MILAN, Nov 2 (Reuters) – Ferrari (RACE.MI) will seek technology partnerships as it moves ahead with the transition towards cleaner mobility, new CEO Benedetto Vigna said on Tuesday after the sportscar maker raised this year’s core earnings guidance.
Vigna was presenting his first set of quarterly results.
Asked if he was concerned about Ferrari’s ability to pivot to technologies that require a lot of investment, Vigna told analysts: “I would say that the solution is to go through partnerships.”
“I think it’s important to leverage, at the best, the partnerships. It’s important that you select the areas where you want to excel. And on the others, you work with partners.”
“I think I can bring the experience that I’ve been able to navigate … in an environment that is changing pretty fast,” said Vigna, 52, a former head of the largest division of semiconductor maker STMicroelectronics (STM.BN).
“The window of opportunity to own Ferrari while the market holds its ‘EVs are bad for Ferrari’ narrative won’t last long,” they said.
The company was seeing a “record order intake” worldwide, particularly in China and the United States, Vigna said, adding that it had no supply-chain issues.
A richer product mix, thanks to the hybrid SF90 family and the Monza SP1 and SP2 models, drove a 12% growth in third-quarter core earnings, prompting the upgrade to full-year guidance, Ferrari said.
In the third quarter, adjusted EBITDA grew 12% to 371 million euros, slightly topping analyst expectations of 365 million euros, according to a Reuters poll, while revenue rose 19% to 1.053 billion euros.($1 = 0.8620 euros)
