Italy’s Piaggio Group, the largest European PTW manufacturer, made significant progress during 2019 with improvements for all key performance indicators. BDN financial editor Roger Willis reports.
Annual revenue rose by 9.5% to £1.282bn. Turnover attributable to scooters and motorcycles was 10.1% up to £889.1m, with volume growing by 1.6% to 399,600 units. Overall operating profit reached £88.1m, a 12.7% increase, and operating margin improved to 6.9% from 6.7%. Net profit stacked on an impressive 29.6% to £39.3m. Capital expenditure during the year benefited from a 22.2% rise to £118.7m, while net debt was reduced by £33.3m to £328.3m.
Piaggio’s Asia Pacific PTW operations made the biggest advance, with sales volume 14.5% up and revenue gaining 23.2%, although the company admitted to a “slight downturn” in India. Europe, North America and Latin America delivered a 2.4% volume increase and an 8.3% revenue improvement.
In Europe, Piaggio claimed to have “confirmed its leadership of the scooter segment” with a 24.1% market share. In North America, it “maintained a strong position” thanks to a 23.7% share of probably not a lot of scooters.
Motorcycle business turnover was a splendid 24.6% higher, largely driven by Moto Guzzi and the widely-acknowledged success of its retro adventure V85TT model in particular. Piaggio added that “results also improved for the Aprilia brand” but declined to provide any details.