Financial performance

Overall assessment of the economic situation

In the first half of 2018, the KION Group continued to demonstrate the strengths of its innovation, sales and brand strategy in the fulfilment of customer-specific requirements and solutions, achieving increases in both order intake and revenue compared with the first half of 2017. Significant negative currency effects were offset by volume increases in both segments.

The effects of temporary bottlenecks at individual suppliers in the Industrial Trucks & Services segment were not fully offset by the increase in revenue. As a result, working capital had risen as at 30 June 2018, thereby temporarily squeezing free cash flow. The countermeasures implemented at an early stage by the KION Group in order to reduce the delivery bottlenecks will generate a substantial catch-up effect in the second half of the year. Following delays in the awarding of projects by customers, Dematic took significantly more new orders in the second quarter. As a result, order intake in the Supply Chain Solutions segment improved markedly, reaching a total of €1,270.4 million for the six-month period. The segment’s revenue was lower than in the prior-year period.

The KION Group’s adjusted EBIT came to €344.9 million, which was down by €17.2 million year on year. Earnings for the reporting period were affected by higher material prices, wage cost rises, currency effects and inefficiencies caused by bottlenecks at individual suppliers in the Industrial Trucks & Services segment. The adjusted EBIT margin was 8.9 per cent (H1 2017: 9.5 per cent). Net income for the period amounted to €147.7 million, which represented slight year-on-year growth (H1 2017: €144.7 million). Earnings per share stood at €1.26 (H1 2017: €1.30).

Net financial debt equated to 1.5 times the adjusted EBITDA on an annualised basis. The slight rise compared with the end of last year (31 December 2017: factor of 1.4) was due to increased current financial liabilities for financing the temporary rise in inventories.

Business situation and financial performance of the KION Group

Level of orders

Order intake amounted to €4,309.0 million, exceeding the figure for the prior-year period of €3,852.3 million by 11.9 per cent. Excluding the negative currency effects of €159.8 million, the KION Group’s order intake was up by 16.0 per cent. In the Industrial Trucks & Services segment, order intake rose by 3.5 per cent to €3,031.6 million (H1 2017: €2,928.3 million), mainly due to the fast growth of the new truck business in the EMEA and APAC regions. The Supply Chain Solutions segment saw the value of its order intake from project business (business solutions) and the service business jump by 39.0 per cent to €1,270.4 million (H1 2017: €913.6 million). The KION Group’s order book rose to a total of €3,060.2 million (31 December 2017: €2,614.6 million).