Strategy & Business Objectives

Irish Continental Group plc is a focused provider of maritime passenger and freight services with its principal operations in the area of North West Europe. The Group operates through two divisions; the Ferries Division comprising Irish Ferries and ship chartering activities, and the Container & Terminal Division, comprising two intermodal freight carriers, Eucon and Feederlink, and two container terminals, Dublin Ferryport Terminal (DFT) and Belfast Container Terminal (BCT), within the two main ports on the island of Ireland.

There are two principal elements to the Group’s strategy for delivering value to shareholders:

• Investment in quality assets in order to achieve economies of scale consistent with a superior customer service.
• Benchmarking costs to industry best practice to enable the Group to compete vigorously in its chosen markets.

We measure our performance using the following financial objectives:

• EBITDA (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation): a measure of the cash generated by the business from its operations.
• Earnings per share (EPS).
• Return on average capital employed (ROACE).
• Operating margin
• Free cash flow.

These financial objectives are supported by a primary operational objective which is schedule integrity (the number of sailings completed versus scheduled sailings).