Welcome to the Alfen Update Call. My name is George, I'll be your coordinator for today's event. Please note this conference is being recorded, and for the duration of the call, your line is in a listen-only mode. However, you'll have the opportunity to ask questions towards the end of the presentation, and this can be done by pressing Star one on your telephone keypad to register your question. If you require assistance at any point, please press Star zero, and you will be connected to an operator. I'd like to hand the call over to your host today, Mr. Marco Roeleveld, CEO. Please go ahead.
Thank you, George. First, I want to thank you for being present in this call, and we'll try to be clear as possible on, say, the update press release we send out. In this update call are present the full management board of Alfen, being Michelle Lesh, CCO, Onno Krap, CFO, and myself, Marco Roeleveld, CEO.
If we then go to the content of the press release, the fundamental step is that due to the slower anticipated market growth for 2024, we have to lower our outlook for 2024, where we lowered it from the numbers that we initiated more or less at February last year, and we lowered it now to EUR 485 million-EUR 520 million. The fundamental aspect that follows that is that we have to also adjust our adjusted EBITDA margin to mid- single-digit numbers.
If we then go to the step, where does it come from? The fundamental step in revenue comes from a number of large energy system deals that originally were anticipated to be signed in Q2 are being postponed and will likely only contribute to 2025 revenue, causing more or less the revenue for energy storage to be declining with approximately 20% compared to 2023.
When you look at, say, the individual quarters of this year, we expect the Q2 to be about double of the Q1. The Q3 will be more or less a little bit below the Q1 number, and the Q4 will be about double of the Q3. Therefore, the revenue will be backloaded even though in the second half year and come up with an overall number that's 20% below the number of 2023.
If we look at smart grid solutions, we have seen that, say, the effort we have to do both on site and also here in our factory to be able to resolve the concrete issues, it leads to two elements. On one hand is that extra costs have to be incurred, and therefore we have to step up the provision with another little bit more than EUR 7 million.
And also, due to the fact that we cannot ramp at this moment, and also we have the closed holiday period, due to several reasons, we cannot ramp up that quickly as anticipated, and therefore the overall revenue growth will be limited to about 5%. And if you look to the quarterly division, we will see that the Q2 will be lower than the Q1.
The Q3, we will have a slow ramp up mainly to the fact that we have to compensate for more or less two weeks of closing time at our concrete manufacturer. And the Q4 will be ramping up quite strongly, but not enough to compensate for the second and Q3 low revenues. As indicated, the revenue guidance as a whole will therefore, as a consequence, go down from EUR 590-660 million to EUR 485-512 million, and the EBITDA level will be in the range of the mid-single-digit number.
W e have taken into account that we also have what we call then two one-off totaling EUR 11.1 million, consisting of two elements. On the one hand, a little bit more than EUR 7 million as an additional provision for the warranty case problem. And the second one is related to obsolete inventory of components of charging stations.
Those components where we initially thought that within, say, an accessible time frame, we would be able to use them all. We have now concluded that in order to not have a too long time horizon, we needed to build up some provisions for obsolete inventory to cope with more or less out of order elements of inventory.
We also have to step away from, say, the medium-term objectives, not the fundamental direction, but we need, due to, say, the low revenue, we need to adjust also the timelines in order to be able to have the proper appreciation of the medium-term objectives. And we'll use the second half year to balance out more of the growth perspectives and also the cost perspectives.
In order to be able to have more or less a validation of our profitable growth strategy, we will realign more or less the strategy of growth in relationship to organizational and cost growth. That's more or less a summary of the press release we have put forward, and we will now open the line for questions. George, can you take over the line for opening for questions?
Most certainly, sir. So ladies and gentlemen, just as a quick reminder, if you wish to ask any audio questions, please press Star one on your telephone keypad. Our first question will be coming from Joren van Aken, calling from the Degroof Petercam. Please go ahead.
Good morning. A couple of questions, please. First, on the RCF, can you confirm that the size is EUR 100 million? C ould you give us an idea of how much of that is already drawn today? Then secondly, in your annual report, you mentioned both the credit facility and also a CapEx facility. The terms seem quite similar. So does that mean that both the CapEx facility and the RCF are under discussions now with the banks?
The governance, do they use also the adjusted EBITDA or the actual EBITDA? And then finally, if I may, should we put basically today's announcement in the context of the previous CFO leaving, basically in the sense that there was a disagreement on how to bring this news today? Thank you.
Maybe to start with the latest question first. There is no relationship to, say, the element of, say, the previous CFO leaving. There were, say, personal reasons for Jeroen van Rossen to leave. The fact that we more or less didn't continue with Boudewijn Tans had nothing to do with, say, a strategic approach or this fundamental disagreement on, say, the numbers we have, because also the elements that came now more or less into play for us to start this discussion now for this press release,
They were more or less elements that came into play in the course of the Q2. T here was nothing related to the previous situation with either Jeroen van Rossen or Boudewijn Tans in relationship to this situation. With the relationship to the RCF, I will ask that.
I will take that one.
On how to continue.
Okay, good morning. L et me talk about the RCF. We have a total debt facility at this moment in time of EUR 150 million. EUR 50 million of that is related to longer-term debt, and EUR 100 million is related to the RCF. We're currently drawing, as of today, around EUR 28 million out of that RCF. So by far not the full EUR 100 million debt is available from a debt capacity perspective.
We are running into the covenant issue that is a 3:1 versus EBITDA. And that is the reported EBITDA and not the adjusted EBITDA. I mean, in the market, there are typically what you see is that covenants are related to adjusted EBITDA. In our case, it's reported EBITDA. So that basically means that the one-time adjustments are included into our covenant calculation.
That is also the reason that we are not making the Q2 covenant requirement with our bank. If that would not be there, if we would be able to adjust for one-time items, then we would be able to maneuver along the Q2 test for our RCF covenant. That to be said, on the longer term, it is important that the profitability often will improve.
I think that's also what we have indicated in the press release. If that's happening, then we feel that the current debt facility is enough to facilitate the financing of the company overall. From a CapEx facility perspective, yes, that's in our annual report. That was related to the building of our new facility here in Almere, or at least one of the buildings, a special construction that was dissolved at the beginning of this year.
So that's no longer in place and is not applicable to the current discussion. Did I answer your question?
Yep, very clear. Thank you.
Thank you very much, sir. We'll now move to Jeremy Lindsay Kincaid of Van Lanschot Kempen. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Hi, thank you, guys. First question for me is just on the waiver. So why do you not have a waiver yet from the banks, and what is required to get one?
Now, what we try to do as soon as possible is we had the complete picture available. We are required, and also we wanted to inform all of you to make sure that you are as up to date on kind of the current situation of Alfen as possible.
That automatically also means that not everything has been resolved yet with the banks. We are in constructive dialogue with them. We fully expect that we will be able to resolve this situation and that we will get a waiver. We are in discussion at this moment.
Sure. And then we've obviously heard that you might be disclosing the energy storage backlog more regularly. Could you provide us some details on what that is and whether or not any additional orders need to be filled or brought into the backlog in order to meet your guidance of -20% for the full year?
Yeah. So our backlog currently sits at EUR 85 million. Not all of that will convert this year, obviously. And for example, where we have mobiles, which is a flow business, those orders we still need to get in. We have one or two smaller orders, one closed yesterday, others that should close this week. So there are still a couple of things that need to be closed.
Fundamentally, we are in that final signing stage, whereas at the beginning of the year, we had many more immature deals that needed to get closed, and that's what has shifted and changed. So yes, there still are a couple that need to close, mobiles being an example of that. But in total, we have EUR 85 million of backlog.
Could you just give us an idea of what the largest project size is there and maybe when that largest project could close? Is there any chance that it closes in December and then gets pushed out to FY 2025 if it's a large project?
No. Right now, everything we're expecting to close, again, other than mobiles, mobiles are more of a flow in that those could close later, but we have a much shorter cycle in terms of recognizing revenue on those since it's a flow product. For the utility-scale business, those are within weeks. W e have already accounted for all of the risk to make sure that we are not relying on deals that still need to close late Q3, Q4 on the utility-scale projects.
We've really run out of time to order the main components to hit that primary revenue milestone. So for the most part, everything that closes from here on out, with the exception of one or two, will be 2025 revenue. But we've accounted for all of that in our guidance.
Great. Thank you. I'll hand over the questions to someone else.
Thank you very much, sir. Ladies and gentlemen, as a reminder, if you have any questions, please do press Star one at this time. Our next question will be coming from Thijs Berkelder of ABN AMRO ODDO BHF. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Good morning all. Maybe good to remind the listeners on, let's say, your guidance for the full year. So you're now guiding mid-single-digit EBITDA margin on, let's say, EUR 500 million of revenues. So roughly EUR 25 million adjusted EBITDA.
You now already have guided for EUR 16 million or so of one-off expenses. And we can expect another figure there to pop up in the second half for further restructuring. W e'll have to see what other things. C onclusion on my side therefore is reported EBITDA probably around zero.
Can you maybe give us insight in when we can expect further updates on further one-off items, further impairments on EV charging inventory, and/or also possibly on energy storage inventory, and on the restructuring of the staff base? Second question is, what number is the staff base more or less right now? Overall number split between fixed and flexible?
Third question is, you mentioned an energy storage backlog of EUR 85 million. What part of the EUR 85 million is hard signed and which is still waiting for final investment decision? And then for now, maybe final question, also coming back on the CFO question earlier asked, do you know or do you have grip on whether former CFO Jeroen van Rossen still holds his Alfen shares? Yes or no?
Let me take the energy storage type. EUR 85 million is all fully signed, fully booked orders in hand.
Maybe then related to your last question related to the shares of Jeroen, say, fundamentally, those shares he has are his private ownership, and we have no track record of, say, formally being able to clear on the ownership situation. But those shares are also registered in the AFM, how you call it, disclosure section. I t could be, say, public available information related to, say, what's the latest state.
If you then talk to one-off costs, what we did is we tried to assess more or less the whole broader, say, financial picture within Alfen and try to assess more or less all the elements that are relevant as we know at this moment. So we tried to take into account all elements that we are aware of or should be aware of to take those into account and bring them together more or less at the table now.
The element you mentioned on restructuring, that's also why we said is that we want to do that in a more or less comprehensive approach that we don't want to make a direct connection because we still have to value a little bit more or less the growth in the different business areas, how we will cope that in relationship with the personnel costs.
At this moment, I don't have straightforward on-hand data on the available personnel buildup. You have to bear in mind that the number that is easily to bear more or less to reference on more than 30% of our people are related to having contracts for less than a year. We have about 20% of our direct workforce is related to temporary workforce based on a temporary working contract.
I have a follow-up question on EV charging. You're also lowering your revenue guidance for EV charging. The press release reads as if it's purely a matter of not enough BEVs being sold in Europe right now. And that's data we see coming out every day.
Can you maybe also give a bit of comment on the pricing of EV chargers in your various segments? The new public AFIR chargers, is price pressure there maybe also coming in? S imilar also for the high-end home charger segment. Lack of demands typically leads suppliers to cut prices to be able to still make the volume and get to production efficiencies.
Yeah. So we're always looking at our pricing and understanding if we've got any elasticity that we can optimize. But fundamentally, we don't see a need to cut prices right now. If anything, with Alfen, we're one of the few that has the dynamic QR code option that is a priced option for our customers.
N o, this is really looking at the market, understanding that we think there will potentially be an impact from this new EV data, and then looking at our run rates. W e had previously communicated stronger quarter-on-quarter growth. What we're seeing is modest, and we just wanted to account for that. But right now, we don't necessarily see price as a lever to offset that, given that there's a market challenge.
Okay. Thanks.
Thank you, sir. We now have a follow-up question coming from Joren van Aken of Degroof Petercam. Please go ahead.
Yes. Thank you. Just one final question. Do you already have just an idea of what the size of the possible penalty could be for the breach of covenants with the banks, or is it too early?
It's too early. We didn't have that discussion with them yet. But in the end, I think in the overall scheme of things, it's not going to be material.
Okay. Thanks.
Thank you very much, sir. As we have no further questions at this time, I'll turn the call back over to Mr. Roeleveld for any additional or closing remarks. Thank you.
Thank you for joining in this webcast. We appreciate the fact that you've taken the effort more or less to try to listen to the elements and also raise questions to further clarify, get further clarification on the elements we want to bring forward. I want to thank you again then all, and then we can close this line now.
Thank you very much, sir. Ladies and gentlemen, that will conclude today's presentation. We thank you for your attendance. You may now disconnect. Have a good day and goodbye.
Thanks.