John Wiley reports Q1 2027 Research growth, reaffirms guidance

John Wiley & Sons (NYSE: WLY ) reported first-quarter financial results on Thursday.

The transcript from the company's first-quarter earnings call has been provided below.

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For comprehensive financial data and transcripts, visit Access the full call at Summary John Wiley & Sons reported a 12% increase in Research publishing revenue for Q1, driven by strong global demand and contributions from the Emerald acquisition and AI initiatives.

AI revenue reached $14 million, with a further $14 million contracted for Q2 and Q3, aligning with the company's goal of over $50 million in AI revenue for fiscal 2027.

Adjusted EBITDA margin for Research increased by 130 basis points to 29.6%, despite a 4% decline in overall adjusted EBITDA due to prior-year AI licensing revenue comparisons and soft market conditions in Learning.

Integration of Emerald Publishing is progressing ahead of schedule, with expected synergy benefits in the coming years.

The company reaffirmed its full-year guidance, expecting mid-single-digit organic revenue growth, adjusted EPS between $4.60 and $5.05, and free cash flow of $205 million.

John Wiley & Sons announced significant partnerships, including with the U.S.

Department of Energy and CUSP AI, to advance AI and data analytics growth.

The Learning segment faced a 20% revenue decline due to prior-year comparisons and current market softness, particularly in the Professional segment.

Full Transcript OPERATOR Good evening and welcome to John Wiley & Sons' first quarter and fiscal 2027 earnings call.

As a reminder, this conference is being recorded.

After today's prepared remarks, we will host a question-and-answer session.

If you would like to ask a question, please press star one to raise your hand.

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At this time, I'd like to introduce John Wiley & Sons' Vice President of Investor Relations, Brian Campbell.

Please go ahead.

Brian Campbell, Vice President of Investor Relations Good morning, everyone.

I'm joined today by Matt Kissner, President and CEO, and Craig Albright, Executive Vice President and CFO.

Our comments and responses reflect management views as of today and will include forward-looking statements.

Actual results may differ materially from those statements.

The company does not undertake any obligation to update them to reflect subsequent events.

Also, John Wiley & Sons provides non-GAAP measures as a supplement to evaluate underlying operating profitability and performance trends.

These measures do not have standardized meanings prescribed by U.S.

GAAP and therefore may not be comparable to similar measures used by other companies, nor should they be viewed as alternatives to measures under GAAP.

We'll refer to non-GAAP metrics on the call and variances are on a year-over-year basis and will exclude the impact of currency.

Additional information is included in our filings with the SEC.

A copy of this presentation and transcript will be available at investors.wiley.com.

I'll turn the call over to Matt Kissner.

Matthew Kissner, President and CEO Thank you, Brian, and hello, everyone.

Welcome to our Q1 earnings call.

If fiscal ’26 was our breakout, then this is the year we build on that momentum and scale our new revenue streams.

Q1 played out as we expected.

Strong momentum in our Research and AI growth engines was offset by a prior-year AI comparison, which we previously mentioned, and continued soft market conditions in Learning.

Recall that Q1 is our seasonally smallest period, so our year-over-year comparisons carry some noise.