DEAG Deutsche Entertainment reported an 8.2% increase in its revenue for the first half of 2024, but has seen its EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortisation) fall, though the company said this was to be expected and is “largely in line with planning”.
Revenue rose to €132.7m (£112m/$147m) compared to €122.7m during the same period the year prior, while EBITDA fell from €5.1m to €3.1m.
A release said that DEAG “saw its business develop positively in the first half of financial year 2024 – despite a weak overall economic environment in Europe, a serious market shakeout in the festival and open-air sector, weather-related event restrictions and significant investments in DEAG’s corporate structures and further growth”.
DEAG’s summer performance has been put down to the hosting of UEFA Euro 2024, which meant there was less spending on other leisure activities. Additionally, heavy rainfall and storms across Germany and Europe saw some events cancelled completely or held with lower capacity.
“A number of DEAG events were also affected by this in the second quarter and were therefore unable to reach their usual level. This resulted in a significant reduction in revenue, but the expenses for the insured events were still incurred in full,” added the release.
However, the DEAG board is optimistic about the second half of the year, thanks to a strong ticketing segment.
Across the year, DEAG is aiming to generate around half of its consolidated revenue with its own event formats, for which an increasing share of tickets will be sold via its ticketing platforms: Myticket, Gigantic and Tickets(.ie). As of June 30, the number of tickets to concerts and events sold in 2024 and 2025 increased by 18% to 5.8 million. An increase to around 11 million tickets is expected for the year as a whole, up from the 10 million sold in 2023.
The festivals segment was also further strengthened by the acquisition of a majority stake in Black Mamba Event & Marketing in June. That same month, DEAG spun off its hip-hop division to become a separate company in the form of District Live.
The live touring segment brought in a revenue of €74.4m for the half year ending June 30, compared to €76.6m during the same period last year. Entertainment services brought in €65.6m compared to €58.5m, however.
“We defied the difficult market environment in the first half of the year. Unfortunately, the bad weather affected some of our events, which is also reflected in our key financial figures,” commented Detlef Kornett, group chief executive of DEAG.
“DEAG’s second half of the year will be strong, as expected, our event programme is diversified and our calendar of events is tightly packed. Visitors can look forward to hundreds of great events of all genres and sizes. We are also investing heavily in staff, new technologies and our platforms in order to further improve the customer experience and offer our customers first-class entertainment. Despite the challenges mentioned, we expect revenue to continue to rise and EBITDA to at least the previous year’s level for the year as a whole.”
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