Trade enabler makes US$ 2,5bn worth of acquisitions last year
DP World has recorded strong financial results for the year ended December 31, 2018 and revenue grew 20%, it recently announced.
Announcing the 2018 results, the Dubai Group said its adjusted EBITDA increased 13.7% with adjusted EBITDA margin of 49.7%, delivering profit attributable to owners of the company, before separately disclosed items, of US$ 1.27bn, up 5.1% and EPS (earnings per share) of 153 US cents.
“This robust performance has been delivered in an uncertain trade environment, once again highlighting the resilience of our portfolio,” said Sultan Ahmed Bin Sulayem, Group Chairman and CEO, DP World.
“We have made good progress in delivering on our strategy of strengthening our portfolio to become a global solution provider and trade enabler with approximately US$ 2.5bn worth of acquisitions announced in the year,” noted Bin Sulayem.
“These acquisitions offer strong growth opportunities and enhance DP World’s presence in the global supply chain as we continue to diversify our revenue base and look at opportunities to connect directly with the owners of cargo and aggregators of demand,” he stated.
“Going forward, we aim to integrate our new acquisitions and drive synergies across the portfolio with the objective of removing inefficiencies in global trade, improving the quality of our earnings and driving returns,” he added.
The Dubai group said the capital expenditure of $908 million was invested across the portfolio during the year, below the group’s guidance of approximately US$ 1.4bn in 2018.
In 2018, gross global capacity was at 90.8mn TEU, while the consolidated capacity was put at 49mn TEU.
According to DP World, the acquisitions of Drydocks, DMC, CWC, Cosmos Agencia and Unifeeder were performing in line with expectations and have led to increased contribution to its revenue line.
“We expect capital expenditure in 2019 to be up to US$ 1.4bn with investment planned mainly into UAE, Posorja (Ecuador), Berbera (Somaliland), Dakar (Senegal) and Sokhna (Egypt),” said Bin Sulayem.
DP World continued to invest in solution providers and acquired the integrated multimodal logistics player Continental Warehousing Corporation (CWC) in India, Cosmos Agencia Marítima in Peru, and the Unifeeder Group in Denmark, which operates the largest container common user feeder and growing shortsea network in Europe.
The company has also announced the acquisition of the pan-European logistics business, P&O Ferries.
“Aside from our investments in solution providers, we won a 30-year concession for the management and development of a greenfield port project at Banana in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). We announced the acquisition of two ports in Chile, which will allow us to serve cargo owners at five major gateway terminals in the west coast of South America,” remarked Bin Sulayem.
“We have also consolidated our position once again in Australia, where there is an opportunity to expand beyond the ports into logistics,” he added.
