GESCO confirms full-year guidance after nine-month period

15.02.2013

- Business activities remain at a high level
- Order backlog of around € 200 million at the end of December
- Full-year outlook confirmed
- Changes in the Supervisory Board at the Annual General Meeting 2013

 

Wuppertal, 15 February 2013 – GESCO Group’s economic performance in the first nine months of financial year 2012/2013 (1 April 2012 to 31 March 2013) testified to robust customer demand. In addition, the Group has been expanded since the beginning of the financial year with the acquisition of three companies, while one company has been sold. While individual subsidiaries recorded marked incoming order declines over the course of the financial year, others profited from continued strong demand. All told, developments for financial year 2012/2013 met the announced guidance expectations presented at the accounts press conference on 28 June 2012.

At € 337.1 million, incoming orders in the first nine months were exactly on par with the figure in the previous year’s period. Slight order income declines at existing companies were offset by changes in the scope of consolidation. At € 335.0 million, Group sales were up 8.3 % on the previous year’s figure of € 309.2 million. Roughly half of this increase is due to organic growth, with around half as a result of the changes in the scope of consolidation. Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) came to € 40.8 million, up 7.1 % year on year (previous year’s period: € 38.1 million). Depreciation rose by a disproportion rate from € 8.7 million to € 10.7 million due to the effects from the first-time consolidation of the new companies. As a result, earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) grew by 2.5 % in the nine-month period, not as strongly as EBITDA, and came to € 30.1 million (€ 29.4 million).

At € 16.9 million, Group net income after minority interest was down slightly on the previous year’s figure (€ 17.4 million), which included a positive one-off effect from legal disputes totalling € 0.7 million. The number of shares rose by almost 10 % as a result of the capital increase conducted in February 2012; earnings per share pursuant to IFRS amounted to € 5.12 (€ 5.77).

The nine-month interim report comprises the months of April to December at GESCO AG and the subsidiaries’ operating business from January to September. In the following fourth quarter, the months October to December in the case of the subsidiaries, according to preliminary figures Group incoming orders amounted to approximately € 100 million (€ 101.9 million) with sales slightly topping € 100 million (€ 106.2 million). At the end of the fourth quarter, order backlog amounted to approximately € 200 million.

Based on the information available at this time, the company confirms the latest guidance for Group sales of around € 438 million as well as the guidance for Group net income for the year after minority interest of € 20.5 million and earnings per share pursuant to IFRS of € 6.17.

The Supervisory Board of GESCO AG was appointed by the Annual General Meeting in 2010, meaning that its term will end at the Annual General Meeting in 2015. When standing for election in 2010, Supervisory Board members Willi Back and Rolf-Peter Rosenthal both declared that they would not be standing for re-election in 2015 due to their age. Entrepreneur Stefan Heimöller, the largest single GESCO AG shareholder who holds more than 13 % of the shares, announced at the Annual General Meeting in 2011 that he would consider standing for a position on the Supervisory Board at a later time. As Willi Back epitomises the entrepreneurial component of the Supervisory Board with his many years of operational experience, his successor would be entrepreneur Stefan Heimöller. The company would suffer a sudden loss of expertise were Willi Back and Rolf-Peter Rosenthal – both of whom have played a decisive role in shaping GESCO AG for many years – to step down from the Supervisory Board at the same time. As a result, following discussions within the Supervisory Board together with Stefan Heimöller, it was concluded that Willi Back would stand down at the Annual General Meeting in 2013, with Stefan Heimöller then standing for election. This would smooth the expertise transition of the Supervisory Board. Klaus Möllerfriedrich, the founder of GESCO AG and the long-serving Chairman of the Supervisory Board, intends to stand for re-election to the Supervisory Board in 2015.

Full Interim Report