Beyond International has announced its full year financial results for 2017, reporting a drop in operating revenue to $86.3m.
Beyond Productions experienced an increase in the number of projects in production. During the 2017 financial year, 137 hours of television commenced production, including 60 hours commissioned by US broadcasters.
Key projects include returning series Deadly Women series and Mythbusters with new hosts, both now in season 11, as well as Beat Bugs and The White Rabbit Project, commissioned by Netflix.
Revenue for Beyond’s Home Entertainment division (BHE) was impacted by a move to consignment trading. As a consequence, BHE recorded a loss of $8.1m in the fiscal 2017 year compared to EBIT of $1.5m in the 2016 year. With the transition to consignment trading now fully completed, BHE is placed to return to profitability in the 2018 fiscal year.
The company’s distribution business and film division, Beyond Distribution, reported a reduction in revenue of $3.9m to $21.9m compared to the corresponding 2016 period.
Beyond Distribution has reported a strong lineup of new releases is planned for the 2018 financial year, including Netflix animated series Beat Bugs, a continuing expansion of the Love It Or List It franchise, new series of Highway Thru Hell and Heavy Rescue: 401 and the return of the Mythbusters series.
Full year revenues for the digital division, BeyondD were $10.5m, down on last year’s total of $12.5m, while 7Beyond, the company’s joint venture with Seven in Australia, has a slate of projects in development and is actively working with US broadcasters to develop and produce new programs for the US market.
Together with a number of impairment charges, the impact of the result in Home Entertainment has meant that the group has reported a loss before interest and income tax of $8.2m.
Mikael Borglund, chief executive officer and MD of Beyond International, commented:
“While overall operating revenue decreased, the company’s EBIT before non-recurring adjustments was $1.8m. The change in trading terms that impacted the Home Entertainment business this year brings BHE in line with the trading terms of most other major DVD distributors in Australia.
“With this one-off adjustment the company has taken a conservative approach by booking the 100% of the stock buy back in the 2017 accounts – even though the stock buy back takes place over the next 12 months. We expect the BHE business will be profitable and cash flow positive in the 2018 financial year. Over the next 12 months the company’s focus will be to further strengthen the financial performance in all operating segments of the group to generate surplus cash to invest in working capital and new content. The focus will be on organic growth in the production and distribution business segments.”