Experian 2016 Annual Report Download - page 26

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“ Experian made excellent progress over the past year. We
returned to organic growth in our target range, a key performance
indicator, and delivered on our strategic priorities to create strong
shareholder value and build an even more successful business in
the years to come. We have again raised our full year dividend,
by 2% to 40.00 US cents per share, reflecting the underlying
strength of our business.”
Introduction
Chairman’s statement
Strong strategic progress
Led by our Chief Executive Officer Brian
Cassin, the Group executed strongly
against our strategic priorities, seeing
us deliver improving growth momentum.
We grew in every region, with particular
strength in key parts of our business,
such as Credit Services and Decision
Analytics. We invested in a number of
exciting high-quality opportunities, which
are making a real difference. From USA
healthcare to fraud prevention to software
and analytics, the contributions from our
growth investments are meaningful and
are helping us build an even better, even
stronger company. While concentrating
our resources and focusing our efforts,
we also exited some activities considered
to be non-core during the year.
At the heart of our strategy is the belief
that by unlocking the power of data we
can help people and organisations to
realise opportunities and transform lives.
Throughout this Annual Report, you can
read examples of our breakthroughs in
data and analytics as we further unlock
this potential.
For example, in our consumer credit
bureau heartland we are taking steps
to put consumers’ emerging needs at
the very heart of what we do. We are
finding new ways to expand the credit
universe for millions of people worldwide
whose current credit profiles are often
too thin for them to qualify for credit.
In North America, experts in our Data
Lab are exploring how alternative data
sources – such as prepaid credit card
data – can support lending decisions,
while extending the scale and reach of
our bureaux.
Meanwhile in business information, we
are successfully globalising the services
we offer to businesses of all sizes. Our
Global Data Network helps small to
medium sized enterprises to trade with
confidence outside of their domestic
markets, and we want to double our
geographic coverage by 2018.
In Consumer Services, I am pleased
to report that our efforts to return the
North America business to growth
are taking effect. Over the past year
we have delivered on a strategy that
has re-shaped the business, including
how we engage with consumers. In the
UK, we are responding to an evolving
market by broadening our Consumer
Services product range and diversifying
our sources of revenue. For example,
we secured wins from clients who are
now providing Experian scores on their
customers’ account statements. We
are looking forward to launching new
services that will broaden our product
range and further strengthen consumer
relationships, a prospect made even more
compelling by a definitive agreement
to acquire CSIdentity Corporation
announced in April 2016.
USA healthcare is one of our fastest
growing vertical markets. We delivered
another outstanding performance,
introducing innovative products to help
hospitals and physicians improve their
payments cycle while also helping them
to prevent fraud. We were honoured
to again receive the industry’s ‘best in
class’ accolade, which reflects our strong
leadership position and our people’s efforts.
Our Decision Analytics business helps
our clients make sense of vast quantities
of data, by transforming it into actionable
information. We use analytics to help our
clients make decisions on hundreds of
millions of credit applications every year.
This includes checking that applicants
are who they say they are, through to
preventing fraud. It is these unique
capabilities that give us an important
competitive advantage. An excellent
example of this in action is in Asia
Pacific, where our identity and fraud
solutions strategy is going from strength
to strength. One of the many high points
during the year saw us announce that
China’s e-commerce giant, JD.com, will
be using our software and technology to
combat online fraud.
Don Robert Chairman
Strategic report •Chairman’s statement