Published by Global Banking and Finance Review
Posted on February 19, 2025
By Bartosz Dabrowski
(Reuters) - Swiss dental implant maker Straumann Holding expects rising demand from China to help boost sales growth this year, it said on Wednesday after reporting 2024 revenues that matched market estimates.
Straumann, which specialises in tooth replacement and orthodontic solutions, said Asia-Pacific sales grew 33% in 2024, helped by China's initiative to reduce the price of medicines as part of a new procurement policy, and increased market share.
Under China's new volume-based procurement model, implant prices for end customers have fallen sharply, boosting demand in the country.
"The whole 2025, we believe, will still be beneficial for the patient flow remaining dynamic because what has been unlocked as a patient pool is really massive," CEO Guillaume Daniellot told Reuters.
He said the company was in a strong position to grow in China this year. Asia-Pacific accounts for more than a fifth of the company's sales.
The group reported 13.7% organic revenue growth to 2.5 billion francs ($2.77 billion) last year, roughly in line with analysts' average forecast of 2.49 billion francs in a poll compiled by Vara Research.
It's shares were lower in early trade by later recovered and were up 2.7% at 1133 GMT.
Straumann expects overall sales growth in 2025 to be in the high single-digit percentage range, with the margin on earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) for the year seen improving by 30 to 60 basis points at constant currency rates.
Its core EBIT margin came in at 26% in 2024, slightly below the consensus expectation of 26.5%.
Full year core net profit rose to 502 million Swiss francs ($556 million) from 482 million francs the previous year.
But Straumann's North America business, which makes up 28% of its revenue, grew just 3.6% organically in 2024 although Daniellot pointed to signs of improvement.
"We are seeing some light increase in patient traffic since the end of the election period in the U.S. ... and then we hope to have sequential improvement quarter by quarter," he said.
($1 = 0.9033 Swiss francs)
(Reporting by Bartosz Dabrowski in Gdansk; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman, Rachna Uppal and Tomasz Janowski)
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