Hubert Burda Media has a positive assessment of the 2023 financial year. Notwithstanding the current geopolitical challenges that include Russia’s aggression in Europe, skyrocketing energy costs, continuing inflation and persistently low consumer confidence, the Burda Group’s outlook for 2024 is optimistic. In the previous year, the Group posted revenues in excess of €2.7 billion. These were generated by some 500 products in Germany and 17 other countries. Year-on-year, this equates to a 5.9 percent dip in revenue. At the end of 2023, the Group employed just under 10,000 people.
The year’s top successes were the further development of the digital business models, above all at BurdaVerlag, BurdaInternational in Poland and BurdaForward. The HolidayCheck Group also generated positive growth in the event and advertising sectors. The Group’s international investment arm, BurdaPrincipal Investments (BPI), expanded its portfolio by some 30 investments.
Burda structures its operations into three divisions: Consumer Media, B2B Media and Services and Commerce. The Group’s objective is to offer products and services in every area that deliver the highest possible added value to customers – by providing helpful advice, information and inspiration, and entertainment.
The media and publishing businesses are combined under the umbrella of Consumer Media. The division’s aggregate revenues for the previous business year totaled €1.1 billion, a slight rise over 2022. On the domestic front, the division is comprised above all of BurdaVerlag and BurdaForward, along with the neighbourhood network Nebenan.de.
Burda published 444 magazine titles worldwide in 2023. In Germany alone, the division's media brands are an integral part of the lives of 37.9 million readers every year. In BurdaVerlag's Health growth market, further partners such as telemedicine and appointment booking providers have joined the "Future Pact Pharmacy", the alliance founded by Burda and Noweda to strengthen local pharmacies in Germany, in 2023. The Publishing Kids unit comprises the children's magazine publisher Blue Ocean Entertainment in Stuttgart and is the leading publisher of children's magazines in German-speaking countries in terms of sales revenue.
The publishing activities of BurdaInternational extend to a dozen countries, foremost Great Britain, continental Europe and Asia. Last year’s acquisition of the key local digital publisher Extra Online Media also set the stage for future-oriented multiplatform media operations in the Czech Republic.
BurdaForward's portfolio includes high-reach brands such as Focus Online, TVSpielfilm.de, Bunte.de, Finanzen100, Fit for Fun, NetMoms and Efahrer.com. The company thus reaches more than 40 million unique users per month and therefore around 65 per cent of internet users in Germany. BurdaForward relies heavily on future technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI) to develop and transform business models. In 2023, the publisher set up an AI-based product advice service to help users make purchasing decisions on Chip.de.
Nebenan.de has been a majority holding of Hubert Burda Media since 2020 and is the leading neighbourhood network in Germany with over 3 million verified users. The network continued its strong growth in users in 2023.
The division B2B Media und Services encompasses all the professional offerings that Burda provides for enterprise customers. These include the majority shareholding in New Work SE (which operates the career network Xing), the employer rating platform Kununu, BurdaDruck and the C3 agency group. In 2023, sales revenues in this division declined by 5.8 percent to a total of €505.5 million.
The Xing jobs network was used by more than 22 million members in the D-A-CH region in 2023. The financial year was particularly successful for the employer review platform Kununu, which significantly increased both the number of platform sessions and the number of company profiles and workplace insights compared to the previous year.
BurdaDruck specialises in the production of high-quality magazines, catalogues and advertising prints in high-volume gravure printing. With sites in Offenburg, Nuremberg and Vieux-Thann in France, BurdaDruck is one of the largest printing companies in Europe. BurdaDruck operates in a market that has been in decline for years and is characterised by overcapacity - this trend has slowed over the course of the year, but not reversed.
The content marketing agency C3 works in the client-pod agency model and supports clients with interdisciplinary, agile project teams. C3 combines over 30 specialist disciplines - from strategy and conceptualisation, content creation and technology expertise to marketing intelligence and performance marketing.
The Commerce division pools all the Group’s key internet-based activities in the areas of e-commerce and travel. Here the 2023 revenues dropped by 13.4 percent to €1.1 million.
BurdaCommerce includes the electronics e-commerce subsidiaries Cyberport SE with the Cyberport and Computeruniverse brands, Cyberport IT-Services GmbH, CyberSolutions GmbH and the online wine retailer Silkes Weinkeller GmbH. Cyberport was also one of the largest e-commerce companies in Germany in 2023 and has 9 stores in Germany and Austria. The expansion of the existing retail business with the service business of Cyberport IT-Services GmbH was driven forward in 2023 in order to be able to offer the company's numerous business customers not only hardware and software, but also corresponding IT services.
The HolidayCheck Group achieved a significant increase in revenue. The digital travel platform has diversified its business models and expanded its B2B business in addition to B2C, for example by establishing a club business and selling advertising space to travel providers.
As in the previous year, the division's largest investments were made by BurdaPrincipal Investments (BPI). In the field of artificial intelligence (AI), BPI invested in the German company AlephAlpha and the French SaaS company Modjo. The German start-up Neotaste complements the BPI portfolio with a voucher app for restaurants. Uluu is another new addition to the portfolio; the Australian company offers natural and sustainable material alternatives to plastic.
Hubert Burda Media remains optimistic about the business year 2024 and is continuing to focus on innovation and growth in the digital sector. Specifically, Burda plans to reinforce the synergies between the various companies (most notably by deploying artificial intelligence, data-based monetarization and editing strategies) with the goal of further driving the transformation of entrepreneurial and journalistic concepts. The emphasis lies on building new digital business models. Overall in 2024, Burda is expecting revenues to remain stable.
| 2022 | 2023 | Change | |||
| € million | in % | € million | in % | ACTUAL (in %) | |
| Consumer Media | 1,124.5 | 38.5 | 1,149.3 | 41.8 | 2.2 |
| B2B Media and Services | 536.5 | 18.4 | 505.5 | 18.4 | -5.8 |
| Commerce | 1,247.8 | 42.7 | 1,080.8 | 39.3 | -13.4 |
| Other | 12.5 | 0.4 | 11.9 | 0.5 | -4.8 |
| Sales revenue | 2,921.3 | 100.0 | 2,747.5 | 100.0 | -5.9 |
Contact:
presse@burda.com