Defence contractor reports good start to the year

Published by

Nicky Godding

QinetiQ Group plc, the leading science and engineering company operating in the defence, security and critical infrastructure markets, has reported a good start to the year with strong operational performance across the Group.

The Group, which has major sites across the country including in Malvern, Pershore and Milton Park, Oxfordshire, reported revenue under contract 85 per cent up from 74 per cent in April 2019 and the company says it is on track to deliver mid-single digit revenue growth this year.

Overall revenue growth is stable, delivering continued operating profit progression excluding non-recurring trading items.

In EMEA Services, QinetiQ reported orders and revenue in the quarter ahead of the prior year at expected margins. This growth was driven by good performance across the division, particularly in our Cyber Information & Training business.

Its Global Products division has also performed well in the first quarter with orders, revenue and operating profit all ahead of the prior year, driven by good performance in all its core product businesses, particularly QinetiQ North America.

In the first quarter, the Group renegotiated a Long Term Partnering Agreement (LTPA) contract with the UK MOD, and the acquisitions of QinetiQ Germany and QinetiQ Target Systems. It continues to pursue strategy-led investments in further organic opportunities and complementary acquisitions to drive sustainable growth in the years ahead.

The Group secured a £19m, nine-year contract to modernise and deliver acoustic and electromagnetic signature measurement and analysis services. These services are critical to enhancing the operational advantage of Royal Navy warships and submarines by decreasing their chances of detection.

In June QinetiQ announced it had signed a new five year contract with the Royal Navy that will see the introduction of a dedicated training variant of QinetiQ’s Pointer system to optimise the effectiveness of Anti-Surface Warfare training on a wide range of weapon systems.

Developed in partnership with the MOD’s Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (DSTL), the Pointer data analytics and measurement system provides an effective link between the Command and Control function and weapon operators to counter threats from Fast In-shore Attack Craft (FIAC). The adoption of Pointer T in Flag Officer Sea Training (FOST) exercises for the Royal Navy will improve situational awareness and performance evaluation on a range of platforms, while also providing immediate and objective training assurance for all non-firing FP serials.

Nicky Godding

Nicky Godding is editor of The Business Magazine. Before her journalism career, she worked mainly in public relations moving into writing when she was invited to launch Retail Watch, a publication covering retail and real estate across Europe. After some years of constant travelling, she tucked away her passport and concentrated on business writing, co-founding a successful regional business magazine. She has interviewed some of the UK’s most successful entrepreneurs who have built multi-million-pound businesses and reported on many science and technology firsts. She reports on the region’s thriving business economy from start-ups, family businesses and multi-million-pound corporations, to the professionals that support their growth and the institutions that educate the next generation of business leaders.