Technical recruiter Matchtech saw strong results for the year ended 31 July 2012 – with revenue, net fee income (NFI) and profit before tax all growing by over 20% – as the core sectors it suppliers are the ones “powering the economy”, chief financial officer Tony Dyer tells Recruiter.

The company specialises in engineering, construction, science, medical and IT jobs through its main Matchtech UK brand, which made up fractionally less than 90% of group revenues, alongside a small Matchtech Germany operation (less than 1%), professional services brands Barclay Meade and Alderwood (6%) and managed services business elemense (3%).

Financial highlights:

• Revenue of £371.4m, up 23% on 2011

• NFI £36.1m, up 21%

• Profit before tax £8m, up 25%

• Contract to permanent fees mix 68:32%, the same as 2011

• Profit increases in three Matchtech UK segments (engineering, information systems & technology and science & medical), but dropping in built environment

• Loss before tax reduces significantly in professional services and elemense, but increases in Germany

• Revenues rise 20% and 73% in professional services and Germany, drop slightly in elemense.

UK clients of Matchtech are split into two broad groups, says Dyer: clients with global demand for products and services, such as the fast-expanding auto maker Jaguar Land Rover, and clients on major long-term infrastructure and other large projects.

On the professional services side, he says that the company supplies to over 300 SMEs and is focused on taking marketshare, where there are “higher margins” compared to if they try to provide professionals to Matchtech UK clients, saying: “There is cross-selling [between professional services and tech services] there, but one of the problem you have with that is you have framework agreements and they want accountants at 6%.”

Dyer also tells Recruiter that Matchtech supplied to 25 different countries last year from its UK operations, saying that supporting UK clients with overseas operations is a strategic aim moving forward, rather than setting up overseas and creating “lots of costly small offices that don’t generate returns”.

However, the company has entered into a partnership agreement with a Chinese recruitment company.

Matchtech Germany is creating extra revenues, despite losing money last year. “It’s about scaling up that operation because we probably started it a bit tentatively,” Dyer says. “We thought we could drop the UK contract model into Germany and they’d love it… it’s been a bit different.”

• For more on the recruitment market in Germany, including comment from engineering firm Atkins’ aerospace HR manager for mainland Europe, see Recruiter’s Global Spotlight from the July edition of the magazine.