Pearson sees pick-up in growth driven by AI-powered learning

By Paul Sandle

LONDON (Reuters) -British education company Pearson said it expected growth to step up in the second half, boosted by its roll-out of AI after it reported a 2% rise in both underlying sales and adjusted operating profit for the six months to end-June.

"We are making rapid progress with bringing AI-powered products to market and are scaling and enhancing our enterprise business with a range of new partnerships and deals," Chief Executive Omar Abbosh said on Friday.

Pearson is rolling out AI across its products after introducing it in higher education two years ago.

Abbosh said the impact of the technology for students, both anecdotally and measured scientifically, was extremely positive.

"We've been able to show that across the 2 million students using our higher education tools in the last few months are achieving higher orders of reasoning and better cognitive outcomes because of the way that AI is being used in their flow of study," he said in an interview.

The company, which had expected low single-digit underlying sales growth for the six-month period, reported sales of 1.72 billion pounds ($2.26 billion) and adjusted operating profit of 242 million pounds.

It said it was on track to meet expectations for 2025, based on a January consensus for underlying sales to rise 4.4% and adjusted operating profit to come in at around 611 million pounds, adjusted for current exchange rates.

Shares in Pearson traded up 4.2% in early deals. The stock is down 17% in the last six months, underperforming Britain's bluechip index which has risen 5%.

($1 = 0.7598 pounds)

(Reporting by Paul Sandle; editing by Sarah Young)