby, Chief Executive Tony Foye, Finance Director Susanna Kempe, Chief Marketing Officer Financial Dynamics 020 7831 3113 Tim Spratt/Charlie Palmer This information is provided by RNS The company news service from the London Stock Exchange

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