BOLOGNA — The Board of Directors of Datalogic, a global leader in the automatic data capture and industrial automation markets and producer of bar code readers, data collection mobile computers, sensors, vision systems and laser marking systems, approved the half-year report.

The results of the first half of the year, that closed with an increase of 40.7 percent in net profit at 21.5 million Euro, confirm the positive trend in terms of growth of revenues for all the divisions. EBITDA remained substantially stable at 34.3 million Euro, notwithstanding the negative impact of the exchange rate trend and continued investments in Research and Development and in the distribution network aimed at re-launching the Group on the North American market.

Datalogic Chairman and CEO Romano Volta commented: “The positive results of the first half of the year reinforce the effectiveness of the strategic choices, made at management and product level, undertaken and that enabled a double-digit growth in Europe and in Asian countries. Retail was confirmed as the driver of such a growth, but in H1 there was also a recovery in the industrial sector thanks to the introduction on the market of new products based on imaging technology for the logistics and factory automation sectors which are growing in Europe. The contract secured with Royal Mail also constitutes an interesting prospect for re-launching the Systems business unit in line with other Group activities."

Sales revenues came in at 257.5 million Euro, with a growth of 14.9 percent compared to 224.0 million Euro in the first half of 2014 (5 percent at constant exchange rates). The booking — the orders already received — reached 271.5 million Euro, 16.8 percent higher than compared to the same period of 2014.
The impact of the new products on revenue in Q2 was 26.4 percent, that is a continuation of the positive trend established in the first quarter (25.0 percent) and a confirmation of the success of the technological innovation.

Gross operating margin came in at 119.8 million Euro, +9.8 percent compared to 109.1 million Euro of the same period of the previous year (+3.9 percent at constant exchange rates).

Operational costs, at 92.7 million Euro, increased by 14.1 percent (the increase would have been 5.1 percent at constant exchange rates) compared to 81.2 million Euro of H1 2014 highlighting a 36.0 percent incidence on revenue slightly less than the 36.3 percent of H1 2014. The cost of Research and Development grew both in absolute value, from 19.8 million Euro to 23.4 million Euro, and in terms of incidence on revenues (from 8.9 percent to 9.1 percent), as a result of the increasing importance that the Group attributes to it, while the cost of distribution increased from 40.4 million Euro to 48.5 million Euro (with incidence on revenue going from 18.0 percent to 18.8 percent) mainly due to the strengthening of the distribution network in the United States.

The EBITDA was almost stable at 34.3 million Euro compared to 34.2 million Euro of H1 2014 (+1.6 percent at constant exchange rates) while incidence on revenue (EBITDA margin) was down to 13.3 percent with respect to 15.2 percent. The reduced margin is in part attributable to the exchange rate effect. Excluding the exchange rate effect, the EBITDA margin would have been 14.7 percent.

The Operating Result grew by 5.2 percent to 24.7 million Euro with respect to 23.5 million Euro (+11.3 percent at constant exchange rates).

After the effect of financial charges for an amount of 3.2 million Euro compared to 4.8 million Euro in H1 2014, a diminishing amount thanks to the effect of a new financing contract with a banking pool, and revenues on exchange rates for an amount of 3.4 million Euro compared to a profit of 0.2 million Euro in H1 2014, the net profit for the Group stands at 21.5 million Euro, representing a 40.7 percent growth with respect to 15.2 million Euro in H1 2014.

As of 30th June 2015, net financial debt was 58.4 million Euro, compared to 55.7 million Euro as of 31st December 2014 and 86.0 million Euro as of 30th June 2014.

The net working capital as at 30th June 2015 was recorded at 30.3 million Euro, a value that is substantially aligned with 29.8 million Euro as at 30th June 2014.