‘Doing our homework’ has paid off for press maker Koenig & Bauer, which has turned in “concrete” financial results despite the difficult environment.

The comment from chief financial officer Stephen Kimmich came as the company reported results in excess of its 2022 and said the expected a further increase in revenue for 2023.

Growth of 6.3 per cent in group revenue to 1,185.7 million Euros was underpinned by all three segments, with its Digital & Webfed division delivering “substantially improved” earnings, with double-digit growth.

Chief executive Andreas Pleßke said the performance “shows we are headed in the right direction for sustainable growth”.

In cumulative terms, earnings before interest and taxes amounted to 22.0 million Euros, exceeding both the company’s own “concrete forecast” of 15-20 million Euros and market expectations.

At the end of last year, the Koenig group order intake stood at 1,329.3 million Euros, up three per cent on the previous year’s figure.

The Digital & Webfed segment reduced its negative earnings contribution substantially in 2022, posting EBIT of -19.3 million Euros on revenue of 139.8 million Euros. By comparison, EBIT had stood at -38.5 million Euros in 2021.

The current year “will see a continuation of the massive effects of the Russian war against Ukraine, the unchanged high energy and commodity prices and the tighter monetary policies of international central banks in response to inflation rates above the target corridor.

“The economic headwinds will thus remain strong, with macroeconomic growth continuing to lose momentum. Despite this challenging macroeconomic environment, Koenig & Bauer projects Group revenue of around €1.3bn, accompanied by an EBIT margin of roughly three per cent, for 2023, and expects the Digital & Webfed segment to make a disproportionately large contribution to both EBIT and revenue growth. “With our strong position in promising product segments and the continuation of our P24x efficiency programme, we are well poised to address the challenges ahead of us,” Kimmich commented, adding that “we have done our homework and showed last year that we can achieve growth even in a difficult environment.”

The annual report is available as a PDF file here.

Pictured: Members of the management board stand in front of the company’s RotaJet, used to print 2500 different covers to the summary of its annual report (below)