Jan De Nul Group, an international contractor specializing in dredging, land reclamation, heavy lifting, offshore and environmental services, has just released its business results for 2015, achieving solid performances despite difficult market conditions.
The traditional dredging market showed limited growth, Jan De Nul said in the report .
In addition, the share of the free market reached a historical low decreasing to approximately 50% of the normal dredging volume. One positive was the large volume dredging for the Suez Canal project in Egypt.
A total of 263 million m³ was dredged by six contractors, of which Jan De Nul Group took on 93 million m3 or 35.4%.
The successful completion of this project contributes significantly to the strong results of the group in 2015. Furthermore, the group also diversified its activities to the African market with the signing of a number of major dredging contracts.
Growing turnover and record EBITDA
Compared to 2014, the turnover increased by almost 10% to 2,244 million Euro, thus exceeding for the fifth year in a row the 2 billion Euro mark.
This increase in turnover is largely the result of the successful delivery of a number of major projects: the construction of the Suez Canal in Egypt, port extension works in Ghana (Takoradi), the development of a port terminal in Panama, the extension of the Brisbane airport in Australia and the construction of a port for an oil refinery in Nigeria.
In addition the EBITDA ratio showed a significant increase and reached the record amount of 632 million Euro. Expressed as a percentage of the turnover, the EBITDA thus increased to 28%, which is well above the company’s objective of 20%-25%.
Parallel with this, the net profit increased to 265 million Euro.
In 2015, Jan De Nul Group generated its turnover for 72% from its dredging and offshore activities, for 25% from its civil activities and for 3% from its environmental activities.
“From a geographical perspective, Jan De Nul Group realized in 2015, as in earlier years, about 1/3rd of its turnover in Europe. 2015 was a very good year for us on the developing African market with projects in, among others, Egypt, Nigeria, Ghana, Ivory Coast and Morocco so that Africa’s share in the group’s turnover increased from 9% in 2014 to 24% in 2015 ,” Jan De Nul said.
Targeted strategic investments
In 2015, Jan De Nul Group invested in the expansion and diversification of its fleet:
Jan De Nul Group said that 2015 was concluded with an order book of 2.7 billion Euro, which is a slight increase compared to 2014 and a strong position considering the challenging market conditions.