€34.77 billion of orders against €23.68 billion of revenue: Siemens's AI story is written in data-centre switchgear and trains

The cleanest reading of the AI boom today came not from a chip designer but from a Munich engineering group. Siemens reported its fiscal fourth quarter, to 30 September, this morning, and its orders rose 58% to a quarterly record of €34.77 billion¹. Revenue rose 11% to €23.68 billion; net profit rose to €2.43 billion from €1.84 billion¹. The order backlog reached €143 billion, and the book-to-bill ratio 1.47¹. Desk arithmetic: €34.77bn ÷ €23.68bn ≈ 1.47, so for every euro billed, almost a euro and a half of new work came in.

Look at where the orders came from. Smart Infrastructure, which sells the electrical kit that keeps buildings and grids running, grew revenue 16% to €7.24 billion and orders 40%, helped by large data-centre contracts, particularly in the US and Europe¹. Mobility’s orders more than quadrupled on big German rail contracts, including a €2.4 billion order for high-speed trains¹. Digital Industries, the automation business, lifted revenue 11% and profit 50%, mostly on operational improvements¹. Industrial profit reached a record €3.90 billion, with the margin up to 16.8% from 15.3%¹.

That is the contrarian point worth keeping. The loudest AI claims are about models; the money Siemens is taking in is for switchgear, power distribution, automation and trains, the dull machinery that a data centre or a timetable needs before any model runs. Siemens itself has raised its medium-term growth targets and says it wants to seize the chances of industrial artificial intelligence¹. Its own drivers for next year are investment in AI and digital infrastructure, government programmes and a pick-up in industrial activity¹.

For fiscal 2027, Siemens guides to comparable revenue growth of 9% to 11% and earnings per share before purchase-price allocation of €10.20 to €10.80¹. For the full year, net profit fell 9% to €9.47 billion, because the year before included a €2.1 billion gain from selling Innomotics; revenue rose 6% to €83.37 billion¹. The proposed dividend rises to €5.50 from €5.35¹. Shares were 4.2% higher on Tradegate early this morning².

For you: when someone tells you AI is changing everything, ask to see the order book. Today one was published, and it was mostly made of copper and steel. Nothing here is investment advice.