Thomson Reuters Corp. TRI-T reported higher second-quarter revenue that matched analysts’ estimates as the content and software company launched more advanced artificial intelligence tools for legal, tax and accounting customers.
The Toronto-based company’s revenue rose 3 per cent to US$1.79-billion in the quarter that ended June 30, compared with a year earlier. Leaving aside the effects of foreign currency and deals to buy and sell assets, revenue increased 7 per cent year over year.
Thomson Reuters has been rolling out new products that use “agentic” AI assistants, which are systems that can complete complex tasks with multiple steps and make decisions with fewer prompts from human users such as lawyers or accountants.
On Tuesday, Thomson Reuters launched an AI assistant with new features, called CoCounsel Legal, which the company says is able to do deeper research and to complete tasks with multiple steps, such as drafting legal complaints or company policies.
The company has also been testing a tax and accounting product to release later this year with AI that could fill out an entire first version of a tax return without any human intervention.
Much of the boost to revenue that Thomson Reuters expects from the new products, which come with price increases, is yet to come.
Clients such as law firms and accounting practices are in the early stages of testing the new tools with pilot projects, and about 20 to 30 per cent of legal customers are “moving very aggressively” to adopt the latest AI products, chief executive Steve Hasker said in an interview.
“It’s probably a little early to characterize this as fully up and running, fully operational. I think there’s still a lot of learning to do,” he said. “But the feedback we get, particularly in the last little while in relation to our innovations is really positive.”
The market for AI-based products to help lawyers is highly competitive, with about 70 legal AI assistants now on the market. Thomson Reuters is hoping to gain an edge by embedding those tools with its deep library of legal research content in a single product.
“We are the only player who has cracked that code,” Mr. Hasker said.
Thomson Reuters earned US$313-million, or 69 US cents per share, in the second quarter. That compared with US$841-million, or US$1.86 per share, in the same quarter last year, when Thomson Reuters recognized a large tax benefit.
Adjusted to exclude certain items, Thomson Reuters said it earned 87 US cents per share, which beat the 82 cents per share analysts expected, according to the London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG).
Woodbridge Co. Ltd., the Thomson family holding company and controlling shareholder of Thomson Reuters, also owns The Globe and Mail.
The impact of uncertainty over tariffs and economic growth has had only muted impact on Thomson Reuters, which gets 82 per cent of its revenue from recurring, multi-year contracts with customers.
Those recurring revenues increased by 3 per cent year over year and are expected to “remain healthy,” chief financial officer Mike Eastwood said in an interview. New sales in the first half of the year were “very encouraging.”
Thomson Reuters kept its key revenue and profit targets for the year unchanged, reaffirming that it expects revenue excluding currency and the sale of assets to rise by 7 to 7.5 per cent this year.
Revenue from the company’s legal division, which is its largest, fell 3 per cent to US$709-million because of foregone revenue from the sale of its FindLaw business. Excluding the effects of that deal and foreign currency, legal revenue rose 8 per cent.
Revenue from corporate customers increased 7 per cent to US$472-million, and tax and accounting revenue climbed 11 per cent to US$277-million.
The Reuters News division reported a 5-per-cent increase in revenue, partly from a scheduled increase to the price of a key contract with LSEG.