Heijmans full year results: poor 2nd half year 2014, order book and housing market offer good prospects

Challenging market requires continuous improvement and innovation

Key developments

• Underlying operating result: € 12 million negative (2013: operating result of € 23 million positive); revenues decrease to € 1.9 billion (2013: € 2.0 billion);
• Net result for 2014 € 47 million negative after write down on property assets and reorganisation costs (2013: net profit of € 2 million);
• Good results from Belgian activities. Property Development and Residential Building show improved result. Disappointing result at Roads and Civil (Infra Netherlands) partly due to unexpected negative outcome in arbitration procedure; except for arbitration case results in line with trading update Q3 2014;
• Reorganisations at Non-Residential, Civil and Oevermann on schedule, 350 jobs involved;
• Number of homes sold up 25% (2014: 1,347, from 1,082 in 2013);
• Order book at year-end 2014 up strongly at around € 2.3 billion (€ 1.6 billion at year-end 2013); strong order intake in PPP and infra projects;
• Solvency solid at 27%.

Bert van der Els, chairman of the Heijmans Executive Board:
"We closed 2014 with a negative result, despite strong growth in the order book and a recovery in the housing market. An unexpected ruling in an arbitration case relating to Energiefabriek Tilburg on 30 December last year had a substantial negative impact on our results. Disappointing results at the Infra activities in the Netherlands put downward pressure on our margin and results. Nevertheless, there is comfort for the future, which is also demonstrated by the additional agreement made with our banks in the past few weeks concerning the financial covenants as per mid-2015. As previously announced, we are introducing additional measures on top of the improvement measures initiated in 2014, to improve project results at Infra in the Netherlands. In the second half of 2014, we saw the recovery in the housing market leading to an increase in production. Our investments in inner-city developments and process improvements at Property Development and Residential Building are starting to bear fruit. We saw a strong decline in revenues at Non-Residential, which is late-cyclical due to the technical installation activities. Therefore for are implementing significant adjustments to the organisation. Our financial position remains solid, with a solvency ratio of 27% and a year-end balance sheet without recourse debt. Furthermore, our innovations, including Heijmans ONE, Hydrofit and Smart Highway, are generating interest around the world and offer ample opportunities for the future. I am convinced that our strategy of targeting improvement and innovation will have a clear impact on our performance in 2015. Barring unforeseen circumstances, we expect to realise a significant improvement of the underlying operating result in 2015. Due to the measures we have introduced, our healthy order book and the recovering housing market, this should be possible."    

About Heijmans
Heijmans is a listed company that combines activities related to property development, residential building, non-residential building, roads and civil engineering in the working areas living, working and connecting. Heijmans is active in the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany and as a technology partners delivers know-how and concepts in various markets. Our constant focus on quality improvements, innovation and integrated solutions enables us to generate added value for our clients. Heijmans realises projects for private consumers, companies and public sector bodies. With more than 7,000 employees and € 1.9 billion in revenues in 2014, we are building the spatial contours of tomorrow.

You will find additional information on www.heijmans.nl.

For more information:
Media:
Marieke Swinkels-Verstappen
+31 73 543 52 17
mswinkelsverstappen@heijmans.nl

Analysts:
Frank Heerens
+31 73 543 52 17
fheerens@heijmans.nl

The Executive Board will explain the published results for 2014 today, 26 February 2015, at a press conference and analyst meeting. The analyst meeting will start at 10.30 am and you can follow the meeting via a webcast www.heijmans.nl.

The agenda and the registration form for the General Meeting of Shareholders of 15 April of this year will be available in the Heijmans website from 4 March onwards.

This press release was also published in Dutch. In the event of any discrepancies between the original press release and the English-language version of same, the Dutch version shall prevail.