Ad hoc me­dia re­leases

ORIOR AG re­ports solid busi­ness per­for­mance and a re­duc­tion in debt, thereby con­firm­ing the turn­ing point

Ad hoc an­nounce­ment pur­suant to Art. 53 LR

Zurich, 25 March 2026

• Organic growth has surpassed guidance.

• Sales reached CHF 623 million, thanks to numerous innovations and a strong performance by the food service business in Switzerland.

• EBITDA reached CHF 42.9 million, compared with CHF 22.5 million in the previous year; the adjusted EBITDA margin of 6.3% (previous year: 6.2%) is at the upper end of the guidance range.

• A positive free cash flow has led to a significant reduction in net debt and improved the Group’s financial position.

• Strategic realignment defined

• Outlook: Profitability is expected to rise despite a challenging market environment

Busi­ness de­vel­op­ment
In the 2025 fi­nan­cial year, ORIOR gen­er­ated net sales of CHF 622.9 mil­lion (pre­vi­ous year: CHF 642.1 mil­lion). Or­ganic growth was –1.5%, which is above the guid­ance pre­vi­ously com­mu­ni­cated and al­ready re­vised up­wards at the end of the first half of 2025 (–2% to –4%). Sev­eral ma­jor con­tracts – both in Switzer­land and in Bel­gium – were landed, and price ad­just­ments ne­ces­si­tated by ris­ing raw ma­te­r­ial costs were im­ple­mented suc­cess­fully. At the same time, the food ser­vice busi­ness, Gesa – the or­ganic juice pro­ducer in Ger­many that has been suc­cess­ful for years – and Möfag, which is con­sis­tently geared to­wards the dis­counter chan­nel, per­formed very well. This has en­abled ORIOR to off­set a sig­nif­i­cant pro­por­tion of the lost ten­ders, the can­cel­la­tion of a ma­jor con­tract with a Dutch cus­tomer, and the im­pact of the chal­leng­ing re­tail en­vi­ron­ment, which is par­tic­u­larly price-dri­ven in the high-vol­ume seg­ment. The ex­change rate ef­fect im­pacted rev­enue by –0.5%, while the sale of the Al­bert Spiess gas­tron­omy de­pots im­pacted it by –1.0%.  

Sig­nif­i­cant cost sav­ings and the re­lease of pro­vi­sions led to an EBITDA of CHF 42.9 mil­lion, com­pared with CHF 22.5 mil­lion in the pre­vi­ous year, rep­re­sent­ing an in­crease in the EBITDA mar­gin of 340 ba­sis points from 3.5% to 6.9% de­spite per­sis­tently volatile com­mod­ity prices and com­pet­i­tive pres­sure from the re­tail sec­tor. EBITDA, ad­justed for one-off and ex­cep­tional ef­fects, reached CHF 39.0 mil­lion, cor­re­spond­ing to an ad­justed EBITDA mar­gin of 6.3%, which is at the up­per end of the com­mu­ni­cated guid­ance range (5.9% to 6.3%) and rep­re­sents an in­crease on the pre­vi­ous year. The clo­sure of the pro­duc­tion fa­cil­ity in Olen (Bel­gium) and the re­align­ment of the Re­fine­ment seg­ment pro­ceeded ac­cord­ing to plan. Com­bined with an im­prove­ment in net work­ing cap­i­tal, this re­sulted in a favourable cash flow from op­er­at­ing ac­tiv­i­ties of CHF 36.8 mil­lion (pre­vi­ous year: CHF –5.6 mil­lion). EBIT reached CHF 14.1 mil­lion (pre­vi­ous year: CHF –31.9 mil­lion). Net prof­its of CHF 9.4 mil­lion (pre­vi­ous year: CHF –35.2 mil­lion) were recorded.

Net debt was re­duced by CHF 29.1 mil­lion from CHF 181.4 mil­lion at the end of 2024 to CHF 152.3 mil­lion, thanks to the ex­cel­lent free cash flow. Among other things, the sale and lease­back of a com­mer­cial prop­erty and the sale of a non-op­er­a­tional plot of land con­tributed pos­i­tively to this. This re­sulted in the debt ra­tio (net debt/​ad­justed EBITDA) falling to 3.9x (pre­vi­ous year: 4.6x). The eq­uity ra­tio be­fore good­will off­set­ting im­proved to 28.8% (31 De­cem­ber 2024: 26.2%), whilst af­ter good­will off­set­ting it reached 12.4% (31 De­cem­ber 2024: 8.8%).

In or­der to fur­ther strengthen the fi­nan­cial sit­u­a­tion and ac­cel­er­ate debt re­duc­tion, the Board of Di­rec­tors will pro­pose to the An­nual Gen­eral Meet­ing on 4 May 2026 that no div­i­dend be dis­trib­uted for the 2025 fi­nan­cial year.

ORIOR seg­ments
ORI­OR’s Con­ve­nience seg­ment, in­clud­ing Fredag, Le Pa­tron, Pastinella and Biotta, gen­er­ated net sales of CHF 200.1 mil­lion, down –4.5% (pre­vi­ous year: CHF 209.5 mil­lion). The main cause of the de­cline was the tra­di­tional re­tail chan­nel, which failed to build on the pre­vi­ous year’s sales fig­ures. The food ser­vice chan­nel once again per­formed very well, post­ing clear gains thanks to growth in ex­ist­ing prod­uct ranges, newly se­cured vol­ume or­ders, and fur­ther cus­tomer de­vel­op­ment.

ORI­OR’s Re­fine­ment seg­ment, com­pris­ing Rapelli, Al­bert Spiess and Möfag, achieved solid or­ganic sales growth of 2.2%. De­spite the lack of sales from the di­vested Al­bert Spiess gas­tron­omy de­pots (di­vest­ment ef­fect: –2.5%), rev­enue to­talled CHF 248.1 mil­lion, prac­ti­cally un­changed from the pre­vi­ous year (CHF 248.8 mil­lion). Möfag once again de­liv­ered a par­tic­u­larly pos­i­tive per­for­mance, achiev­ing a strong re­sult thanks to its clear po­si­tion­ing in the dis­counter seg­ment.

ORI­OR’s In­ter­na­tional seg­ment, in­clud­ing Culi­nor Food Group, Ca­su­al­food, Gesa and Spiess Eu­rope, gen­er­ated net sales of CHF 197.9 mil­lion (pre­vi­ous year: CHF 203.8 mil­lion), rep­re­sent­ing or­ganic growth of –1.3% (ex­change rate ef­fect: –1.6%). This de­crease is pri­mar­ily due to the ter­mi­na­tion of a ma­jor con­tract with a Dutch cus­tomer and the as­so­ci­ated clo­sure of the pro­duc­tion fa­cil­ity in Olen, Bel­gium.  Culi­nor per­formed well, thanks to newly won con­tracts and suc­cess­fully im­ple­mented price ad­just­ments. Spiess Eu­rope also demon­strated solid growth, while Gesa once again im­pressed with an ex­cep­tion­ally strong per­for­mance.

ORIOR Group key fig­ures – 2025 fi­nan­cial year

ORIOR – Strate­gic re­align­ment
ORIOR is strate­gi­cally re­fo­cus­ing the Group on sus­tain­able, prof­itable growth. De­mo­graphic and so­cial shifts are cre­at­ing a struc­tural de­mand for func­tional, high-qual­ity food so­lu­tions. Healthy age­ing is no longer aimed ex­clu­sively at the 65-plus age group. Mil­len­ni­als and Gen Z are now also in­creas­ingly fo­cus­ing on nu­tri­tional qual­ity, func­tional in­gre­di­ents and well-be­ing ear­lier in life, which opens up cross-gen­er­a­tional mar­ket po­ten­tial for ORIOR.

With strong brands, in­dus­try ex­per­tise and scal­able plat­forms, ORIOR is well po­si­tioned as an in­te­grated so­lu­tions provider for the re­tail and food ser­vice sec­tors. ORIOR con­sis­tently strives for cat­e­gory cap­taincy in its core seg­ments. The strate­gic growth dri­ver lies in the well-be­ing and care sec­tor. ORIOR ad­dresses the en­tire spec­trum of daily nu­tri­tion – from bal­anced meals and snacks to cater­ing for el­derly care and hos­pi­tals.

All strate­gic op­tions for the Bel­gian com­pe­tence cen­tre Culi­nor were re­viewed; how­ever, no value ap­pro­pri­ate for ORIOR could be re­alised. Fur­ther­more, Culi­nor and its port­fo­lio of high-qual­ity fresh meals and meal com­po­nents fit very well with the ORIOR Group’s strate­gic re­align­ment.

Since op­er­a­tional ex­cel­lence and ca­pac­ity util­i­sa­tion are key man­age­ment met­rics, ex­ist­ing struc­tures are op­ti­mised be­fore new ca­pac­ity is cre­ated. Strate­gic sourc­ing and lo­gis­tics are be­ing cen­tralised across the Group in or­der to re­alise economies of scale and en­hance se­cu­rity of sup­ply. Our in­vest­ments fol­low a clear prin­ci­ple: op­ti­mi­sa­tion be­fore ex­pan­sion and strate­gic added value be­fore vol­ume growth. ORIOR op­er­ates with short de­ci­sion-mak­ing processes, rapid im­ple­men­ta­tion ca­pac­ity, and a strong mar­ket fo­cus – and trans­forms its in­dus­trial strengths into sus­tain­able value for share­hold­ers, part­ners and con­sumers.

Out­look
The past fi­nan­cial year was shaped by a tough mar­ket en­vi­ron­ment, which was re­flected in sales. ORIOR is re­spond­ing to this de­vel­op­ment with a clear strate­gic ap­proach.

Two ex­ter­nal fac­tors con­tinue to weigh on the en­vi­ron­ment. The Swiss re­tail sec­tor is go­ing through a chal­leng­ing phase, the ef­fects of which are also be­ing felt by ORIOR. At the same time, com­mod­ity prices re­main volatile, mak­ing it dif­fi­cult to con­duct ac­cu­rate cost plan­ning through­out the value chain. Lower pork prices and the loss of sales from the Dutch cus­tomer are weigh­ing on rev­enue.

Nev­er­the­less, ORIOR is con­fi­dent about the fu­ture. We ex­pect con­tin­ued growth in the food ser­vice busi­ness in Switzer­land, and our de­fined strate­gic growth dri­vers, such as the care sec­tor, are also gain­ing mo­men­tum. Re­tail busi­ness re­mains a key sales chan­nel, which we are ac­tively de­vel­op­ing us­ing a range of in­no­v­a­tive ini­tia­tives. The ac­qui­si­tion of the Ital­ian pasta man­u­fac­turer Pas­ti­fi­cio Gaetarelli, which was com­pleted in early 2026, is also en­abling us to ex­pand and strengthen our strate­gic po­si­tion in the pre­mium fresh pasta seg­ment.

The planned trans­fer of pro­duc­tion vol­umes from Al­bert Spiess to Rapelli is on track to be com­pleted by mid-2026 as sched­uled; at the same time, the prod­uct port­fo­lio will be se­lec­tively stream­lined. Fur­ther mea­sures in­tro­duced to im­prove ef­fi­ciency are also hav­ing a pos­i­tive im­pact on prof­itabil­ity.

As part of its strate­gic re­align­ment, the Board of Di­rec­tors has set it­self medium-term fi­nan­cial tar­gets: EBITDA > 7.5% and debt < 3x. With the debt ra­tio sig­nif­i­cantly be­low 3x and a good free cash flow, the re­turn of cap­i­tal to share­hold­ers is to be re­sumed. Fur­ther­more, we ex­pect to re­turn to or­ganic rev­enue growth in the medium term.

The ORIOR Re­spon­si­bil­ity: Launch of Sus­tain­abil­ity Strat­egy 2030 and ORIOR Cli­mate Fund
At the end of 2025, ORIOR com­pleted its first year un­der the new Sus­tain­abil­ity Strat­egy 2030. The tar­get scope has been sig­nif­i­cantly ex­panded and now com­prises 15 quan­ti­fied tar­gets, eleven of which were on track as at the end of the re­port­ing year. We are par­tic­u­larly pleased that, for ex­am­ple, the food waste rate, en­ergy in­ten­sity and the num­ber of self-at­trib­ut­able com­plaints have been sig­nif­i­cantly im­proved, thereby mak­ing a pos­i­tive con­tri­bu­tion to the ORIOR Group’s busi­ness per­for­mance. In terms of pro­jects and ini­tia­tives, the launch of ORI­OR’s in­ter­nal cli­mate fund and the sub­mis­sion and ap­proval of the SBTi tar­gets were es­pe­cially note­wor­thy ac­com­plish­ments dur­ing the past fi­nan­cial year.

Per­son­nel changes in the Board of Di­rec­tors and man­age­ment
Dr Patrick M. Müller, a mem­ber of the Board of Di­rec­tors of ORIOR AG, re­signed from his po­si­tion in mid-De­cem­ber 2025. This de­ci­sion was reached by mu­tual agree­ment due to dif­fer­ing views re­gard­ing ORI­OR’s man­age­ment struc­ture. The Board of Di­rec­tors would like to thank Dr Patrick M. Müller for his con­tri­bu­tions and wishes him all the best for the fu­ture, both per­son­ally and pro­fes­sion­ally.

Af­ter over 18 years with ORIOR, Milena Math­i­uet, Chief Cor­po­rate Af­fairs Of­fi­cer and a mem­ber of the Ex­ec­u­tive Com­mit­tee, has de­cided to leave the Group. ORIOR is grate­ful to Milena Math­i­uet for her many years of in­valu­able ser­vice and wishes her noth­ing but the best, both pro­fes­sion­ally and per­son­ally. Milena Math­i­uet will con­tinue to sup­port the on­go­ing re­port­ing and An­nual Gen­eral Meet­ing sea­son, af­ter which time she will be leav­ing the Group. In­vestor Re­la­tions will then be taken over by the Group CFO.

Our thanks
The cur­rent phase calls for a high level of com­mit­ment, en­tre­pre­neur­ial courage and a will­ing­ness to break new ground. We would like to ex­tend our heart­felt thanks to our em­ploy­ees for their ex­cep­tional ded­i­ca­tion and their vi­tal con­tri­bu­tion to ORI­OR’s con­tin­ued growth and de­vel­op­ment. We would also like to thank our cus­tomers, our part­ners and our share­hold­ers for their trust and un­wa­ver­ing sup­port.

In­vi­ta­tion to video con­fer­ence
To­day, Wednes­day, 25 March 2026, at 10:00am (CET), Chair­woman and Del­e­gate of the Board of Di­rec­tors Monika Friedli-Walser and CFO Sacha D. Ger­ber will pre­sent the 2025 full-year re­sults as part of an in­vestor and an­a­lyst con­fer­ence. The con­fer­ence will take place close to Zurich’s main rail­way sta­tion; at­ten­dance via Teams is also pos­si­ble by re­quest.

Please con­tact us to reg­is­ter and so that we can pro­vide you with the de­tails.
> Vivien Erne, vivien.erne@orior.ch, di­rect line +41 44 308 65 02

Down­load links
>> An­nual Re­port 2025
>> Al­ter­na­tive Per­for­mance Mea­sures Full Year 2025
>> Pre­sen­ta­tion of 2025 fi­nan­cial re­sults
>> Im­age gallery for the me­dia

Con­tact
Milena Math­i­uet, Chief Cor­po­rate Af­fairs Of­fi­cer
Phone +41 44 308 65 13, e-mail: milena.math­i­uet@orior.ch

In­vestor's agenda
25 March 2026: Pub­li­ca­tion of 2025 fi­nan­cial re­sults and An­nual Re­port
8 April 2026: Pub­li­ca­tion of the re­port on non-fi­nan­cial mat­ters
8 April 2026: Mail­ing of the in­vi­ta­tion to the An­nual Gen­eral Meet­ing
24 April 2026 (11:00am, CEST): Share reg­is­ter closes
4 May 2026: An­nual Gen­eral Meet­ing of ORIOR AG
25 Au­gust 2026: Pub­li­ca­tion of 2026 half-year re­sults

Archive me­dia re­leases: