GE launches 2021 annual reports

Each GE business has a very strong foundation for continued and faster profitable growth

At the same time, the company also published its annual diversity report giving a clear view of how it is creating a global culture of inclusion where people of all backgrounds can thrive.

The annual report showed that, in 2021, GE delivered solid margin and earnings per share performance and $5.8 billion of industrial free cash flow.

Through constant investment in new technologies and innovations, further embedding the lean mindset across its operations, and bringing decision-making closer to the customer, GE has maintained delivery timelines for customers across its markets, despite a year of historic changes.

The company expects to deliver between $5.5 billion and $6.5 billion of free cash flow in 2022 and more than $7 billion in 2023.

With its strengths in technology and innovation, each GE business has a very strong foundation for continued and faster profitable growth.

In the aviation segment, thanks to operational improvements and increasing shop visits, margins expanded in 2021 to 13.5 per cent, while revenues were slightly down, in line with departure activity.

The healthcare segment felt the impact of supply chain disruptions sooner than other businesses in 2021, but the team managed costs, sourcing, and logistics to deliver a solid performance. Orders and organic revenues went up, and margins expanded 70 basis points organically, giving the team both the capital and the flexibility to play some offence.

The renewable energy segment delivered double-digit orders growth in 2021, but revenues and margin both declined organically. Onshore wind is a mature business that faces near-term challenges both structural and of the company’s own making. Demand for offshore wind continues to mount globally, while grid solutions are steadily approaching profitability. In the long term, GE is firmly positioned to lead the energy transition.

In the power segment, service growth offset decreased revenues, driven primarily by GE’s selectivity strategy including more restrained turnkey scopes and project underwriting. Margins improved more than 300 basis points organically. Orders were slightly up, driven by services growth offsetting equipment.

Building a world that works

In 2021, GE announced the biggest transformation in the company’s history – creating three companies focused on the critical global needs in aviation, healthcare, and energy.

With the move, GE is committed to creating a smarter and more efficient future of flight, enabling precision health, and driving decarbonisation through the energy transition.

These independent businesses will take forward the core of GE while better leveraging the innovation muscles, technology expertise, leadership, and global reach to build a world that works for everyone.

As the leader in energy transition, GE is building the breakthrough technologies the world will need in the future, including carbon capture, utilisation, and sequestration, low- and zero-carbon fuels like hydrogen, and small modular nuclear reactors.

GE’s gas turbines have accumulated more than eight million hours running on low-carbon blends and providing reliable baseload electricity to complement large wind projects.

Also, its Haliade-X offshore wind turbine prototype in Rotterdam began operating at 14MW. One of these turbines can offset the emissions of 11,000 vehicles, and GE has over 7GW of Haliade-X commitments worldwide.

GE’s software is helping digitalise the grid to add more renewable energy and make it more resilient. Through innovation and strategic acquisitions such as grid management software company Opus One in 2021, GE is paving the way to an autonomous grid that can detect problems and come up with the most efficient solutions.

The culture of diversity and inclusion

At the same time, GE published its annual diversity report providing a snapshot of the people and practices at the heart of the company’s progress.

GE now works with employees from 169 countries – 68 per cent of whom are based outside the US.

In 2021, nearly 60 per cent of the company revenues were generated from more than 175 countries outside the US.

This is also the first year GE has released pay equity data, with the stated goal of achieving full pay equity in each of its businesses.