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Pinewood Technologies Group PLC on Wednesday expressed confidence in the scale of the market opportunity for the business, as it introduced an ‘ambitious’ medium-term earnings target. The Birmingham, England-based provider of software to the automotive retailing sector was break-even for the six months to June 30, down from pretax profit of £7.0 million a year earlier. On an underlying basis, pretax profit improved 10% to £4.4 million from £4.0 million. However, this was offset by a non-underlying loss before tax of £4.4 million, swung from £3.0 million profit, to leave the reported result at break-even. Pinewood said the non-underlying loss comprised a £1.3 million loss from its share of the result from the Pinewood North America LLC joint venture, one-off transaction-related costs of £1.7 million, and share-based payment costs of £1.4 million. Pinewood’s top line advanced 22% to £19.6 million from £16.1 million, with 86% of this recurring revenue. The company reported a net user churn of 0.3%, excluding Lithia, which it said reflects the ‘stickiness’ of the Pinewood.AI system. The company attributed the strong on-year growth to the onboarding of major new customers, as well as the increased spend across its existing customer base. In a statement, Chief Executive Bill Berman hailed the interim period as ‘another half of great progress for Pinewood.AI, delivering on our strategic objectives and positioning the business for continued accelerated growth.’ Looking ahead, the business said the the size of the available opportunity ‘remains vast’. Pinewood previously had been part of Pendragon before that car dealership chain decided to sell its UK motor and leasing operations, retaining the Pinewood software-as-a-service business. Pinewood guided underlying earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation for the full-year of between £15.5 million and £16.0 million. For the half year, this figure was £7.9 million, up 15% from £6.9 million. The company also introduced ‘ambitious’ medium-term guidance for financial 2028, targeting underlying Ebitda of £58 million to £62 million. Shares in the company were 9.5% lower at 479.00 pence on Wednesday morning in London. ‘Our strong year-on-year performance reflects the onboarding of major new customers and increased spend across our existing customer base. During the period, we launched a new modern user experience which landed well with customers, and we are fully integrating Seez’s impressive AI tools into the Pinewood Automotive Intelligence Platform. Taking full ownership of Pinewood North America and the contract signed with Lithia marked major achievements in our growth strategy for this key market. Preparations for the US roll-out continue at pace, and we remain on track to pilot the Pinewood Automotive Intelligence platform later this year,’ added Berman. ‘We are confident in the scale of the global opportunity in the market, and we are looking forward to delivering on this in the years ahead.’ Copyright 2025 Alliance News Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
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