DGAP-News

Vossloh Aktiengesellschaft: Vossloh with a very good start in the 2021 fiscal year, sales and operating profitability well above the previous year - Seite 3

Customized Modules division
The Customized Modules division generated €87.3 million in sales in the first quarter of 2021, on a par with the previous year (€87.6 million). Lower revenues particularly in Italy and France were balanced out by improved sales figures in Australia and India. Orders received amounted to a total of €127.0 million in the first three months of 2021 (previous year: €147.7 million). The book-to-bill ratio accordingly was at 1.45. The order backlog came to €380.0 million at the end of the first quarter of 2021, a significant rise compared to the previous year (€333.2 million). EBIT saw a sharp increase to €4.0 million (previous year: €1.8 million). Consequently, the EBIT margin rose to 4.6 percent (previous year: 2.1 percent). The improvement in earnings and profitability was largely driven by operational efficiency gains.

Lifecycle Solutions division
The Lifecycle Solutions division generated sales of €19.7 million in the first quarter of 2021, in line with the previous year's performance (€20.2 million). Rail and turnout grinding sales fell year on year as expected. This decline was compensated for by higher revenues from machinery sales and stationary welding. Both orders received with €38.9 million (previous year: €38.4 million) and order backlog with €28.8 million (previous year: €28.6 million) were on a par with last year. EBIT was negative at €(2.4) million (previous year: €(1.8) million). EBIT is typically negative in this period due to seasonal reasons. The decline in EBIT was largely due to lower earnings contributions from rail and turnout grinding as well as logistics. Vossloh expects the situation to improve over the course of the year, with profitability at a higher level than the previous year.

Employees
In the first quarter of 2021, the average number of employees in the Vossloh Group was 3,608 (previous year: 3,472). The increase in the workforce was largely due to the full consolidation of an Indian company in the Customized Modules division.

Outlook 2021
Based on current knowledge, Vossloh still assumes that it will be able to generate sales between €850 million and €925 million in 2021. Vossloh is expecting an EBITDA margin of between 13 and 14 percent. The EBIT margin is expected to be between 7 and 8 percent. Excluding the one-time effect of €15.6 million from the transitional consolidation of the joint venture in China in the 2020 fiscal year, the EBITDA margin and EBIT margin in the past fiscal year were 12.4 percent and 6.6 percent, respectively. Vossloh thus expects its operating profitability to improve significantly, with contributions coming from all divisions. The outlook assumes that there will not be any significant additional impact related to the COVID-19 pandemic.