(10) Cost of sales
Accounting and measurement policies
Cost of sales
The cost of sales primarily includes the cost of manufactured products sold and the merchandise sold.
Cost comprises the following items: directly attributable costs, such as cost of materials, personnel and energy costs, depreciation and amortization, overheads attributable to the production process, inventory impairment losses and their reversals.
The cost of sales included amortization of intangible assets (excluding amortization of internally generated or separately acquired software) in the amount of € 207 million (2021: € 201 million). Material costs amounted to € 3,996 million in fiscal 2022 (2021: € 3,535 million) and were largely reported under cost of sales.
Impairment losses on inventories amounted to € 279 million (2021: € 221 million) in the reporting period, while reversals of impairment losses amounted to € 197 million (2021: € 171 million).