Pliezhausen, 24 May 2022. DATAGROUP SE (WKN A0JC8S) today publishes figures for the first half of FY 2021/2022 (01.10.2021 – 31.03.2022). The company once again achieved significant growth in revenue and earnings. Main drivers were organic growth by signing new customers contracts as well as upselling among existing customers. Additionally, the first-time consolidation of Urano and dna (today DATAGROUP BIT Oldenburg) since 1 May 2021 has contributed to the group’s success.

Revenues increased significantly from EUR 211.5m to EUR 247.6m (+17.1 %). Earnings have also developed very positively in H1 2021/2022: Operating earnings before taxes, interest, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) improved by 23.5 % to EUR 37.4m (PY EUR 30.3m). The EBITDA margin continued to improve, growing from 14.3 % to 15.1 %. Earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) improved by 47.7 % to EUR 20.5m (PY EUR 13.9m), the EBIT margin increased significantly from 6.6 % to 8.3 % and is further approaching management’s long-term ambition of 9 %. This reflects the sustainable reduction of investments in property, plant and equipment and intangible assets (CAPEX), which had already been halved from roughly EUR 22m to roughly EUR 11m in FY 2020/2021 and is set to decline further to EUR 3.4m for the first half of 2021/2022. Earnings per share were 150 cents compared to 130 cents in the previous year, corresponding to an increase by 15.1 %.

The momentum of digitization created by the coronavirus pandemic continues and materializes at DATAGROUP in the form of new customer acquisition but also upselling on existing contracts. Koelnmesse, for instance, is one of the new customers DATAGROUP has acquired with a full-service outsourcing agreement for all modules of the CORBOX: The framework agreement with an order volume of over EUR 21m has a term of 60 months, with an option to extend it for another 60 months. Transition has started in February 2022 and complete IT outsourcing will be taken over from January 2023. From service desk to on-site support, IT operations and application hosting to SAP and databank services, all from a single source. In cooperation with Cloudeteer, an associated company, DATAGROUP also brings its strong public cloud expertise to the project. Alongside the extensive range of services provided, DATAGROUP scored with the innovative data center concept of the latest CORBOX generation. DATAGROUP is perceived as a dedicated partner at eye level with complex problem-solving expertise and a committed interdisciplinary team.

“Our efficient and modular full-service offer, which we provide to our customers under long-term framework agreements, is more efficient than ever before”, says Andreas Baresel, CEO of DATAGROUP. “We are constantly working to improve our central supply structure, the application of digital solutions in the provision of our services – for instance software robots or automation solutions – and extend the scope of our services. In the midterm, this will be reflected in the margin, where we want to achieve further improvements”, Baresel continues.

The takeover of Hövermann, which we announced after the reporting date, marked the 28th acquisition: With a staff of some 55 employees, the company is focused on small and mid-sized corporate customers, which are currently mainly based in North Rhine-Westphalia and Lower Saxony. Hövermann is the largest full-service provider of its region with its IT services and IT consulting offering and its expertise in SAP Business One. The company has been a certified SAP and Microsoft Gold Partner for many years and thus strengthens expertise in this area at DATAGROUP. Hövermann generates revenues of some EUR 9m.

The interim consolidated financial statements are available for download under datagroup.de/publications.

DATAGROUP will host a conference call on the first-half results with the management. It is scheduled for 24 May 2022, at 10:00 AM (CET). You can register for the event under the following link: https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/1818742188860099852. A recording of the webcast will be provided after the event.