Offshore boosts Boskalis’ 1H

Royal Boskalis Westminster N.V. (Boskalis) reported a net profit of EUR 253 million in the first half of 2014 compared to EUR 123 million in the same period of 2013.

Revenue rose 21% in the first half of the year to EUR 1.5 billion versus  EUR 1.3 billion in 1H 2013. Organic revenue growth was 13.4%.

EBITDA amounted to EUR 466 million in the first six months and the operating result (EBIT) was EUR 338 million (H1 2013 EBITDA: EUR 280 million and EBIT: EUR 162 million, respectively).

The order book stood at EUR 3,146 million at the end of the first half of the year (end 2013: EUR 3,323 million).

Peter Berdowski, CEO Boskalis: “We have posted a historically high result in the first half of 2014 and the performance across the board of the company has been very good. This result is partly thanks to the strategic choice we made to broaden our focus on offshore. The offshore activities are becoming increasingly important and the contribution of Dockwise forms a key part of this. But the traditional core dredging activities also made an excellent contribution to the results.

In the first half of the year we achieved a high fleet utilization rate and good project results. In addition, a number of exceptional gains made a substantial contribution to the results, including settlement results on old projects in Dredging and Salvage as well as compensation for Dockwise transport contracts that were cancelled. The extremely good results may however not be viewed as a fair reflection of current market conditions which remain very challenging, both in terms of margin and volume.”

In its report, Boskalis has said that the growth opportunities for the company are mainly in the offshore sector in the field of Transport, Logistics and Installation.

Despite growing reluctance in the offshore sector to make investment decisions when it comes to large projects, Boskalis remains cautiously positive about its own prospects in this part of the market by using and combining equipment and expertise throughout the group, the company’s report reads.