Driven by strong revenue and earnings in the fourth quarter, Koenig & Bauer fully achieved or exceeded its guidance for 2017. Consolidated figures show that with the increase in revenue, earnings and order intake achieved last year, it is well on track towards achieving its medium-term targets by 2021. With security business remaining strong, Koenig & Bauer achieved growth in the packaging markets for cartonboard and corrugated printing, metal, glass and hollow container decorating and coding as well as with new products such as rotary and flatbed die-cutters.
The company is working intensively on further applications in packaging, digital and industrial printing to achieve additional profitable growth beyond its medium-term targets. One key aspect is corrugated board printing, which is flourishing at above-average rates thanks to long-term trends such as home-shopping as well as more sophisticated and colourful outer packaging. CEO Claus Bolza-Schünemann explains, “We have already started marketing the sheetfed flexo presses CorruFLEX and CorruCUT (with an integrated rotary die-cutter), both of which have been developed with a number of unique features. In early 2019 we will be installing a CorruCUT system at our pilot customer Klingele.”
In early 2019 a CorruCUT system will be installed at Klingele.
At €1,217.6m, group revenue in 2017 reached the target corridor of up to €1.25bn defined in the guidance. With revenue up 4.3% over the previous year (€1,167.1m), Koenig & Bauer fully achieved its mid-term organic revenue growth rate of around 4% p.a, more than making up for the further decline of €25m in revenue from newspaper and commercial web presses. The group’s new orders rose substantially by 10.1% over 2016 (€1,149.7m) to €1,266.3m. With orders up 29.7% over the previous year, the fourth quarter was particularly strong. The book-to-bill ratio came to 1.04, while order backlog stood at €606.2m, up 8.7% on the previous year.
Driven by innovative, bespoke solutions for folding carton and commercial printing as well as a broader sales and service footprint in the markets of the future, order intake in the Sheetfed segment, which as the largest segment, is dominated by packaging printing that rose by 15.2% over the previous year (€569.7m) to €656.2m. Revenue climbed by 7.3% over 2016 (€615m) to €660.2m. EBIT increased from €31.3m in the previous year to €37.5m, with the EBIT margin widening from 5.1% to 5.7%.
Order intake, revenue and earnings were particularly gratifying in flatbed die-cutter business in 2017
In the absence of any material deterioration in global economic and political conditions for international business, Management Board expects to achieve organic growth of around 4% in group revenue and an EBIT margin of around 7% in 2018.
