GENEART Publishes Financial Results for First Half 2009

14-Aug-2009 - Germany

GENEART AG showed stable business development correlating with current expectations in the Interim Consolidated Financial Statements for the second quarter and first half of 2009. Net sales increased moderately by 3.4% to EUR 8.1M during the first half of 2009 compared to the prior year (first half 2008: EUR 7.9M). Second quarter 2009 net sales increased by 2.9% to EUR 4.1M compared to the prior year's reference quarter (second quarter 2008: EUR 4,0M). Thus, despite a difficult market environment, GENEART managed to compensate for the expiring major contract by the NIH (U.S. American National Institutes of Health) in the third quarter 2008 by an increasing number of medium-sized and small orders. With new customers in the medium and small segments, the customer structure continued to broaden significantly, and the market share of GENEART in gene synthesis could be extended again.

GENEART was able to generate a EBITDA of EUR 0.8M for the first half of 2009. During the prior year's reference period EUR 1.4M were recorded. The Group's EBIT totaled EUR 26 thousand for the first half of the year. After adding the financial result of EUR 39 thousand the EBT reached EUR 66 thousand (first half 2008: EUR 1.1M).

While first quarter 2009 results had still been severely affected by a price increase for the chemical acetonitrile, the switch to an alternative substance could already be noticed in a decreasing material cost ratio during the second quarter. Starting in the second half of the year GENEART expects to see the material cost ratio to reach normal levels again.

The investment program implemented in 2008 resulted in an increase of the cost structure and affected the 2009 results. With these investments GENEART created a highly automated and scalable technology platform, which allows to significantly boost production capacities even on short notice and with only a moderate cost increase. This is a prerequisite for GENEART to profit superproportionally from increasing demand through economies of scale and to actively support market consolidation in the field of Gene Synthesis providers.

Based on the current economic situation and its current order status, the company still expects net sales of EUR 16M for 2009 to be at least at prior year's levels. Assuming a recovery of the economic environment, net sales between EUR 17M and EUR 18M can be expected with a balanced EBIT for the entire year, as it had already been achieved in the first half of the year.

https://www.bionity.com/en/news/104702/geneart-publishes-financial-results-for-first-half-2009.html