Deliveries to drive press maker to big second half

Aug 21, 2018 at 07:42 pm by Staff


Koenig & Bauer is set for a strong second half following a 17.2 per cent rise in orders and a greater accumulation of deliveries.

The group says that with orders reaching a "particularly high" 454.4 million Euros in the second quarter and the order backlog rising to 805.8 million Euros at the end of the first half, it is on track to meet its targets for 2018.

Strong security business and more orders in packaging printing drove the order increase to 705.3 million Euros. Group revenue came to 514.4 million Euros but fell short of the previous year's figure, also reflected in EBIT which at 10.6 million Euros was lower than in 2017.

President and chief executive Claus Bolza-Schünemann says substantial growth was achieved in large-format cardboard printing but despite encouraging growth in new business in flexible packaging, orders in the Digital & Web division (84.7 million Euros) were slightly down because of reduced orders for newspaper web presses and services. Market-entry costs for corrugated and flexible packaging were also a factor in reducing EBIT.

Driven by large orders in security printing and growth in marking and coding, order intake in the Special segment rose by 52.8 per cent to 330.6 million Euros.

The management board expects to achieve organic growth of around four per cent in group revenue in 2018, and an EBIT margin of around seven per cent.

Medium-term goals to 2021 see organic revenue growth of around four per cent per annum and an EBIT margin of between four per cent and nine per cent by 2021, "depending on global economy, end markets and the necessary investments in growth".

Bolza-Schünemann says a strong focus corrugated board and flexible packaging will help boost revenue and profitability as well as the stability of the business.

Pictured: The Ipress 106 K PRO flatbed die-cutter - which uses the same feeder as Rapida sheetfed presses - had its global premiere

Sections: Print business

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