VNU Credits Expositions With Driving Income

Growth at VNU Expositions helped lift revenue at the parent company's business information unit during the first half of this year, but the unit still posted a sales decline due to softness in trade magazine advertising.

VNU's business information unit reported first-half revenue of €315 million ($386.2 million), down from revenue of €348 million ($426.6 million) in the first half of 2003. The unit declared operating income of €51 million ($62.5 million), compared with €60 million ($73.6 million) in the first six months of last year.

The Dutch media giant blamed magazine advertising revenue declines, particularly in the music, and food and beverage categories.

Company officials said its tradeshows, the majority of which are held in the United States, continued to grow, driven by the launch of new shows and the organic growth of existing shows. The revenue performance, combined with cost cuts, led to profit margin increases of 16.2 percent, compared with 17.2 percent in the first half of 2003.

The expositions unit, which produces more than 50 trade-shows per year, generated about 34 percent of the group's total revenue and 86 percent of the group's operating income. "If I start with the most important part, tradeshows yet again continued a strong performance and they grew organically," VNU CFO Frans Cremers told analysts during the company's conference call.

During the second half of 2004, VNU expects advertising revenue declines to taper off in both Europe and the United States.

Meanwhile, TechTarget, a producer of Web sites, e-newsletters and invitation-only conferences, continued to report swelling revenues. The privately held company claimed that sales in the second quarter increased 54 percent from the year-ago quarter.