Joep van Beurden, Kendrion CEO:
“We had a strong quarter, with all of our Business Groups increasing revenue and EBITDA. A year ago, we prepared ourselves for the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on our operations. With demand increasing we are now finding ourselves having to navigate various capacity and supply chain constraints so that we can meet our customers’ demands. I am grateful for the agility and commitment of our entire organization as we continue to build on the recovery that started in Q3 and Q4 of 2020.
In Automotive, revenue was higher than in Q1 2020 despite shortages in semiconductors, certain types of steel and even plastics. Our strong momentum in actuators for Autonomous, Connected, Electric and Shared mobility (ACES) in the passenger cars segment remains intact, as the transition towards the ACES accelerates.
Industrial Brakes benefits from a strong trading environment. We see a wide-ranging increase in demand in most of Industrial Brakes’ business segments across all regions. We also note that the broad energy transition towards electrification, boosts demand for electromotors and thus for our brakes. Industrial Actuators and Controls also had a strong start to the year, with demand challenging our production capacity in several market segments such as such as medical and machine safety. Our China operation continues to grow its revenue. The construction of a new factory in Suzhou’s renowned Industrial Park is progressing according to plan.
Looking ahead we expect the current healthy economic activity level to continue in the second quarter and, depending on the efficiency of national vaccination programs, the rest of the year. Longer-term, we expect the accelerating push towards clean energy to benefit our three growth areas of Automotive, where we focus on the ACES; Industrial Brakes as it boosts demand for wind power, robotics, and various other segments; and China, with both Automotive and Industrial Brakes growth opportunities.
We are confident that the global push for cleaner energy, combined with our strong position in relevant markets for our focus areas Automotive, Industrial Brakes and China, will help deliver our medium-term financial targets of 5% organic growth between 2019 and 2025, an EBITDA of at least 15% in 2025 and an ROIC of at least 25% in 2025.”