Ipsos posts first-half revenue of €837m

Double-digit growth was seen across all regions and disciplines, with Asia Pacific up 120% to €142.9m, EMEA up 50% to €371m and the Americas up 32% to €323m.

Advertising research grew 12% to €136.5m, marketing research up 69% to €427.6m, media research rising 39% to €86.4m and opinion and social research up 31.5% to €80.6m. CRM research delivered the best performance, up 78.3% to €105.8m.

Ipsos said it was not possible to calculate a first-half organic growth rate. Instead it compared this year’s financial results with the combined results for Ipsos and Synovate in the first six months of 2011. On this basis, revenue growth was just 0.6% year-on-year, while gross profit was up just 0.5% to €530.4m. Operating profit did improve 5.5% to €48.2m.

Ipsos bought Synovate in October and is still in the process of merging the two businesses, though it says “a big part of the plan” was completed between March and June. 85% of the team mergers have been made, Ipsos said, while half the 750 planned job cuts in back office staff have also gone through. As of 30 June, the group had 15,972 employees – 392 less than there was at 31 December. All in all, merger related expenses for the first half of 2012 totalled €12.7m.

At the same time, Ipsos spent €21.5m on acquisitions, in part to buy out minority interests in some emerging market companies but also to settle the deferred payment tied to the 2010 acquisition of OTX. The upfront payment was $60m; the deferred payment is $10.3m (€8.5m).

Pictured is Ipsos CEO Didier Truchot.