RWS Holdings plc reported sales results for the second half and for the full year ended 30 September 2015. Following a flat sales performance in the first six months on a constant currency basis, with reported sales of £45.4 million, the company significantly recovered in the second six months with sales up almost 10% sequentially to £49.7 million against £46.7 million for the second half of 2014.

Sales for the full year were £95.1 million, representing an increase of 2% over £93.6 million for 2014 or a 5% increase on a constant currency basis. This performance reflects further organic growth across the Group with good results from the core patent translation activities, which benefitted from the conversion to sales of clients won in earlier periods, and a spike in patent applications arising from the 2011 America Invents Act; from growth in the subscriptions for the high margin PatBase database (+8%); and from a return to growth in inovia (+5%).

The company provided financial guidance for fiscal 2015 and 2016. The company announced that adjusted profit before tax (before amortisation of intangibles and share option costs) is estimated to be approximately £22.5 million, ahead of the prior year. The RWS balance sheet shows further strength with shareholder funds in excess of £85 million and net cash of approximately £30 million. The directors anticipate that this strong balance sheet will underpin the Group's acquisition strategy and its progressive dividend policy, with the final dividend payable to shareholders in February 2016. The company expects the current financial year to benefit from increasing sales from previous client wins, a healthy pipeline of new client opportunities and further benefits accruing from the full integration of inovia, which has now been completed.

The company is seeing an active pipeline of acquisition opportunities and therefore expect to use the strong balance sheet to good effect in the new financial year 2016.