Pearson’s digital restructuring yields sales growth

Pearson’s painful restructuring should stabilise the eduction group this year, as it reported underlying sales growth for the first time in six years.

Revenue grew 2 per cent  to £1.83bn across the company’s three main geographical divisions in the six months to June 30.

Although the figure represents a 2 per cent drop, following disposals such as the $250m sale this year of its K12 courseware business.

The company’ share rose 8 per cent after the announcement before stabilising up 5 per cent  in late London trading.

John Fallon, CEO said the results reflected the group0’s shifting focus from renewal and reform to future growth after a long period of restructuring.

As part of the move away from printed textbooks to digital publishing, Pearson plans to launch an artificial intelligence-powered app for students studying introductory Calculus, which will allow handwrite exercises , scan themselves and receive personalised computer-generated marks and feedback within five seconds.

The company announced this year it would only print new edition of only 100 of its 1, 500 university-level books next year compared with 500 last year.

Pearson has been focusing on online testing including a contract agreed with Egypt for digital assessment.

Adjusted operating profit was up 35 per cent arg £144m in the first six months of the year, accounting for restricting charges and lower profit on disposal of business, that figure dropped 84 per cent to £37m from the year before.