Slovenia’s Gorenje and VTB Bank (Austria) have signed a €72mn five-year loan agreement, which will be used to refinance Gorenje’s current debt and, in turn, improve the maturity profile of the Group’s financial resources and its financial stability.

Gorenje was established in 1950, as a manufacturing agricultural machinery company, but has now grown into one of the largest exporters of household appliances – such as refrigerators, freezers and cookers – across Europe today. With 95% of total output exported, Gorenje is Slovenia’s most internationalised company.

In addition to the improvement in the maturity profile, this is a further move to cut the company’s overall debt. The target for this year is to deleverage by €25mn. With planned EBITDA of €93.7mn, the net financial debt to EBITDA ratio is anticipated to be cut to 3.6 by the end of this year, and to 3 by the end of 2015.