31.08.2010

Manitou up 8.3%

French based telehandler and aerial lift manufacturer Manitou has posted first half results with revenues up 8.3 percent to €387.1 million and a strong order book at the end of the period.

Telehandler/RT Fork lift revenues climbed over nine percent to €274 million, with construction sales improving in spite of very limited rental company business, while Agricultural sales slipped during the period.

Spare parts and service made a significant contribution according to the company, particularly in terms of mix and margin.

Overall the telehandler division made a €9 million operating profit for the period, thanks to the company’s restructuring efforts and lowered break-even point. The division is now concentrating on ramping up manufacturing volumes and compensating for extended supplier lead times with added direct manpower.

The Industrial Material Handling division saw its revenues slip by 12 percent to €59 million. The compact Equipment division – largely Gehl- saw a 42 percent rebound thanks to improved sales of skid steer loaders, while telehandler ales to US rental customers showed little sign of improvement.

The company as a whole saw gross margins improve from 28 percent to over 33 percent, which helped generate a positive EBITD and cut the net loss from -€93.8 million to -14.3 million. Net debt was slashed by half compared to last year to €182 million.

Manitou’s chief executive Jean-Christophe Giroux, said: “The strong business swing over the last six months reflects favourably in our H1 earnings, and pulled us up towards breakeven earlier than expected. Our end-June balance-sheet also features reduced indebtedness and confirms Manitou’s recovered financial condition. The challenge is now to further improve our profile, finding ways to reconcile erratic end demand levels and highly-congested components supplies.”

“As the environment still fails to clear up, and possibly for quite some time, we believe the key to profitable growth will be in new models for operational efficiency. For FY’10 however, thanks to a strong backlog, we confirm that full year revenues for 2010 will be up 10 to 15 percent on 2009 and expect to be progressing further towards OP breakeven.”

Vertikal Comment

A decent result from Manitou which reflects the gradually improving telehandler market. The company’s access division is another story,
While the company makes a number of excellent aerial lift models, it does not have the range or the volumes to compete head to head with the likes of JLG, Genie or Haulotte.

It could do well when the market really starts to take off and availability is restricted, but this may still be two or three years off.
Manitou is still very well placed when it comes to telehandlers though and if it can manage the supplier issues it could turn this current challenge into an opportunity

This is the second encouraging result today and once again it comes from a French company.