While the Post Group can count on a solid foundation, there will be many challenges to face in the future. Evolving markets, changing consumer habits, the launch of new generations of technology... the list goes on. A survey and analysis, with consulting firm Deloitte, of what lies ahead for the postal and telecoms giant.
Like a letter in the post. Or almost. For the moment, the Post Group is performing well. But despite sales of 861.9 million in 2019, up 25% on the previous four years, and an EBITDA - a highly revealing indicator of a company's health - which, despite a slight compression, showed an increase of 21% over the same period, Claude Strasser, Post's Managing Director and Chairman of the Executive Committee, begins with a note of nuance: "I wouldn't have turned my phrase by talking about outperformance. Rather, I would say that the Group is doing well compared with our international peers.”
A slight leap into the past is necessary to explain the Group's good performance. In the 1990s, a number of European countries decided to liberalize and privatize their postal and telecommunications services. Luxembourg's decision not to follow the example of its neighbors, such as France and Belgium, and leave these services in the hands of the State, raised many questions. But today, with the benefit of hindsight, the Grand-Ducal decision suggests that, decades later, the gamble of leaving the various historic trades under one roof has proved a winning one. "We have retained all our historical activities, and after more than 20 years of separation, the trend is reversing. We can see, among our neighbors, postal players getting into the banking business, like Orange in France, which has bought a bank, or Austria's main independent postal operator, which is getting closer to the main local telephone operator. This could well be a happy situation for us. We haven't followed the trend, and that's fortunate," says Post's CEO.
Cautiously, Claude Strasser, who has held this position since May 2012 - and who has driven the development of logistics and communication technology services within the Group - observes these good results while keeping in mind the major challenges ahead. Because there will be.
"We're experiencing very aggressive competition in the mobile world, but we've found the balance."
(This article was written for the April issue of Paperjam magazine, which appeared on March 24, 2021).
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