Homag: slight increase in order intake

Homag reported a slight increase in orders in the first months of 2024, after a significant drop in 2023. In contrast, sales and profits declined, as predicted at the beginning of the year.
“Although our order book has increased slightly compared to 2023, we still do not see an end to the market weakness, “ explained Homag CEO Daniel Schmitt. “This is mainly reflected in the still weak demand for single machines from the furniture industry, while things are somewhat better for large-scale projects and service business is growing slightly despite the difficult environment.”
Between January and September 2024, orders increased slightly by 6 percent, reaching 1,031 million euros (previous year: 968 million euros). The order backlog fell to 806 million euros as of September 30, 2024 (9/30/2023: 832 million euros). Turnover fell 14 percent to 1,055 million euros in the first three quarters of 2024 (previous year: 1,222 million euros) due to the low order volume in the previous year, while Ebit before special items fell to 35.0 million euros (previous year: 91.2 million euros).
In addition to the reduction of external employees, Homag completed the package of measures to adjust capacity and increase efficiency, which included the reduction of about 600 jobs. “In this way we ensure our competitiveness and also want to increase our profitability again,” Schmitt commented. As a result, the number of employees decreased to 6,875 as of Sept. 30, 2024 (9/30/2024: 7,482 employees). In addition to the reduction in jobs, a reclassification effect should also be taken into account, as at the beginning of 2024 about 120 employees of a Polish service company will no longer be assigned to Homag, but to the parent company Dürr.