Publisher Reed Elsevier saw an increase in revenues and operating profit last year aided by cost savings from the outsourcing of IT development and back office activities.

Reed Elsevier said outsourcing its IT work helped hold down costs, it was reported in computerworlduk.com, as systems engineering and maintenance and software development engineering were all outsourced, in addition to some back office processes.

"Good progress is being made in developing the next generation of legal research products, and the advanced back office infrastructure to support them, to deliver an integrated and superior customer experience across legal research, workflow tools, practice solutions and client development,” said the company in a statement.

The publisher revealed last week that its revenues for the year had grown 14 per cent to £6,071m, while operating profit had also increased 14 per cent to £1,570m.