After a strong first quarter 2025, Krones’ business developed according to plan from April to June, despite the challenging macroeconomic environment. The company’s markets are generally less affected by economic fluctuations and Krones’ customers continue to show robust willingness to invest.
Stable order intake – 6.7% increase in revenue
Krones’ order intake remained at a good level in the second quarter of 2025 at €1,294.5 million, 1.2% below the previous year. In the first half of 2025, despite the macroeconomic uncertainties, the contract value of orders fell compared to the previous year’s very high figure of €2,792.9 million by just 2.2% to €2,730.4 million.
As of 30 June 2025, Krones had an order backlog totalling €4,293.4 million. Krones’ order backlog thus showed virtually no change from the end of 2024 (€4,289.5 million). Relative to the previous year’s figure of €4,359.1 million, the order backlog was down slightly by 1.5%. The continued very high order backlog ensures production capacity utilisation in the lines and project business through to the middle of 2026.
Krones’ stable revenue growth continued in the first half of 2025. Due to calendar effects, the pace of growth slowed as expected from April to June. In the first six months of 2025, revenue increased by 6.7% year on year, from €2,556.1 million to €2,726.5 million. Part of the revenue growth in the first half-year is due to Netstal Maschinen AG, which was acquired in 2024 and whose revenue Krones has consolidated since 28 March 2024.
Significant rise in Krones’ profitability
The implementation of strategic measures to improve performance and the company’s cost structures had a positive impact on Krones’ profitability in the first half of 2025. This also benefited from good production capacity utilisation. Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) rose between January and June 2025 by 12.6% year on year, from €256.2 million to €288.5 million. The EBITDA margin consequently improved significantly from 10.0% to 10.6%, which is within the EBITDA margin target of 10.2% to 10.8% for the full year 2025. The acquisition of Netstal Maschinen AG had a slightly dilutive impact on the margin in the reporting period.
Earnings before taxes (EBT) increased by 10.7% to €205.5 million in the first half of 2025 (previous year: €185.7 million). The EBT margin consequently rose from 7.3% to 7.5%. On the bottom line, Krones generated consolidated net income of €145.8 million in the first six months of 2025, up 8.0% year on year. Earnings per share improved to €4.60 (previous year: €4.27).
Free cash flow (excluding M&A activities) of €46.7 million in first six months
Krones significantly improved free cash flow in the first half of 2025 by €102.9 million year on year to €44.5 million (previous year: €–58.4 million). It should be noted here that the acquisition of Netstal Maschinen AG had a negative impact of €166.7 million on free cash flow in the previous year. Adjusted for M&A activities, free cash flow fell from €127.0 million in the previous year to €46.7 million in the first six months of 2025.
