Industrial holding company High Tech Industries (HTI, Neudörfl / Austria; www.hti-ag.com) is to shed 470 jobs, almost one-third of its total workforce of 1,650, at its facilities in Germany, Austria and the Slovak Republic by year-end 2008. This is in response to “drastic and unannounced changes in contract orders”. The company said the crisis in the automotive sector has had a particularly severe financial effect on itsthe company’s plastics processing operations. The cash flow from operating activities was negative in the first nine months of this year, and the company’s equity ratio contracted.

The restructuring drive announced by CEO Peter Glatzmeier some time ago, but which had not previously been outlined in detail, includes relocating production from HTP Liebscher Kunststofftechnik (Straßlach / Germany) to facilities in Vrable / Slovak Republic and Fohnsdorf / Austria. Sales and distribution and German project management operations will remain at Straßlach. While technologically sophisticated components will continue to be manufactured in Austria, production of basic products will be shifted increasingly to eastern Europe. The production of automotive components is also being relocated from Neudörfl / Austria to Fohnsdorf. Earlier this year Xaver Gruber, who heads the mechanical engineering (machinery manufacture) segment, indicated that both the extrusion machinery manufacturer Technoplast, acquired earlier in 2008, and Topf Kunststofftechnik, a subsidiary of Theysohn Extrusionstechnik, were working only at half capacity. The three sites in Kirchdorf and Micheldorf, both in Austria, were planned to be reduced to one by the end of this year. Both HTI subsidiaries have offices in Russia.

Sales at HTI group increased to EUR 156m in the first nine months of 2008, up from EUR 113m in the same period of 2007. However, the increase was due chiefly to the acquisitions made during 2008: HTP Skinline, Theysohn Extrusionstechnik, Technoplast and Hitzinger. The sales split for the company’s three segments – plastics processing, metal processing and mechanical engineering – shifted significantly towards the latter. This increased the segment’s share of total sales from 11% to 34%, while metal processing saw its share drop from 34% to 31% and plastics processing accounted for just 35%, compared with 50% last year, and achieved the company’s objective of a more balanced sales split among its three segments.

The plastics processing segment reported virtually unchanged sales of EUR 56m year-on-year in the nine-months period. Metal processing posted a slight improvement to EUR 48m (EUR 44.6m), while acquisitions boosted sales in mechanical engineering from EUR 12.6m to EUR 52m. However, the positive earnings performance by the the two other segments was unable to offset the sharp earnings drop in plastics processing, where the company posted a loss of EUR 7m, compared with a profit of EUR 1.5m in the 2007 period.

HTI’s consolidated EBITA slipped to EUR 8m in the first nine months of 2008, a fall of one-third year-on-year, while EBIT was a negative EUR 1m, compared with a EUR 5m profit in the same period of 2007. Glatzmeier attributed the loss of EUR 6m (compared with a EUR 2m) to one-off expenses for the restructuring drive.

Glatzmeier said he does not expect full-year results so show much change in the usiness outlook. and the company is upholding its full-year sales guidance of EUR 200m. For 2009, the CEO forecasts sales of EUR 250m as a result of the full-year consolidation of this year’s acquisitions. Substantially higher earnings and the original sales guidance of EUR 275-300m no longer seem realistic, he added.