Strong order book and increasing revenues in New Cavotec  

On 5 March 2021, Cavotec communicated a decision to focus resources and make investments in the ports & maritime and industrial markets. As a consequence, a process was initiated to divest the Airports business. On February 22, 2022, we signed an agreement to divest 100% of our Airports business to US based investment company Fernweh Group. The transaction is expected to close in the summer of 2022. As a result of the sale, Airports is reported as a discontinued entity. The publication of this report was therefore postponed to today, 30 March, to make the necessary adaptations under IFRS to the annual accounts and the year-end report.

OCTOBER–DECEMBER 2021 NEW CAVOTEC

•  Order backlog increased 6.5% compared to Q321 to EUR 98.9 million
•  Revenues increased 5.4% to EUR 31.4 million (29.8)
•  EBIT amounted to EUR -1.7 million (-2.2), corresponding to a margin of -5.4% (-7.4%).
•  EBIT adjusted for growth investments amounted to EUR -0.0 million, corresponding to a margin of -0.1%

OCTOBER–DECEMBER 2021 TOTAL (INCL. DISCONTINUED)

•  Net result for the group was EUR -36.4 million (-4.7), of which EUR -32.8 million attributable to the discontinued operations

JANUARY–DECEMBER 2021 NEW CAVOTEC

•  Order backlog of EUR 98.9 million increased 71.2% compared to FY2020. 
•  Revenues increased 0.4% to EUR 115.8 million (115.3)
•  EBIT decreased to EUR -0.7 million (0.0), corresponding to a margin of -0.6% (0.0%)
•  EBIT adjusted for growth investments amounted to EUR 6.4 million, corresponding to a margin of 5.5%

JANUARY– DECEMBER 2021 TOTAL (INCL. DISCONTINUED)

•  Net result for the group was EUR -37.1 million (-4.0), of which EUR -35.9 million attributable to the discontinued operations
•  The Board proposes to the Annual General Meeting that no dividend be paid to shareholders for the 2021 financial year

Key events during the quarter 

• Cavotec won repeat cleantech orders worth EUR 3 million to equip container ships with shore power connections to global marine equipment manufacturer Samsung Heavy Industries 
• Cavotec won two key orders for motorized cable reel electrification systems for container cranes at major ports in China and the US from leading crane manufacturer ZPMC 

Subsequent events 

• On 28 January 2022, Cavotec announced that Mikael Norin has decided to leave his position as Group CEO of Cavotec. Norin will leave later in the year when a successor has been identified 
• Due to the lockdown of Shanghai to contain surging COVID-19 cases in the latter part of March, Cavotec’s production facility there has not been able to deliver and invoice a substantial part of booked orders at the end of the first quarter. Planned invoicing in March is delayed until further notice, despite production being completed. We anticipate that approximately EUR 4 million of revenue will be delayed until the following quarter. Orders are not cancelled, but deliveries will resume as soon as the situation is normalized
• Due to the temporary impact on our ability to deliver and invoice according to plan, we have initiated a discussion with our banks in the event we are not be able to meet all the conditions of our existing bank agreement in the first quarter
• The date for publication of Cavotec’s annual report has been moved from March 31 to April 27 

Comment from the CEO

Sale of Airports lays foundation for full focus on New Cavotec

It has been almost a year since we launched our strategy to focus on cleantech for ports and industrial applications and to divest the airports business. We have since seen continued increase in demand for our sustainability solutions in what we call New Cavotec, i.e., excluding Airports. 

In the fourth quarter, New Cavotec’s order backlog increased 6.5% compared to the previous quarter and 71.2% compared to a year ago to EUR 98.9 million. We especially saw continued strong growth in orders for on-ship Shore Power for both new vessels and for retrofits. We also saw an increase in orders for Motorized Reels, including two key orders for reel electrification systems for container cranes at major ports in China and the US from leading crane manufacturer ZPMC. Furthermore, Industry showed a strong increase in the order backlog, driven by an increase in orders from heavy equipment OEMs. It is truly encouraging to see the continued increase in demand for our cleantech solutions and the effects of our new strategy.

Revenues increased 5.4% to EUR 31.4 million in the fourth quarter, which is a reflection of the strong orderbook in previous quarters and it was also rewarding to see that services share of revenues in New Cavotec increased to 23.9%, in line with our strategy. During the quarter we continued to make investments in sales, marketing, engineering, and technology to meet future demand. Adjusted for those growth investments we recorded a break even EBIT for the quarter.

Looking at the whole of 2021, while order intake has been the highlight of our performance, the majority of revenue from the maritime orders will not materialize until 2022 and onwards since the planning cycle in the industry is long. As a result, annual revenue was flat compared to the previous year at EUR 115 million. Adjusted for growth investments we recorded an EBIT for the year of EUR 6.4 million, corresponding to a margin of 5.5%.

On February 22, 2022, we signed an agreement to divest 100% of our Airports business to US based investment company Fernweh Group. The transaction is expected to close in the summer of 2022. As a result of the spin off, a non-cash impairment charge of EUR 32.8 M was taken. Although it is bittersweet to see our Airports colleagues leave, we believe that they, as well as customers and partners, will substantially benefit from the focus that the new owners will bring.  

The sale of our Airports business is an important step to allow us to fully focus on New Cavotec, which accounted for 75 per cent of our revenues in 2021 and operates in the fast growing ports & maritime and heavy duty industrial applications markets with products such as shore power, automated mooring, reels, electrical charging systems as well as a wide service portfolio.

We are well positioned to create unmatched environmental and financial benefits for our customers through our technology solutions. 2021 has been a year of confirmation for this strategy and the growing demand for our solutions is a strong sign of our expectations for the future of Cavotec.  

On 28 January 2022, I informed the Board of Directors that I have decided to leave my position as Group CEO of Cavotec later in the year when a successor has been identified. After having been based in Switzerland for the last five years my family have a desire to return home to the US. It has been the privilege of a lifetime to lead the transformation of Cavotec from a traditional product manufacturing company to a focused cleantech solution provider. As this journey is almost complete, it is the right time to hand over to someone else to continue developing this great company.

As I write this, the unjust war in Ukraine rages on with unfathomable suffering for the brave people of that country. As a company we have limited exposure to Russia and thus see little impact on our 2022 financial performance.

Due to the lockdown of Shanghai to contain surging COVID-19 cases in the latter part of March, Cavotec’s production facility there has not been able to deliver and invoice a substantial part of booked orders at the end of the first quarter. The impact is temporary, and deliveries are not cancelled but will resume as soon as the situation is normalized. Nevertheless, we have initiated a discussion with our banks in the event we are not be able to meet all the conditions of our existing bank agreement in the quarter, due to our inability to deliver and invoice according to plan.

Lugano, 30 March 2022

Mikael Norin
Chief Executive Officer

ENDS

Conference call in connection with publication of the quarterly report
A conference call for shareholders, analysts and media will be held on 30 March 2022 at 10:00 CEST. Participating on the conference call from Cavotec will be Mikael Norin, CEO, and Glenn Withers, CFO.

Conference call Dial-in numbers:
SE: +46850558366 
UK: +443333009271 
US: +16467224903

Weblink: 
https://tv.streamfabriken.com/cavotec-q4-2021

Quarterly Reports on www.cavotec.com
The full report for the period January-December 2021 and previous quarterly and full year reports are available at: 
http://ir.cavotec.com/financial-reports

Analysts & Media
Johan Hähnel – Investor Relations Manager
Mobile: +46 70 605 63 34 – Email: investor@cavotec.com

This is information that Cavotec SA is obliged to make public pursuant to the EU Market Abuse Regulation. The information was submitted for publication, through the agency of the contact person set out above, at 07:00 CEST on 30 March 2022