Vehviläinen

Cargotec is celebrating a strong quarter in its latest interim financial results.

CEO Mika Vehviläinen notes that demand for Cargotec's load handling solutions continued to be strong during the first quarter of 2019. Orders received grew in total by 18% from the same time last year, "and the growth was evenly spread between all of our business areas".

"Sales developed favourably as well, increasing by 11%," he says.

Vehviläinen says the group’s operating profit remained stable, but Kalmar's profitability improved on the back of higher sales. Sales grew also for Hiab, but supply chain challenges "led to a decline in the comparable operating profit compared to the first quarter of 2018".

"We continued our efforts to solve these issues  and believe that Hiab's performance will improve during the second half of 2019," he explains.
Despite the increase in MacGregor's orders received, the market situation remains difficult, according to the report. "Nevertheless, MacGregor's comparable operating profit remained positive."

Vehviläinen reports good performance for the service and software businesses, which accounted for a third of group sales. Service sales grew by 5% and software sales rose by 18%.

"During the quarter, we strengthened our software offering by acquiring the US-based Cetus Labs, Inc., which offers a cloud-based Octopi terminal operating system (TOS) for small container and mixed cargo terminals. With the addition of Octopi to its software portfolio, Navis is better positioned to support thousands of smaller terminals around the world that are eager to modernise their terminal operations, yet lack the technology infrastructure or technical expertise required to support a full-scale Navis N4 TOS deployment."

Cargotec has reiterated its outlook published in February 2019 and expects its operating profit for 2019 to improve from 2018.