Interim Results for the Six Months Ended 31 January 2021

VOLUTION GROUP PLC

INTERIM RESULTS FOR THE SIX MONTHS ENDED 31 JANUARY 2021

Strong revenue and profit growth, operating margin increased to 21.1%

Volution Group plc (“Volution” or “the Group” or “the Company”, LSE: FAN), a leading international designer and manufacturer of energy efficient indoor air quality solutions, today announces its unaudited interim financial results for the six months ended 31 January 2021.

The Group uses some alternative performance measures to manage and assess the underlying performance of the business. These measures include adjusted operating profit, adjusted profit before tax, adjusted EPS, adjusted operating cash flow and net debt. A definition of all the adjusted and non-GAAP measures is set out in the glossary of terms in note 19 to the condensed consolidated financial statements. A reconciliation to reported measures is set out in note 2 to the condensed consolidated financial statements.

FINANCIAL HIGHLIGHTS

• Strong revenue growth of 10.9% (8.6% at constant currency):
  • organic revenue growth of 9.8% (7.5% at constant currency) with all three geographic regions growing in the period; and 
  • inorganic revenue growth of 1.1% (1.1% at constant currency) as a result of the acquisition of ClimaRad BV in the Netherlands in December 2020.
• Adjusted operating profit increased by 27.4% to £27.7 million (23.9% at constant currency) due to revenue growth and margin expansion through our operational excellence actions.
• Significant adjusted operating profit margin expansion of 2.8pp to 21.1% (H1 2020: 18.3%) delivering the Group’s target six months earlier than anticipated.
• Reported profit before tax increased by 18.8% to £14.2 million (H1 2020: £11.9 million).
• Adjusted operating cash inflow of £29.6 million (H1 2020: £22.3 million) with strong cash conversion of 104.5% (H1 2020: 99.5%).
• Leverage (excluding lease liabilities) of 1.4x at 31 January 2021, post the acquisition of 75% of ClimaRad BV for £36.2 million (H1 2020: 1.3x).
• Interim dividend of 1.90 pence per share (H1 2020: Nil), reflecting strong profitability, free cash generation and confidence in our future growth prospects.
• The Board expects earnings for the full year to be ahead of current market expectations.
   

OPERATIONAL HIGHLIGHTS 

• Business continuity maintained across the Group despite the impact of local “lockdowns” and with a large proportion of our non-production staff still working from home. Production facilities are operating as normal and all practicing “Covid-19 Secure” at all times although we are experiencing some industry wide supply chain inefficiency most notably in the UK. 
• Strong organic revenue growth in Australasia of 27.0% (23.9% at constant currency) benefitting from the Healthy Homes Standard in New Zealand stimulating demand for ventilation products and an increase in our market share in Australia as we roll out an extended range of the Group’s ventilation product portfolio to the market.
• The integration of ClimaRad BV, the leading provider of de-centralised heat recovery ventilation in the Netherlands, is progressing well, with revenues and profit in the first two months in line with our expectations.
• Considerable progress with our Operational Excellence Programme delivering a broad-based adjusted operating profit margin improvement achieving our 20% target six months earlier than planned.
• Completed our factory relocation project in Sweden moving to a more energy efficient and well invested modern facility in Växjö with considerable capacity headroom to support our ambitious growth plans in the region. 
• Investment in additional injection moulding and manufacturing equipment in the UK and Sweden to support our R&D plans to develop new products across the Group.
   

 SUSTAINABILITY HIGHLIGHTS 

Our products save energy, reduce carbon emissions and help to build healthy sustainable homes and buildings. We made good progress with our recently announced sustainability targets in the first half of the year, targets which are also captured in our new Sustainability Linked Revolving Credit Facility. 

• 63.1% (FY20: 56%) of plastic used in our own manufacturing facilities was from recycled sources.
• 62.1% (FY20: 59%) of our revenue was from low-carbon, energy saving products.
   

Commenting on the Group’s performance, Ronnie George, Chief Executive Officer, said:

 “I am hugely grateful of the efforts made by our dedicated employees as well as mindful that many of our back office and support staff have been working from home, on and off, for nearly twelve months now. We have made tremendous progress with our strategy in the first half of the year. We have delivered strong organic revenue growth, adjusted operating margins expanding to meet our 20% target six months earlier than anticipated and two acquisitions fully focussed on providing low carbon, energy efficient solutions to improve indoor air quality. Our refreshed approach to “Healthy Air, Sustainably” has made great progress in the first half of the year despite the many challenges that operating within this prolonged period of the Covid-19 pandemic presents. Our asset light and flexible model has again proved adept at managing the supply chain challenges that we and large parts of UK industry continue to face and we are also confident that our strong, leading trade brands will be able to deliver the price increases necessary to mitigate some of the inflationary headwinds we see both in regards to inbound logistic costs and material component prices.”

Outlook

Across our Group we have been working with industry wide supply chain inefficiency for some time now and although these interruptions are likely to continue, we believe we are now over the worst impacts with greater visibility for the coming months. With a strong order book across all areas, price increase initiatives underway to offset the inflationary pressures and in general an expected easing of the impacts of Covid-19 in all of our geographic regions, we are confident of making progress in the second half of the year. Underpinned by the margin expansion we have delivered in the first half of the year, the Board expects earnings for the full year to be ahead of current market expectations.

 -Ends-

For further information: 

A conference call for analysts will be held at 10:00am today, Thursday 11 March. Please contact volutiongroup@tulchangroup.com to register and for instructions on how to connect to the conference facility.

A copy of this announcement and the presentation given to analysts will be available on our website www.volutiongroupplc.com from 7.00 am on Thursday 11 March.

Certain information contained in this announcement would have constituted inside information (as defined by Article 7 of Regulation (EU) No 596/2014 as amended by The Market Abuse (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019) prior to its release as part of this announcement.

Volution Group plc Legal Entity Identifier: 213800EPT84EQCDHO768.

Note to Editors:

Volution Group plc (LSE: FAN) is a leading international designer and manufacturer of energy efficient indoor air quality solutions. Volution Group comprises 17 key brands across three regions:

UK: Vent-Axia, Manrose, Diffusion, National Ventilation, Airtech, Breathing Buildings, Torin-Sifan.

Continental Europe: Fresh, PAX, VoltAir, Kair, Air Connection, inVENTer, Ventilair, ClimaRad.

Australasia: Simx, Ventair, Manrose.

For more information, please go to: www.volutiongroupplc.com

Cautionary statement regarding forward-looking statements

This document may contain forward-looking statements which are made in good faith and are based on current expectations or beliefs, as well as assumptions about future events. You can sometimes, but not always, identify these statements by the use of a date in the future or such words as "will", "anticipate", "estimate", "expect", "project", "intend", "plan", "should", "may", "assume" and other similar words. By their nature, forward-looking statements are inherently predictive and speculative and involve risk and uncertainty because they relate to events and depend on circumstances that will occur in the future. You should not place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which are not a guarantee of future performance and are subject to factors that could cause our actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by these statements. The Company undertakes no obligation to update any forward-looking statements contained in this document, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

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