Main highlights from the consolidated Annual Report 2021:

During 2021, the second full year of the Covid-accelerated digital transformation, ELKO Group observed stable and strong demand from the market in key product segments of IT and consumer electronics products, while supply remained challenging because of the accumulating effects of the component shortage, lack of production capacity and strained logistics from the Far East. Nevertheless, this challenging environment created many opportunities for improving profitability, which, for ELKO Group, resulted in gross profit growth of 22.2% compared to 2020, while cautious cost base management led to a net profit increase of 28.7% to USD 44.4M (EUR 37.5M).

“In 2021, nothing was easy. The record-high results were earned with tough work, and the main key to success is agility. Agility to secure product availability, find logistic routes, manage inventory levels and all along - scrupulous calculation. The profit is in the details. The more complex the environment, the more services and the higher added value we as a distributor can provide,” Svens Dinsdorfs, the CEO of ELKO Group.

In February 2021, ELKO Group issued 20M EUR five-year non-secured bonds with a coupon rate of 6 per annum, payable semiannually. Bonds were listed on the Nasdaq First North in the second quarter of 2021.

Akciju Sabiedrība ELKO Grupa, through its subsidiary ELKOTech Romania SRL acquired 100% of the shares of value-added distributor IT Smart Distribution SRL and WESTech CZ s.r.o, a member of ELKO Group, took over a controlling stake (85% of shares) in Apple B2B solution provider Logicworks s.r.o. from Etnetera Group.

Since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, ELKO Group has stopped supplying goods to the Russian market and, on April 25, 2022, exited the Russian market by selling a 100% stake in all legal entities in Russia, as a continued presence in the Russian market is associated with both financial and reputational risks.

Meanwhile, the business operations of ELKO in Ukraine have resumed since the end of March by opening sales to customers and planning new supplies.

“We have a reorientation ahead of us. The focus is on developing the CEE region and Scandinavia and business recovery in Ukraine. With ELKO's characteristic agility, we are confident that none of the opportunities will be wasted. We already have a shortlist of new product groups to work with, new markets to expand and new services waiting on implementation,” Svens Dinsdorfs.