Statement Dr. Ludwin Monz, CEO Heidelberger Druckmaschinen AG at SAXOPRINT GmbH, Dresden, August 3rd, 2022

Current Status of HEIDELBERG:
•	HEIDELBERG had a really successful fiscal year 2021/22 and is back on track.
•	Despite headwinds, we have stabilized our leading position in the core market of the printing industry and made ourselves financially fit again (reduction of cost base, reduction of debt, increase of equity ratio).
•	HEIDELBERG benefited from post-COVID recovery of the markets.
•	Other success factors:
•	HEIDELBERG continued to invest into innovation during the Corona crisis. We introduced a new printing press: Speedmaster CX 104. Main application is Packaging printing. 
•	Establishing new business models for generating recurring revenue. 
•	The development of new markets. Our current example is the business with charging units for electric vehicles, which developed excellently in last year.
•	And I can already say today that business has continued to develop stably in the new financial year.

Outlook:
•	In the future, HEIDELBERG will have to strike a balance between the further development of its core printing business on the one hand and the development of new business on the other. 
•	HEIDELBERG will continue to be the technology leader in the printing sector in the future. 
•	We will address the two major challenges of the printing industry: cost and competitive pressure and the shortage of qualified workers
•	We will further improve productivity of printing, and drive automation. 
•	You will see how far we have come tomorrow at SAXOPRINT.

Cooperation with SAXOPRINT

•	HEIDELBERG develops printing technology together with its customers
•	Our loyal customers are a great asset for HEIDELBERG
•	SAXOPRINT is one of the leading online printers here in Germany. 
•	Klaus Sauer, who is the CEO of SAXOPRINT, has a long history with HEIDELBERG. 
•	We will hear more about web-to-print from Mr. Sauer tomorrow. Let me just highlight a few points:
o	Web-to-print is a worldwide growing business and part of the digitization of the printing process.
o	Requirements in terms of print and production quality as well as delivery times are ever growing.
o	Competition is fierce: price pressure drives productivity.
•	From a HEIDELBERG perspective: working with SAXOPRINT is ideal, as we can test new product concepts under challenging conditions.

HEIDELBERG approach:
•	We want to contribute to improving the competitiveness of our customers
•	We focus on the productivity of the production process in the printing plants. 
•	First lever is the productivity of the machines in the print shop, be it the printing presses or the finishing machines.
•	Regarding the printing machines, we eliminate the need for manual intervention. An excellent example is plate-to-unit, as you will see tomorrow 
•	Furthermore, we automate the printing process itself. HEIDELBERG has introduced the "Push to Stop" operating philosophy. It is probably fair to say that the approach has initiated a paradigm shift in industrial print production.
•	Another lever for productivity is the integration of the entire process of the print production end-to-end: the digital preparation, the creation of the printing plates, the printing itself, and the multi-step post-processing. Managing the flow of materials, optimizing machine utilization, and minimizing manual intervention are all aspects of the complex control system.
•	In short: our vision is autonomous printing. 

Thank you SAXOPRINT
•	I’m looking forward to seeing “autonomous printing at SAXOPRINT” tomorrow.
•	I want to thank Mr. Sauer for hosting us.
•	Many thanks to all of you for joining us at this event.