Berlin, 10 November 2003 – The PSI Group improved its EBIT in the first nine months by 8.9 million euros to –1.8 million euros compared to the same period in the previous year (2002: –10.7 million euros). The group result improved in the first nine months to –1.7 million euros (2002: –11.1 million euros). Sales decreased compared to the previous year by 9.5% to 98.8 million euros (2002: 109.2 million euros). This resulted from the decrease in hardware sales by 41 % to 9.1 million euros (2002: 15.5 Million euros), the deconsolidations of the previous year and the decrease in license sales to 2.9 million euros (2002: 5.9 million euros). The group’s liquidity was 15.1 million Euro as of 30 September 2003.
The Network Management segment (energy, telecommunication, transportation) achieved sales of 53.0 million euros (2002: 54.3 million euros), whereby the own added value increased by 11.2% to 44.4 million euros (2002: 39.7 million euros). The poor earnings in the Telecommunication Business up to August placed a burden on the EBIT which was 2.1 million euros (2002: 3.4 million euros).
In Production Management (production, logistics) sales decreased slightly to 33.9 million euros (2002: 35.8 million euros), while the EBIT for the first nine months improved to
–2.4 million euros (2002: –12.3 million euros). With that Production Management achieved a balanced result for the first time on a quarterly basis in the third quarter. Due to the fact that PSIPENTA has not yet completely reached the break-even point, a previously announced cost adjustment was put into effect. The GSI mbH clearly achieved the break-even point in the third quarter with the focus on MES.
Sales in Information Management (government, services) decreased in the first nine months to 11.9 million euros (2002: 19.1 million euros), the EBIT to –1.4 million euros (2002: –1.8 million euros). Here, the poor results of Public Management in the months July and August had a negative effect on the result. PSI Infrastruktur GmbH (merger with Schindler Technik AG) and PSI Solutions GmbH (insolvency in October 2002) were not consolidated in the current year.
New orders in the first nine months were, with 90 million euros, below the level of the previous year of 104 million euros. Following a halting Product and Consulting Business in July and August, business revived significantly starting in September, attributable, amongst other things, to a number of major acquisitions in the fields of energy, telecommunications and metals. The order backlog in the PSI Group on 30 September 2003 was 78 million euros.
The number of employees on 30 September 2003 was, as planned, 1,226 (30 September 2002: 1,324). Investments in the third quarter were made in new PSIpenta variations for the project business (PSIprofessional) and for maintenance (PSImaintenance). The development and marketing launch costs of the new control systems for the manufacturing and steel industries are also contained in the group result. As a precautionary measure, the forecasts for the year’s EBIT have been reduced to 0 to 2 million euros; the sales forecasts remain unchanged.
PSI AG develops individual solutions, on the basis of its own software, for the management of large networks (electricity, gas, oil, telecommunications, transport), cross-company production management (steel, chemicals, machinery, automotive, logistics) and information management for government and service providers. PSI was founded in 1969 and currently employs 1,200 persons in the group.
