On Friday, Siemens raised its profit and revenue forecast for the full year for the second time this year after the German conglomerate exceeded its profit forecasts for the second quarter.
Roland Busch, President and CEO of Siemens, told CNBC on Friday that the company had “good momentum” in the second half of the fiscal year, with growth and production in Europe and China returning to pre-Covid levels.
Siemens reported an adjusted EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization) of 2.1 billion euros (2.53 billion US dollars) for the industrial business in the second quarter. This corresponds to a 31% increase over the same period last year as the company has recovered strongly from its pandemic -induced downturn.
Net income for the year reached 2.4 billion euros and earnings per share rose to 2.82 euros, while incoming orders rose nominally by 8% to 15.9 billion euros due to the strong growth in the Siemens Healthineers health sector.
“The growth momentum came in particular from the automotive industry, mechanical engineering, our software business and – from a geographical point of view – from China,” said Busch in a statement on Friday.
“In addition to the positive margin developments in our industrial companies, our successful portfolio management has also paid off.”
In light of the results, Siemens increased its FY 2021 net income outlook to € 5.7 billion to € 6.2 billion, compared to its previous forecast of € 5 billion to € 5.5 billion.
Busch told CNBC on Friday that he expects the company to benefit from accelerating customer transitions to digitization, automation and cleaner energy strategies.
“Our markets are growing faster than GDP because we are sitting on the product portfolios that generate more demand and return to the level of automation, but also to CO2 reduction. Therefore, energy efficiency is a big issue,” he said.
“Even when you see stimulus programs kicking off, they really give us a tailwind because they are aimed at not investing in what has been invested in in the past – they want to do the new things that are about energy efficiency, and use fewer resources. But here, too, automation and digitization are one of the big issues. “
