With gains in all three of its operating divisions, John Wiley reported this morning that total revenue for the year ended April 30 rose 5% to $1.70 billion, while net income increased 12% to $143.5 million. Excluding currency fluctuations, revenue rose 4% in the year. In a statement, Wiley CEO Will Pesce said the company’s fiscal 2010 performance “is a compelling story about the quality of our content and its value to our customers; effective execution of Wiley’s digital strategy and business models; and the strength of our company’s culture.”
The revenue gains were led by the higher education division which had a 18% sales increase, to $282.4 million. The professional/trade segment posted a 7% sales increase, to $430 million, and its largest group, scientific/technical/medical/scholarly, had a 2% increase, to $986.7 million. Digitization played a role in improving results in each segment. In the higher education group, nearly 30% of sales in the U.S. came from products other than traditional textbooks, and digital revenue and manufacturing resulted in gross margin improvements, the company said. Digital highlights in the higher education segment included sales of$61 million from e-books, digital content, WileyPLUS (which had revenues of $31 million), CustomSelect, and binder editions. The group also has strong frontlist sales and higher sales to community colleges and for-profit universities.
In professional/trade, e-book sales rose 93%, to $7 million (1.6% of P/T revenue); Wiley has 11,000 titles available for the Kindle and has signed a deal with Apple. Wiley’s best performing category was consumer which had a 15% sales gain led by the cooking segment a GMAC agreement. Sales in the psychology segment grew 14, and also rose in business (4%), technology (4%), and education (6%). Sales fell 6% in architecture. Advertising on clifffsnotes .com rose 28% in the year.
In the STMS segment, higher revenue from rights, individual articles and the Cochrane Library offset lower sales from advertising, journal subscriptions and individual member subscriptions. During the year, online book revenue rose 44%, to$6 million, as more library customers buy digital books individually or through subscriptions. Late in July, Wiley will replace Wiley InterScience with the Wiley Online Library which will provide access to over 4 million articles.
Looking at fiscal 2011, Wiley expects mid-single-digit revenue growth (excluding the effect of foreign exchange) and a 10% increase in earnings per share
