AZ Medien reports loss of six million
AZ Medien reported an EBITDA of 25.2 million and a loss of six million francs. The reasons for the unsatisfactory consolidated results were high depreciation and amortization on investments and acquisitions, as well as start-up losses.
In the past financial year, AZ Medien generated sales of CHF 247.7 million (previous year: CHF 242.2 million / +2.3%), an Ebitda of CHF 25.2 million (previous year: CHF 28.6 million) and an operating result of CHF 6.3 million. (previous year: CHF 8.3 million.) The bottom line is a negative net result of minus CHF 6.0 million due to high write-downs and start-up losses on investments.
According to a statement on Friday, the company is maintaining its course of expansion and diversification into new channels. In the past financial year, Dietschi, the publisher of the Oltner Tagblatt, was taken over in full, the magazine Haustech was acquired from Axel Springer Schweiz, and the printing center in Aarau was expanded and modernized with the acquisition of a new rotary press, allowing the closure of the Subingen and Olten printing sites and thus leading to significant rationalization.
In electronic and digital media, the company launched the national TV24 channel, launched the Watson mobile platform, and created the central AZ Digital division. The projects and measures are on track, but continue to require a high level of resources; the start-up losses were written off in full. In total, the Board of Directors has approved investments of over CHF 40 million for 2014.
CEO Axel Wüstmann commented on the unsatisfactory result in the release as follows: "AZ Medien was able to increase sales both through acquisitions and new products, particularly in the electronic and digital business in 2014. However, the extraordinarily high start-up losses in the digital business and electronic media, as well as various one-off effects and depreciation and amortization, led to a negative consolidated result. For the current year, AZ Medien again expects a significant improvement in profitability."
