Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, dear colleagues. Welcome on the occasion of the press conference here in Cologne, sunny Cologne. My name is Zemke, and we have got Matthias Zachert and Oliver Stratmann with us as well. We would like to give you an overview of the performance first quarter 2025. We want to give you an outlook concerning the remainder of the year. We are very happy to have you here. Let me start with a few technical remarks. We have got the press conference in German, but it is translated into English simultaneously. After Mr. Zachert's presentation, you can ask the question. For legal reasons, also the indication that this is being streamed on the internet. Mr. Zachert, the floor is yours.
Thank you very much, Claus Zemke. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome on the occasion of the press conference Q1.
I would like to start with my presentation on slide three. The German industry and the chemical industry are still having difficulties, and the reporting season has confirmed that. Having said that, we have been able to show stable sales figures, and the operating income was increased significantly. Reason, slightly increased volumes in all segments, and our cost-lowering program, FORWARD!, has paid off as well. It is against this backdrop that we can confirm our guidance for the entire year. Let me talk about the details. Slide four. S ales level with prior year results, and we have been able to increase our earnings by 32%. Now let me talk about the individual segments. Consumer Protection was able to do an awful lot of catching up.
Constant sales, but earnings improved by almost 50% on the basis of a greater demand, which gave us a better utilization of our facilities. Six, this is additives. Here we have got a decline in sales, simply because the building and construction industry is still on the weak side, but we have lowered costs, and we have got a very good basis in the U.S., which had a very positive development. It has been possible to increase EBITDA by 8%. Advanced Intermediates, rather similar picture. Rather stable when it comes to sales, and a good improvement in EBITDA. Again, it is better utilization and the best cost structure that drove the results. Slide eight. Portfolio transformation.
We are now a specialty chemicals industry or company, and in October we communicated that the Urethane Systems activity would be divested to UBE, and this was all completed on the 1st of April 2025. Now we are a true specialty chemicals company, and the polymer businesses were divested, and there are others now that are better positioned to manage the business. We are going to use the proceeds thereof to deleverage in order to strengthen our balance sheet. Let me talk about the topic of U.S. tariffs, and that of course has kicked up a lot of uncertainty the world over, and also the industry. On slide nine, you see the direct impact on LANXESS, and it does not look very bad.
As far as the U.S. market is concerned, we are in a good position, and that of course is advantageous, even if there are many products in our portfolio that were exempted from particular measures. We have seen that the U.S. administration put quite a lot of products on the exemptions list so that not all the products are impacted. Having said that, there are many products where we know that in the next months we should be able to benefit from the situation vis-à-vis the Chinese competitors. The European market, here we think that lots of products that used to be sold on the American market will now go to Latin America and Europe. Altogether, we see the impact on LANXESS is neutral, maybe even slightly positive.
What I can underline, like many other CEOs, the indirect impact on the global economy could be significant but cannot be quantified. Having said that, ladies and gentlemen, we are able to confirm our guidance. Our guidance is marked by uncertainty. The order behavior of our customers is very much on the short-term side. Nobody would like to make orders if the uncertainty is so great and if tariffs are so very volatile. It is more an ordering behavior that might change every week and not every one or two months. We can confirm EUR 600 million-EUR 650 million, that's the EBITDA guidance, and we feel that the second quarter will be significantly better. Of course we will not consolidate Urethane Systems any longer, and therefore Urethane Systems will not make any earnings contribution any longer.
Ladies and gentlemen, this is what I wanted to share with you concerning the achievements of the first quarter of 2025, and now we will take your questions.
Okay, ladies and gentlemen, use the raise hand button if you want to ask a question in your digital platform, and you would then have to unmute before you can ask your question once we have called you up. Now the first question comes from Annette Becker, Börsen-Zeitung.
I hope you can hear me.
Yes, we can.
Good morning. Mr. Zachert, one question. You mentioned that the portfolio cleanup is now completed. Nevertheless, there is the 40% shareholding in Envalior, which definitely is not part of your core business anymore. So there should be some cleanup there as well. In 2022, when you closed the deal, you said that at the earliest after three years you can sell your shares therein. What are your plans? Will you do that? Will you do it this year? What about your considerations in this respect?
Oh, what a valid question, Ms. Becker. Thank you. Envalior is where we have already taken the first step. We have prepared the agreement already so that the second step can be taken as well. This is no longer part of the classical P&L, and it will not be completely consolidated, but only at equity.
This means we have already taken the first step of leaving Envalior. The second step will follow, and our comment there too has not changed, and it is a confirmation of what we said in 2022. At the earliest after 36 months, we said that we have the opportunity to step out, but we have not commented on our steps for the future. We will do so as soon as we have decided on what to do, and then we will certainly communicate it.
Okay, next question, Thorsten Breitkopf from Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger. Mr. Breitkopf?
I hope you can hear me now.
Yes, we can.
Good morning, Mr. Zachert. My name is Breitkopf. Could you tell us how many jobs were reduced in Q1?
If you look at the figures published, we are now at the status of December.
We used to have 13,200, and now it is round about 12,300 members of staff, which goes to show that the formally communicated figure of about 900 employees worldwide is what we have reduced our workforce by de facto. There are some projects that are still to be terminated, but the lion's share of the cost savings is already affected. We can confirm what we used to say originally, but we did so much sooner than we thought we could be able to.
Thank you very much, and all the best for you. Greetings to the other side of the river.
Yes. Okay, this is jokes between people in the same city. More questions? That does not seem to be the case. Three, two, one. No more. Show of hands. Dear colleagues, thank you. Oh, there is someone from the English-speaking room, Andrew Knowles.
I would have missed him had he not wanted to ask a question. Andrew, the stage is yours.
You launched FORWARD! in 2023, and I think it extends to EUR 150 million in savings by 2025. I wanted to ask, as you look ahead, are you looking at another savings program, or do you feel like over all these years you've looked under every stone for every kind of savings possibility? Could you give me an idea of if you're working on a new, if you're starting to think about a new program starting in 2026, what it might look like, and really how much more costs can you get out of the business? Any thoughts would be appreciated. Thank you.
Ja, Andrew, das ist eine berechtigte Frage.
That's a valid question, Andrew. With FORWARD!, we very clearly focused on the so-called administrative part of our group, and it was mainly in 2023 that we were able to reduce our so-called SG&A costs. That was the intention, and we managed to do so. Of course, we keep looking at our cost structure all the time. At this present point in time, I have to say, of course, you have to keep an eye on the global competition situation. We do not think that we are going to launch another global program of the kind of FORWARD! I do not think that is necessary, but we do continually look at our operations, at our operational network. We look at the framework conditions in the different countries. We look at the product life cycles. We also analyze the effect of the tariffs and the tariff development on our production chains.
This is an ordinary course of business. Having said that, we keep an eye on that, and we do so also in 2025. With respect to SG&A, we believe to have taken a very positive step. Productivity and efficiency of our plants is something that we have to look at all the time, and we do that in 2025 as well, of course.
Fine. Now, Jonas Jansen from FHZ wants to take the floor. Obviously, there were some technical problems in unmuting his mic. His question is, Mr. Zachert, you mentioned the U.S. advantages vis-à-vis the Chinese competition, but also the risk of oversupply. Are you talking about high volume or generic products, or will Chinese also be more competitive in your niche businesses? Especially there is an enormous price competition because of the reduced production costs in China. That is the question.
Again, another good question given the situation as we experience it today. I mean, China is no longer a country, just like in the automobile industry, where they would only produce commodities. Technologically speaking, they have developed a lot, but in the commodities, China was already in a very strong position in the European markets and the American markets. In the specialties, it is slightly different. In specialty chemicals, you have to have close contact to your customers. Commodities in Europe and Latin America, we feel that there is a stronger presence, a stronger footprint of the Chinese competitors. Now in the specialty chemicals, we see more competition, but of course, the Chinese producers do not have these close contacts with the customers here in Europe.
We have to be aware of these developments, and China is no longer the supplier of standard products, and China has done an awful lot of catching up over the past couple of years, and the same will happen in India. Therefore, it is one thing that is for sure. We need to work on our competitiveness. We have to strengthen our sites, and the government promised that they want to get away from an ideological support of the economy, but that they want to support the industry in general. The coalition agreement very much goes into that direction. Here in Germany, we certainly need something like a call that we say we want to step up our performance and we want to step up our competitiveness because the competitors are not asleep at the wheel.
Andrew Knowles, you want to ask another question, fire away.
Yes, thank you. I just wanted to ask about the impact of avian flu and perhaps foot and mouth in the first quarter. What was the sort of financial impact there? Looking forward, these not plagues, but these diseases come around more frequently. I know CapEx, I know investment budgets are tight, but what are your thoughts about, do you have everything you need in terms of capacity there, or is that one of the selective investments that you might be able to find funds for? If that's the case, you need to have to expand it. Thank you.
Ja, ich kann bestätigen, dass.
I can confirm that we do proceed on the assumption that on the basis of more viruses spilling over, zoological viruses have been on the increase over the past couple of years, and we had taken the strategic decision a couple of years ago to become active in the biocides business and also animal health. We are now one of the global leaders when it comes to animal health, disinfectants, and farming products. Therefore, we are in a very good place. The biocides business was taken over from the American companies, i.e., IFF microbial control, Dow Chemicals, DuPont, and a third partner. The biocides business of Bayer was taken over by us and developed further. This makes us one of the strongest players all over the world in this sector.
We believe that when it comes to animal health, there will be a very strong development trend, more activities to be expected. Therefore, we feel that we are going to improve our standing in this direction in the future. When it comes to capacities, we have already enhanced our capacities, and we do not need additional investments. We are able to meet the demand, also additional demand. Should there be further pandemics, be it swine flu, bird flu, whatever, we are in a good place. We are strong, and we will benefit from such diseases should they break out again. We are certainly one of the companies that will be able to give a lot of support in all regions of the world.
Thank you very much. More questions? Obviously not. Thank you very much for dialing in.
No matter where you are on this time of the river, beyond the river, or somewhere else in the world, thank you very much for coming, and goodbye now.