4 April 2014

Riber makes profit in 2013 despite revenue falling 14%

After reporting revenue for full-year 2013 in late January, Riber S.A. of Bezons, France, which manufactures molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) systems as well as evaporation sources and effusion cells, has now reported its full earnings figures.

Revenue was €23.5m for 2013, down 14% on 2012’s €27.4m. Of this, MBE system revenue of €16.9m was down 13% on 2012’s €19.4m. No production machines were sold in 2013 (compared with 2 in 2012). However, this was partly offset by sales of systems to research customers rising from 15 in 2012 to 17. Riber says that, during the past year, it has further strengthened its positions in research markets in order to limit the significant downturn affecting industrial markets due to their current excess capacity.

Revenues from services and accessories (€5.3m, down 13% from €6m) and cells and sources (€1.3m, down 35% on €2m) are down 18% overall, due primarily to the weak level of demand in 2013 from industrial customers. Sales of cells for new markets - organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) and thin-film solar - have remained sluggish, pending the next wave of capacity investments in South Korea. However, this decrease has been limited by the development of sales of MBE effusion sources to R&D customers.

Gross profit was €7.5m in 2013 (down 17% from €9.1m), representing gross margin of 32.2% of revenue (down only slightly from 33.2%). More specifically, the 1-point drop in margin reflects the provisioning for inventories, with a net charge of €0.2m for 2013, compared with a €0.6m reversal in 2012.

Also, operating expenses are down year-on-year, notably benefiting from the policy rolled out by Riber at the beginning of 2013 to reduce its fixed costs. Hence, Riber still made a net income of €0.2m (1% of revenue), albeit down from €1.9m (7% of revenue) in 2012.

During 2013, cash reserves fell from €3.6m to €1.7m, factoring in the high level of billing at the very end of the year and the ramping up of innovation efforts during the year. Despite a lower level of business, the firm generated +€1.2m in cash flow from operations in 2013.

In view of the results for 2013 and the requirements for financing innovation, Riber’s management board will not be submitting a proposal for a dividend at the general meeting on 3 June.

At the end of February, order backlog was €7.4m (up from €7m at the end of 2013), with six research systems to be delivered from second-quarter 2014 and significant levels of orders for services and accessories. The firm says that it is currently seeing an increase in deals for the R&D MBE market.

Riber says that in 2014 it is focusing its efforts on:

• promoting its new Compact 21 DZ R&D MBE system;

• extending its range of MBE effusion sources, and continuing to make gains in market share;

• developing thin-layer complex material deposition equipment, particularly for the buoyant OLED flat-screen sector;

• over the longer term, incorporating MBE into the silicon manufacturing chain (for III-V on silicon materials, etc).

Riber’s technological expertise, its presence in South Korea, and the quality of its research partnerships represent strong assets to support these developments.

See related items:

Riber’s full-year revenue falls 14% to €23.5m in 2013

Riber’s 2013 revenue to end-September down 39% year-on-year to €10.2m

Riber's first-half losses double after sales fall 17% year-on-year

Riber’s revenue impacted by pause in system sales in Q1, but research system orders continue unabated

Tags: Riber MBE

Visit: www.riber.com