A loss of £7.6m (€8.7m/$9.5m) for 2018 has been posted by Genius Sports Group despite also reporting a 23.9 per cent year-on-year rise in revenue for the 12-month period.
Revenue for the year had ended December 31, 2018 and amounted to a total of £65.8m, up from £53.1m in the previous year.
Genius experienced a significant grow in the rest of world business, with revenue up from £20m to £31.3m. UK revenue has also increased from £6.1m to £7.3m. The rest of Europe’s revenue has increased slightly from £26.9m to £27.2m.
However, Genius have also noted an increase in expenses for the year, with the cost of sales rising from 52.4 per cent from £18.4m to £28.0m and administrative expenses up from £23.3m to £29.5m.
Higher staffing costs have particularly hit Genius, with this jumping from £22.3m to £29.7m as the business increased its employee headcount from 669 to 901 in the year.
The increased costs pushed Genius from an operating profit of £5.9m in 2017 to an operating loss of £4.2m for the full year, while loss before tax amounted to £5.8m, compared to a profit of £4.2m. The losses for the full year stood at £7.6m, down from a profit of £4.8m in 2017.
Reported earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation have slipped from £11.3m to £8.4m, with total comprehensive income for year coming in at negative £7.6m, compared to a positive figure of £5.3m last year.
After analysing the results, Regulus Partners said that Genius’s historical pattern of growing revenue at the expense of profitability also need to be transformed in order to deliver sustainable potential.
Regulus have noted two significant events for Genius in the past year, which have included the acquisition of a controlling stake by Apax in the third quarter, which Regulus said will improve firepower and discipline.
Analysts at Regulus also highlighted Genius’s acquisition of English and Scottish football official betting data from what is now Stats Perform, saying that this is “transformational to Genius and potentially transformational to the betting as well as sports rights sectors”.
