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Financial information

CEO's comments on the Financial Statements Release 2023 on February 15, 2024

A year of significant changes ending with a record-high order book and exit from Russia

In 2023, Raute had a record-high order intake and order book in a challenging market environment. This great achievement underlines our position as a leading end-to-end partner in veneer, plywood and LVL production technologies. In 2023, we received four mill-sized orders in total and proceeded with the delivery of our first line to the solid wood production segment. Comparable EBITDA reached EUR 9.3 million, representing a margin of 6.4%. Profitability improved in line with our expectations from the exceptionally low level in the comparison year, partly thanks to the profitability improvement program.

In the fourth quarter, comparable EBITDA was EUR 2.7 million, representing a margin of 5.9%. The Analyzers and Services business units were able to increase their comparable EBITDA, driven by higher sales. Meanwhile, the Wood Processing business unit’s comparable EBITDA was slightly below our expectations. During the quarter, costs were elevated due to development projects to implement our growth strategy, including initiatives to drive our ESG agenda.

Order intake in the fourth quarter reached a record-high EUR 118 million, including Raute’s single biggest order in its history, a EUR 93 million contract from Metsä Wood’s new LVL mill in Finland. The order intake also included after-sales services and modernization projects.

In the fourth quarter net sales amounted to EUR 45.2 million and were in line with the comparison figure of Q4/2022. Comparison period still included a relatively high share of sales from Russia. In addition, the structure of the order book is more weighted towards mill-sized projects that have longer delivery times and slower revenue recognition. We are pleased about the sales growth in the Analyzers and Services businesses.

Our new ERP system is now operational at our main unit in Nastola, and we have moved to a continuous development phase. The new ERP system is expected to bring improved efficiency in the coming years.

The fundamental demand for Raute’s solutions excluding mill-sized projects remained at a reasonable level in 2023, even though the short-term market uncertainty has increased, impacting the demand for single production lines and spare parts. We have a strong position in complete mill-sized projects and there is continuous customer interest in these solutions over the business cycle, driven by sustainability needs.

The profitability improvement program was concluded as planned and we achieved the previously announced annual cost savings of EUR 4−5 million by the end of 2023. In addition, we terminated all the remaining Russian project agreements and decided to terminate our remaining service operations in Russia.

We will continue to implement our growth strategy with determination, including driving our ESG agenda and expanding our portfolio into new engineered wood product segments. We have also made changes to our Executive Board to ensure a strong focus on the deliveries of large projects and to boost our offering across businesses.

Our record high order book puts Raute in a good position to further develop our business and drive our growth strategy forward. I am confident that together with the Executive Board and our dedicated and skilled personnel we have a good year ahead of us.

Mika Saariaho
President and CEO