PA Media Group has grown its revenues every year since 2016 helped by a series of acquisitions.
Newly-filed accounts show PA Media Group revenues were up 6% year-on-year in 2023 to £112.1m – almost double where it was ten years ago.
Almost three-quarters (73%) comes from the UK and Ireland versus 86% five years ago.
Profits were also up: pre-tax profits grew 65% to £5.5m while operating profit rose 53% to £8.3m.
The accounts state there was “growth across each of the group’s core business units”.
Press Gazette understands the growth was driven by live sport streaming technology company Stream AMG, stock photography agency Alamy, and PA Betting services, which provides horse and greyhound racing data, news briefings and content solutions.
The accounts also state that last year the group “continued to invest to grow, with a focus on technology, products and people” as well as “maintained its strategy of delivering growth through revenue diversification”.
A "significant portion" of PA's revenue is generated through recurring subscription arrangements with publishers paying to use its content (which includes the news wire, sports wire, features ond puzzles), or through sporting rights licences. The Press Association news agency has been running for 156 years.
In recent years PA has further expanded the group through a series of acquisitions. They have included:
- Content marketing agency Sticky (initially 80% of the business in 2013 and then the remaining stake in 2016)
- StreamAMG in 2017
- Alamy in 2020
- Social media agency Hydrogen in 2022
- 85% of the share capital of Singapore-based Asian racing data specialist iRace Media in October 2023
PA Media Group also runs PA Training and Globelynx (a company which connects experts with broadcasters and also provides camera and broadcasting technology).
The business now describes itself as a "market-leading, diversified news information and services business with the news agency at its core".
It said it will "protect the news agency through continuing to diversify and grow revenues from outside of the traditional media market, capitalise on market opportunities through services and product innovation, identify acquisitions that are value enhancing and complementary to our existing businesses, and deliver continuous shareholder value".
In 2023 PA Media started a fact-checking service which formally launched this year ahead of the UK general election and its new live video service became fully operational. It also experimented with AI with a focus on "identifying options for efficiencies and for developing new services and products".
In 2024 so far PA Media Group has also seen major leadership changes. Emily Shelley, formerly managing director of Alamy which PA bought in 2020, was appointed as chief executive to succeed Clive Marshall who held the role for 14 years. Months later Pete Clifton and he would step down as PA Media editor-in-chief after ten years and Evening Standard managing editor Jack Lefley was named his successor.
Lefley said he will take PA "forward into a new era. That’ll mean accelerating digital transformation, maintaining the exemplary editorial standards that define PA, growing the outstanding video services and making the best use of data in our decision making".
Average staff numbers in 2023 were 992, up 4%, and staff costs were up 8% to £51.5m.
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