Hilton Food Group PLC

Earnings Release • Nov 8, 2022

National Storage Mechanism | Additional information

RNS Number : 5875F

Hilton Food Group PLC

08 November 2022

8th November 2022

Hilton Food Group plc

TRADING UPDATE

Hilton Food Group plc ("Hilton Foods" or the "Group"), the leading international multi-protein food business, today announces its Autumn trading update.

Trading

During the period, Hilton Foods' volume and revenue have been in line with the Board's expectations, with continued revenue growth compared to the same period last year, although inflationary pressures are providing a headwind. We have continued to make progress in our strategy of diversification across geographies, proteins and channels:

·    In APAC, trading has been in-line with expectations with the New Zealand food park continuing to make excellent progress with strong volume and revenue growth. We hosted an analyst visit to Australia and New Zealand in September to showcase our world class facility in Brisbane and the Group's first multi-protein food park in Auckland.

·    In Europe, our single customer facilities performed well with revenue ahead of the same period last year primarily driven by higher input prices, with particularly strong trading in our Scandinavian markets as well as in Central Europe, driven by the continued strong performance of our fresh food business.

·    In our European multi-customer businesses, overall trading conditions have improved and we have instigated a number of cost savings initiatives and continued our investments in automation, the benefits of which will be delivered in 2023. Within our UK Seafood business we continue to work closely with our retail partners and have made good progress in either mitigating or passing through the unprecedented inflationary costs faced by the business.  However, with this occurring at a slower pace than anticipated, the process is not fully complete, and will continue for the rest of this year and into early 2023.

·    Our technology businesses, Foods Connected and Agito, have continued to add new customers in the period and we are pleased with the early stages of our partnership with Cellular Agriculture.

Outlook

Given the challenges in the UK Seafood business alongside the wider macro-economic environment, the Board anticipates that operating profit will now be below its expectations for the full year.

Despite this the Board remains confident that the business is well placed for 2023, with the Group's financial position continuing to be strong, with leverage remaining at comfortable levels.

We have made good progress in ongoing discussions regarding geographic expansion and continue to explore opportunities for growth in our existing markets as we deliver on our strategy of becoming the protein partner of choice.

The Group expects to announce the publication date for its results for the 52 weeks ending on 1st January 2023 in its January Trading Update on 12th January 2023.

This announcement contains inside information for the purposes of Article 7 of the UK Market Abuse Regulation (EU) No 596/2014 which is part of UK law by virtue of the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018.

For further information please contact: 

Hilton Food Group plc	Tel: +44 (0) 1480 387214
Philip Heffer, Chief Executive Officer Matt Osborne, Chief Financial Officer
Headland Consultancy	Tel: +44 (0) 20 3805 4822
Edward Young
Will Smith
Joanna Clark

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