In the calendar year ending 31st December 2022, Middle Eastern express and logistics company Aramex saw net profits drop by 27% y-o-y to AED 165.3m (£37.1m). This was on a revenue drop of 2.3% to AED 5.93bn (£1.33bn).
In part due to softening economies in its main international markets of the UK and US and China’s now-ended COVID lockdown policy, Aramex saw a big drop in its International Express segment. The 15.2% drop in revenues to AED 2.248bn (£500m) bucked the overall trend of growth at the logistics player.
A sign of future growth in International Express came with the two final months of strong growth in Q4 thanks to the acquisition of MyUS, Aramex’s biggest single acquisition to date. The costs associated with the acquisition were excluded from the normalised EBIT figures, yet impacted its net profit significantly.
Freight Forwarding, Domestic Express and its Logistics business lines all saw moderate growth in the financial year. Aljeda continued, “The strong performance of our Freight-Forwarding product contributed significantly to our top and bottom line in 2022. This is attributed to the implementation of our B2B growth strategy and investments in talent and competencies to deliver on it, while capitalising on market opportunities.”
Looking forward, Aljeda said, “We now have a more diversified customer base than ever before, with no single customer making up more than 7% of our revenue.” Being exposed to different markets should reduce the risk further, with the US and Europe seeing recent difficulties, balanced by strong growth in Africa and Asia.
Aljeda concluded, “We have earmarked AED 2.4bn in capital expenditure over the next five years to sustain our organic growth plans. We also have several M&A opportunities in the pipeline, as inorganic growth is a key component of our growth strategy.
Author: Richard Shrubb
