Basler AG Reports Resilient Performance Amid Challenging Market Conditions

Basler AG has disclosed its business figures for the first half of 2024. The company showed a positive development despite a persistently weak market environment. Sales totaled Euro 93.0 million, which is a 20% decrease from the previous year's Euro 116.1 million. Incoming orders slightly fell by 2% to Euro 92.5 million, compared to Euro 94.0 million last year.

The EBITDA fell by 34% to Euro 7.1 million, and the pre-tax result was Euro -2.3 million. However, free cash flow improved to Euro -2.1 million from Euro -9.6 million the previous year. The forecast for 2024 has been adjusted to sales of Euro 190 to 200 million and a pre-tax margin of 0 to 3%.

The company saw gains in the second quarter with incoming orders rising by 10% and sales increasing by 14% from the first quarter. Geopolitical uncertainties and increased customer inventories continued to impact performance, leading to no positive cumulative result for the first half-year. However, improvements were noted in the gross profit margin and cost structures.

The regional sales shifted slightly towards Asia, accounting for 49% of sales, up from 46% last year. The German Engineering Federation reported a 19% industry-wide decline in sales for machine vision components, with Basler's sales performance closely mirroring these trends but showing better incoming orders.

Given the weak market environment, Basler AG anticipates a delayed recovery in demand for capital goods. The management has confirmed its forecast but adjusted expectations to align with the lower half of the initial range.