Since the start of the 2007 financial year, we have been reporting on the Parcel Germany unit in the MAIL Division; the prior-year figures were restated accordingly.

The division once again increased its revenues in 2007, pushing them up by 1.3% from €15,290 million to €15,484 million. The fourth quarter, which is traditionally strong, contributed much to this development. We counterbalanced the anticipated decline in domestic mail by growing our business abroad, largely thanks to the first-time inclusion of Williams Lea with effect from 1 April 2006. As in the past, currency effects were marginal in the reporting period. They pushed down revenue by €79 million.

Profit target reached

With a profit from operating activities (EBIT) of €2,003 million, we achieved our announced target of around €2 billion. Alongside higher revenues from the international mail business, improved productivity and lower costs also played a role. Compared with the previous year (€2,094 million), our performance deteriorated by 4.3%, amongst other things because the period was 1.8 working days shorter and due to our price reduction in the Parcel Germany business in 2006. In addition, we reduced the price of orders for the formal delivery of documents in January 2007. The figure for the third quarter of 2006 also contained €66 million attributable primarily to the settlement with the Bundesanstalt für Post und Telekommunikation (German federal posts and telecommunications agency), which gave rise to reimbursement of the payments already made for financial years 1997 to 2003. The figure for the fourth quarter of 2007 contained €58 million, chiefly from the adjustment of pension provisions in view of the changed retirement age. Measured against 2006, non-recurring effects thus had only a marginal impact. The return on sales was 12.9%.