The Germany-headquartered manufacturer said it expected to meet its annual forecasts, despite its first half performance being impacted by Drupa expenses of €10m (£8.3m), and the expected “purchasing restraint” prior to the trade show.
CEO Jürgen Otto said the group’s factories were running flat out.
“Heidelberg is starting a very strong second half of the year,” he stated.
“We are now ramping up the utilisation of our production capacities so we can work through our order backlog in the third and fourth quarters quickly and profitably.”
Otto noted that the forecast sales volume for new machines “has already been almost entirely met with orders and our production operations are running at full capacity”.
He said he was confident the business would achieve its full-year target for sales of nearly €2.4bn, with “similar” adjusted EBITDA margin of 7.2% to 2023/24.
Incoming orders in the six months to 30 September were up 7.4% on the prior year at €1.27bn, while sales slipped to €915m from just over €1bn the previous year.
Orders at its Packaging wing were up 9.7% to €675m at the half year, around 53% of total order volumes.
In packaging, the replacement of plastics with paper-based materials is viewed as a key growth opportunity, along with growing demand for premium packaging products “providing a tailwind to conventional printing technologies”, the firm said.
In Print Solutions orders were up 5.5% to €594m.
The biggest growth in orders received came from the Asia Pacific region.
Heidelberg said that strict cost discipline was also evident in its results, with free cash flow in positive figures in Q2.
However, the post-tax loss for the period was €35m, compared with a €33m profit the prior year.
Otto, who took up the CEO role on 1 July, set out his growth ambitions over the summer.
The “portfolio for growth” outlined alongside the H2 results included three focus areas where the group expects additional sales potential in the “low triple-digit million euros”: firstly, accelerating Heidelberg’s growth in packaging, and entering new markets with its flexo offering; second, commercial inkjet printing growth through its partnership with Canon, and capitalising on Heidelberg’s Prinect workflow; and thirdly, building upon its installed base of more than 10,000 machines with “more competitive pricing and more proactive approach” to servicing.
Otto’s plan to leverage Heidelberg’s precision manufacturing and assembly know-how and global network has resulted in the creation of Heidelberg Industries to target partners for those services.
Despite the upbeat outlook, Heidelberg’s share price fell in early trading and was down nearly 7% at €0.92 at the time of writing (52-week high: €1.39, low: €0.85).
