30 March 2017

Riber more than doubles gross margin as losses slashed in full-year 2016

For full-year 2016, Riber S.A. of Bezons, France, which manufactures molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) systems as well as evaporation sources and effusion cells, has reported revenue of €16.5m, up 29% on €12.8m in 2015, driven by growth across all product lines accompanied by a significant upturn in various industrial markets.

MBE systems revenue grew by 45% from €6.1m to €8.8m, reflecting an improvement in product mix (with five research systems delivered in 2016 versus nine in 2015 but two production systems delivered in 2016 compared with none in 2015).

Revenue for Services & Accessories has risen by 10% from €4.2m to €4.6m, due to commercial initiatives rolled out over the past few years.

Revenue for Cells & Sources rose by 21% from €2.5m to €3m, due primarily to the resurgence of interest in Riber’s solutions for applications in diverse fields, such as screens, organic light-emitting diode (OLED) technology, photovoltaics and other specific industrial applications.

Gross margin has more than doubled from just 14.9% in 2015 to 36.4% in 2016, reflecting the improvement in sales margins, benefiting from a better product mix, which has also led to €0.6m of provisions for inventories being reversed.

Following a reduction in operating expenditure from €8.3m in 2015 to €7.1m in 2016, operating loss has been cut from €6.3m (49.2% of revenue) in 2015 to €1.1m (just 6.7% of revenue) in 2016. This has resulted from a positive change in other operating income and expenses, while sales, administrative and R&D costs remain virtually unchanged. R&D efforts have been maintained to develop Riber’s range of products and services.

During 2016, cash (net of financial debt) rose from just €0.1m to €2.5m, including improving by €1.7m during second-half 2016 following the capital increase in August and an order down-payment received at the end of the year.

In addition, Riber repaid all its financial debt for €0.7m, and its shareholders’ equity represented €15.5m at the end of 2016.

In view of its order book at the end of 2016, the orders received since the start of 2017 and the outlook for orders to be delivered in 2017, Riber confirms its forecast for year-on-year revenue growth of at least 30% in 2017.

See related items:

Riber's first-half revenue rises 23% year-on-year, driven by MBE system sales

Riber's Q1 revenue almost halves year-on-year

Riber to sell part of facility after losses grow in 2015

Riber's annual revenue falls 23% to €12.8m in 2015

Tags: Riber MBE

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