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Victoria Barnsley's first three months as chief executive of HarperCollins UK have proved to be a financial success, with sales up 16% and a 29% hike in operating profit.
The figures were released as HarperCollins' worldwide business reported sales of $337m (£225m) for the quarter to end-September 2000, up 17% on the same period in 1999. Operating profit rose by 56% to $50m (£33m). Operating margin improved from 11% to 15%.
Jane Friedman, HC president and chief executive, told The Bookseller: "We're delighted at how healthy the business is. If you have good books and you publish them keeping an eye on the bottom line and on marketing costs, you can achieve these kinds of results."
HC did not break out actual sales figures for the UK division. The latest results for HarperCollins Publishers, the UK-based company, suggest that it generated about 25% of overall turnover for the year to end-June 1999. Ms Barnsley declined to say whether the UK's contribution had increased.
The trade division, children's division, education division and Fourth Estate had all performed well, she added. "It's a very healthy ship. We're growing fast, and profits are going up. Obviously there will be changes, but I'm not making any announcement at the moment." Fourth Estate had not yet begun to sell into the US market using HC's distribution network.
Ms Barnsley said HC would honour all the contracts it had taken over when it agreed to buy 250 Element titles two weeks ago. Thorsons and Element would be run as a single division. "Whether we use the names for different types of publishing we haven't quite decided," she said.
HC UK this week announced that it had licensed 28 Element titles to Elemental Media for use in a new health and stress management service, Well at Work.
In the US general book group, adult books produced a 15% increase in sales and 158% increase in operating profit. Children's books showed 34% sales growth and 51% profit growth.
HarperCollins' distribution agreement with Scholastic had also proved fruitful in the US. Turnover from the distribution business, which included shipments of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, grew by 271%, while profits soared by 665%. Ms Friedman said HarperCollins was not looking to build "a parallel universe regarding distribution, here or anywhere".
Book publishing contributed 10% to the total sales of HC's parent company News Corp, up from 9% for the comparable period. News Corp sales grew by 3% to $3.2bn (£2m) and operating profit was up by 3% to $235m (£157m).