Hyve Group PLC on Thursday said it has seen a strong start to financial 2022, with events largely going ahead as planned.
The London-based events organiser reported that trading in the first fourth months of its financial year ending September 30 was ‘resilient’, with a strong like-for-like customer spend, forward bookings and cash collection.
Despite continuing disruption to the events industry from Covid-19, the majority of Hyve’s global events in the period ran to schedule. A highlight included the top 10 event YugAgro in Russia, an agricultural tradeshow that outperformed its pre-pandemic comparative of 2019.
However, government restrictions in China saw two of Hyve’s four events in the country cancelled and one postponed. Its Bett education show event in the UK was postponed from January to March, and Paperex, a paper industry exhibition in India, also was postponed by five months.
Hyve said the integration of its acquisition of mining event company 121 Group Ltd was proceeding as planned.
Hyve noted uncertainty around new Covid variants and the political tensions in Russia and Ukraine continue, but it has contingency plans in place.
Hybe Chief Executive Officer Mark Shashoua said: ‘Hyve has started 2022 with strong trading, forward booking and cash collection. We were pleased to see the relaxation of travel restrictions in some of our key markets and are encouraged by the limited impact of Omicron on our events schedule...We are confident in the continuing recovery of our portfolio, have a strong liquidity position and remain focused on accelerating our omnichannel strategy.’
Hyve’s share price dropped 2.6% to 99.39 pence each in London on Thursday near midday.
The events company also announced changes to its board.
Nick Backhouse will take on the role of senior independent director. Backhouse has been a non-executive director at Hyve since 2019, and the chair of the audit committee since 2020. He also is senior independent director of Hollywood Bowl Group PLC and Loungers PLC, both London listings.
Backhouse is replacing Hyve’s current non-executive senior independent director Stephen Puckett, who is leaving the board following the annual general meeting on Thursday.
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