Eezy Plc's Half-Year Report 1–6/2022: Growth continued strong, profitability not yet at the target level
EEZY PLC -- HALF-YEAR REPORT -- 9 AUGUST 2022 AT 8:00
*Eezy **Plc**'s **Half-Year** Report** 1–**6**/**202**2**: **Growth continued strong, profitability not yet at the target level*
*April**–**June** 202**2*
· Revenue was EUR 67.1 million (EUR 48.0 million in April–June 2021).
· EBITDA was EUR 4.3 million (5.0*).
· EBIT was EUR 2.1 million (3.1*) and was 3.2% of revenue (6.4%).
· Earnings per share was EUR 0.07 (0.08).
· Revenue grew by 40% exceeding the market growth.
· Business continued to normalize from Corona conditions, but high sick-leave costs affected the result, approx. 0.7 million euro more costs than last year.
*) 4-6/2021 EBITDA and EBIT included EUR 1.0 million Corona subsidy.
*January–**June** 202**2*
· Revenue was EUR 118.1 million (EUR 84.6 million in January–June 2021).
· EBITDA was EUR 6.8 million (7.7*).
· EBIT was EUR 2.6 million (4.0*) and was 2.2% of revenue (4.7%).
· Earnings per share was EUR 0.07 (0.09).
· Revenue grew by 40% exceeding the market growth.
· Business continued to normalize from Corona conditions, but high sick-leave costs affected the result, approx. EUR 1.7 million more than last year.
*) 1-6/2021 EBITDA and EBIT included EUR 2.7 million non-recurring income (Corona subsidy, VAT refund)
*Outlook for 202**2* (since 8 August 2022)
Eezy expects revenue to grow and EBIT to be 5-6% of revenue in 2022.
Old guidance:
Eezy expects revenue to grow and EBIT-% to increase during 2022. The guidance will be made more precise during the year.
*Key figures** (IFRS)*
EUR million, unless
otherwise specified 4–6/2022 4–6/2021 1–6/2022 1–6/2021 1–12/2021
Revenue 67.1 48.0 118.1 84.6 203.3
EBITDA 4.3 5.0 6.8 7.7 19.5
EBITDA, % 6.4% 10.4% 5.7% 9.1% 9.6%
EBIT 2.1 3.1 2.6 4.0 11.8
EBIT, % 3.2% 6.4% 2.2% 4.7% 5.8%
EPS, undiluted, EUR 0.07 0.08 0.07 0.09 0.31
EPS, diluted, EUR 0.07 0.08 0.07 0.09 0.30
Net debt / EBITDA - - 3.3 x 2.9 x 2.4 x
Chain-wide revenue 94.1 73.3 171.1 129.7 305.5
*CEO **Sami Asikainen**:*
*Strong g**rowth **not yet fully reflected in profit *
"In the second quarter Eezy's revenue grew by 40 percent compared to last year and was 67 million euro. This is the highest quarterly revenue reported by Eezy. We have grown on a wide front, both in the staffing services as well as in the professional services. Our growth clearly exceeds the market growth and the recovery from Corona is showing up especially in the demand for HoReCa staff.
The undisputed stars of the quarter were our working-life professional services businesses, whose revenue doubled from last year. This is based both on good organic growth and on the acquisitions done. I am also delighted that our long-term development work in our light entrepreneur business materializes as good growth.
*Sick-leave costs and investments into future have burdened our results*
Our profit has nicely doubled in the first six months when taking the 2.7 million euro non-recurring items (1.0 million euro Corona subsidy and 1.7 million euro VAT refund) last year into account. Although the comparable profit develops into right direction, we are still far away from our long-term goals. Our profit has been burdened by the clearly higher than normal sick-leave rates in the first year-half. The integration of the acquired companies is also still ongoing, and some business areas still weaken our profitability.
The goal is to continue strong growth during the whole strategy period. To ensure organic growth, we have invested into our organization in the first year-half. We have hired new group employees and our headcount has already exceeded 550. After the long period of remote work during Corona the significance of our employees' commitment is emphasized. During the year we have significantly invested into training and employee wellbeing. A positive, professional and courageous culture in Eezy is our most important and hardest-to-copy competitive advantage.
We also aim to significantly improve our profitability, especially by increasing efficiency. We aim to improve efficiency with increased usage of automation and machine learning in our operations. To ensure the wide scope of our digital development, with have strengthened our organization and found strategic partners to support us in the development. The implementation of our digital strategy progresses according to plans, and I believe that we will achieve significant competitive advantage through the ongoing development projects, both in the staffing and in the professional services businesses.
*Growth strategy progresses widely*
We have done three strategic acquisitions in the first year-half. Those acquisitions generate some 10 million euro inorganic growth for 2022. The new revenue scales our fixed costs and creates synergies for our businesses.
Of the new companies, Eezy Farenta expands our staffing services into the pharmacy sector and complements our existing services in the healthcare sector. Eezy Siqni is a fast-growing surveyor of employee experience and Eezy Leidenschaft is a unique specialist in business culture development. They nicely boost Eezy Flow's already strong position in employee experience surveys, related consulting and management development.
Regarding organic growth, Eezy United, specializing to staffing of athletes, has expanded its geographical presence. We have also focused on international recruiting and the amount of foreign labor grows steadily. During Q2 approx. 500 internationally recruited persons worked in Finnish companies.
We have also started a strategic co-operation with VeggArt's Oy that offers employment services for immigrants. Together we have already employed over 200 immigrants into Finnish companies. During the remaining part of the year, we will launch new training and employment services for this important target group. Our mission is to create successes, both by solving the companies' labor shortages as well as employing people. Every new job builds a more diversified and stronger society.
*Growth also in second year-half*
Growth in 2022 seems to be strong. We have started cost and pricing related actions, so that profitability can be increased.
Corona continues to affect our business for the third year in row. The effects of Corona restrictions were relatively easy to forecast and to react to. Thus in 2020-2021 we proved ourselves with great performance in the declining markets. But we didn't succeed in forecasting the surprisingly high sick-leave costs this year, and the sick-leaves have also decreased possibilities for operational flexibility. Fortunately, the sick-leaves are on a decreasing trend.
The darkening economic outlook, inflation and war in Ukraine increase our cautiousness regarding the remaining part of the year. However, Eezy in is strong shape and we can focus in implementing our strategy. Our operations have expanded and became more diversified in the last few years, which has increased our resilience for economic downshifts.
*Big picture is unchanged*
Labor shortage, age demographics, significance of work, digitalization, workplace wellbeing and working-life changes are permanent trends that grow our markets. The current demand situation is reflected in the over 1200 currently open positions and in the good order backlog of our working-life professional services. I believe that the need for workforce and for the working-life professional services will continue to grow also in future. In uncertain times also our role in providing flexibility for our customers creates growth potential for us.
We have grown already five quarters in a row, so I confidently look forward into the important quarters of the second year-half."
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*Result publication event:*
A Finnish-language briefing for analysts and media will be held on 9 August 2022 at 13.00 Finnish time as a webcast at https://eezy.videosync.fi/2022-q2
The webcast will be hosted by CEO Sami Asikainen and CFO Hannu Nyman. During the presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. The presentation material will be available at the company website at https://eezy.fi/en/financials/reports-and-presentations/ before the conference. A recording of the webcast will be available at the same website later.
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*Attachment:* Half-Year Report January–June 2022 in PDF format
*Further information:*
Sami Asikainen
CEO
sami.asikainen@eezy.fi
tel. +358 (0)40 700 9915
Hannu Nyman
CFO
Eezy Plc
hannu.nyman@eezy.fi
tel. +358 (0)50 306 9913
*Attachment*
· Eezy_Plc_Half-YearReport_Q2_2022_ENG