a&s Italy and analyst KF Economics (K Finance Group) recently released the fourth edition of the Top 25 Italian Security Leaders. The past four years haven’t been brilliant for the Italian economy as a whole; however, the mature sector still showed signs of growth without compromising on profitability.
The fourth edition of the Top 25 Italian security leaders has been released by a&s Italy and analyst KF Economics (K Finance Group). The past four years haven't been brilliant for the Italian economy as a whole; however, the mature sector still showed signs of growth without compromising on profitability. This list included only firms, Italian or multinational, that had an Italian value-added tax number and that were entirely dedicated to security.
Based on 2014's revenue, the top five companies of the Italian Security 25 were Notifier Italia, Project Automation, Hesa, Cima, and Tecnoalarm. The list didn't show many new entries or changes of position. Nevertheless, it would be worthwhile to note the entry of two new companies: Cima and Data General Security, as well as the significant rise of Hikvision Digital Technology, which moved from the 50th to the 22nd position as a result of an impressive 98 percent growth.
The average revenue of the Top 25 in 2014 was US$24.3 million – almost five times the average for the entire sample included in the survey, which amounted to an average of $5 million. Variations over the past four years have not been marked. However, a comparison of the entire sector by revenue during the said time period revealed an industry slowdown in 2012, followed by an 8- to 10-percent improvement in EBITDA/sales margins.
The distribution of revenue of the overall sample across the supply chain remained fairly stable. Producers still dominated the sample, representing 48 percent of the revenue, followed by systems integrators and distributors that covered 23 and 21 percent respectively. Producers/distributors represented the remaining 7 percent.
Revenue Growth
The top 25 by revenue growth ranking only considered SME and corporate companies that had an income of at least $5.7 million in 2014 as smaller-sized companies can show more volatile trends. This year showed a high rotation of players in the sector with Logital, Cima, Telematic Solutions, Hikvision Italy, and Consiag taking the first five slots.
However, there were three exceptions to this trend: Hikvision, Videotrend, and Aikom were already in the first three places in 2014 and remained at the summit of the top 25 for growth in 2015. An interesting aspect is that these tend, on average, to be companies that also succeeded in maintaining excellent margins (12 percent of EBITDA/sales compared with -4 percent for the sample and 10 percent for the top 25 by revenue).
It has to be said, though, that some of these entities have such a low number of employees as to suggest a holding structure rather than an operative company, growing in potential through acquisitions and not organically.
TOP 25 COMPANIES BY REVENUE
*Monetary figures have been converted from euro to US dollar at 1:1.13