Other operating income rose moderately by 0.2 million euros, primarily due to a slight increase in project grants.

At 108.9 million euros (previous year: 106.9 million euros), the total operating performance thus increased by 2.0 million euros.

The cost of materials increased by 1.7% or 0.6 million euros to 35.6 million euros, primarily

due to the increase in expenses for IT and video services, coupled with a decline in sales-driven fee expenses in the image segment and in the written content segment at Custom Content.

In 2025, personnel costs increased year-on-year by around 1.6 million euros from 62.0 million euros to 63.6 million euros. The development of personnel costs was particularly affected by the 5.0% adjustment of standard salaries as of November 1, 2024 and then by 2.5% as of April 1, 2025, as well as an increase to the special allocation to the dpa provident fund of 0.75 million euros. On the other hand, a decline in the average number of employees by 12 positions had the desired cost-saving effect.

The annual average number of employees fell to 694 (previous year: 706). In addition, an average of 70 temporary staff were employed (previous year: 51). The proportion of female employees in the company remained virtually unchanged at around 52%, as in the previous year. The number of part-time employees rose to 168 (previous year: 164).

Depreciation and amortisation amounted to 2.6 million euros, the exact same as the previous year’s figure.

Other operating expenses fell significantly by 1.2 million euros to 24.3 million euros and thus even exceeded the budgeted cost reduction target of 1.0 million euros. Despite the significant construction work that was still underway at the Hamburg and Frankfurt locations in 2025, the decline of 0.4 million euros in communications costs, as well as many other reductions in operating and administrative expenses, which were the result of targeted cost-cutting measures, played a decisive role here.

The financial result amounted to 18.8 million euros, compared with 19.9 million euros in the previous year, a decline that was thus significantly smaller than had been expected, due to the transfer of the digital editorial department, and thus WebLine revenues, from infocom to dpa GmbH. In particular, the above-average contribution to earnings from dpa Picture-Alliance, which increased by 1.5 million euros compared with the previous year, had a significant impact, more than offsetting the decline at news aktuell of 0.7 million euros.

This resulted in earnings before taxes of 1.6 million euros. The consolidated profit after taxes also amounted to 1.6 million euros, 0.2 million euros higher than the previous year’s figure.