In a statement from PostNL on 6 August 2018, Herna Verhagen, CEO of PostNL explained the decision to divest Nexive and Postcon. ‘‘In line with our strategy to be the postal and logistic solutions provider and the focus on our core markets in the Benelux, we have decided to divest Nexive and Postcon. We have full confidence that the management teams in both countries will be able to realise their strategic ambitions, develop their activities and strengthen their position in Italy and Germany respectively. The preparations for the divestment processes have been started and we will update the market when appropriate.

Our Q2 results are in line with the development in the first quarter with no material changes in the underlying drivers, as we indicated when publishing our Q1 results. Year-to-date, 44% of our revenue is e-commerce related, evidencing our accelerating transformation. In Parcels, we again saw impressive volume growth translating into double-digit revenue increase. This confirms our solid position in the Benelux e commerce logistics market. As we guided earlier, the investments in growth continue to impact results. The construction of our new sorting centres is proceeding as planned. Three of these are expected to become operational and to contribute to efficiency improvement towards the end of the year.

Volume decline in Mail in the Netherlands develops in line with expectations, caused by the same drivers as we have seen before: particularly substitution, and increased competition, supported by regulation. We realised €10 million of cost savings, which is lower than anticipated, due to delays in the roll-out of the sorting code and other adjustments in our operational process. We are confident that these developments will improve. However, we expect to end up slightly below our indication of between €50 million and €70 million for 2018. The anticipated step-up in cost savings after 2018 is well supported by several projects, including further savings in overhead and the next phase of efficiency improvements in our sorting and delivery model.

We welcome the conclusions of the state secretary of Economic Affairs, Mrs. Keijzer further to the postal dialogue. The recognition that regulation should reflect the strongly declining postal market, is a crucial step. Adjustment of current regulation is mandatory to safeguard the accessibility and reliability of the postal delivery for everyone in the Netherlands for the years to come. As stated before, we consider consolidation of networks the best solution for an affordable postal delivery and to manage the volume decline in a socially responsible manner. Given the pace of the changes in the postal market, facilitating such consolidation will require swift political action.

Taking into account the decision to divest Nexive and Postcon, our outlook for underlying cash operating income in 2018 is between €160 million and €190 million. Furthermore, all other things being equal for our continuing operations, this will impact our ambition for 2020 by around €25 million. Having said that, we must acknowledge that implementation of the conclusions of the postal dialogue may impact the business drivers of Mail in the Netherlands, as well as the cost saving plans going forward. We remain confident that the run-rate in cost savings will increase based on the robustness of the underlying plans, but the possible changes in the Dutch postal market make it difficult to predict the exact numbers and phasing of the anticipated cost savings and related cash-out in the years towards 2020. More visibility on the possible financial consequences is expected before the summer of 2019, depending on the pace at which adjustment of regulation and other measures will be realised. For Parcels (including Spring) we remain fully focussed on achieving our ambition to maintain a solid underlying cash operating income margin with a growing revenue towards 2020.

We confirm our aim to paying progressive dividend, also over 2018, and expect our consolidated equity position to be positive again per year-end. In line with our dividend policy, we announce a 2018 interim dividend of €0.07 per share.”

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Source: PostNL