Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the Brunel International N.V. Trading Update for the second quarter conference call. My name is Brika, and I will be coordinating your call today. During the presentation, you can register and ask a question by pressing star followed by one on your telephone keypad. For operator assistance, any point is star zero. And now I will hand over to your host, Jilko Andringa, CEO of Brunel, to begin. So, Jilko, please go ahead.
Thank you very much. Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, everybody. Quarterly and half-year update from Brunel. It's important to mention a couple of elements that Peter will address a little bit deeper later on. One element is we are in the right markets. Of course, our results and our forecast are not as good as the last couple of quarters. We know that, and we want to explain that. But what I also want to explain is that the opportunity for Brunel is still there. The capital investment commitment in the conventional, renewable energy markets, in the mining industry, and also starting to come back in the life science industry are still very positive. Our pipeline of projects is incredible. But big projects sometimes have the tendency of timing issues.
There are some very, very large multi-billion dollar projects in the pipeline that were unfortunately postponed a little bit. That's what we called out in our press release. Postponing doesn't mean that they're going away. We are still the partner of our clients for these projects, and the projects are still coming because they went through FID. It's a matter of planning. The other thing is you saw in the first half year and the second quarter that we're still growing as a company. You look at our industry growth in a professional service environment is a pretty good performance. Are we happy? No. We want to do more because we believe our markets are bigger. We have a small share of a very, very large market, and we can take more of that market. We are continuously investing in growth.
What we're also doing is making sure that the organization doesn't carry too much cost. Positively said, we invested over the last couple of years a lot in a flexible, agile organization. Through the right tools, the right processes, the right management structures, we are able to constantly focus on cost. You can see that in the first half year already our costs were lower than last year. We announced today that we are executing a next step when it comes to conversion, and we're taking out a significant amount of cost. We will explain in this call that we already executed this. We're already very far in this project, and we'll see the benefits of this already partly in this year and with a large effect of over EUR 20 million in next year. The third story is my departure.
I announced that I will depart Brunel because I found another opportunity. We mentioned in the press release that the Supervisory Board is, of course, going through a process. Once we can, or when we can, we will, of course, inform you about the succession plan. With that, an introduction from my side. Good opportunities in the market that will deliver continued growth for Brunel. Right-sizing on the cost side because we face a little bit of headwind with project delays. As we called out in the press release, the tough market in Germany that many, many industries are facing at the moment.
The combination of that gives us a very, very, very good trust in continued positive results and delivery of our multi-year plan because we still are very confident that we can deliver on the financial plans that we shared during our Capital Markets Day November last year. With that, I would like to hand over to our CFO, Peter de Laat.
Thanks, Jilko. Yeah, as Jilko mentioned, we are still growing, and that's the result of the markets we are in and that we have chosen and explained in our Capital Markets Day, albeit at a slightly lower pace than we did in Q1. The reported EBIT for this quarter is at the same level as last year, but there is a support of one working day. In the second quarter, the impact of a working day, which roughly equals EUR 2 million, is, of course, percentage-wise much higher than in other quarters. That explains why the organic development for Q2 in EBIT is so negative, -20%. But if you look at the first half year, we achieved the same EBIT as last year. Good to know that also Q3 and Q4, there will be an additional working day compared to last year.
Then going directly into the regions, start with the DACH region. You can see here the headcount development in DACH is pretty flat with a small decrease in June, but that trend is not continuing in July. So for now, we expect a flat trend to continue. And with a little bit of help from increased rates, revenues should be around the same level as last year. What did change slightly compared to last year is the gross margin. In challenging markets, we always see that our bench increases a little bit more because it takes us longer to find the next job for people. We get less per placement and transfer fees, and there's a bit more margin pressure. So that explains the lower gross margin. And all elements are equal in the difference compared to last year. Then looking at the results.
So revenue more or less equal to last year. EBIT almost €2 million down. But DACH region is the only region where there's a difference in working days in the first half year. If you adjust for that, EBIT is EUR 1 million down. So a pretty stable, robust performance in a challenging market. And we are very optimistic about the changes our new leadership team is implementing at the moment that we will return to even more outperforming the market in the DACH region. And then moving on to the Netherlands, yeah, also a flat headcount trend there, but higher rates results in revenue increases. IT being the strongest contributor there. Gross margin more or less at the same level, slightly lower than last year. But especially the EBIT performance is impressive in the Netherlands.
And to compare to DACH, we have a new leadership team in place since almost 18 months now. We now are clearly seeing the results of that and moving in the right direction and again outperforming the market. As you can also see in the financials in the first half year, they are pretty stable. But considering the circumstances and looking at what we see in the industry report for the Netherlands, we are, yeah, this is a very okay performance and there's more to come. Australasia is the most impressive performance. For starters, you can see that in the headcount development that is way above last year. That's especially driven by the mining industry and the conventional energy industry where we're doing a lot of good, sizable projects and are very successful in that.
The only challenge there is that despite the 25% revenue growth, we did not improve our conversion. So you can imagine that this is also being considered in our cost saving plan going forward. Our long-term plan is to improve our conversion ratio as a group, but also for each region individually. Australasia is definitely part of that. And with this revenue growth, they are in a very good position to improve their conversions going forward. Middle East and India, for many years, a resilient contributor. And still, the headcount development might seem a bit concerning, but the trend is definitely not continuing. This is just a result of a project on a fabrication yard in Dubai finishing and now preparing for the next projects where they have a nicely filled pipeline and many opportunities. So I'm sure they will continue to deliver their stable, resilient performance.
As you can also hear, pretty EBIT at the same level, but with the higher revenue, so also there the conversion will be improved to make sure that also they contribute in that element of our strategy. Then Americas, the headcount development is in line with last year, but the mix is slightly different. So we have more people in the US and less in Brazil. And that especially supports the gross margin development. And that helps the conversion improvement that you can see in the numbers where they did achieve a strong EBIT percentage improvement as a result of a more efficient organization leveraged on five percent revenue growth. Then Asia, the headcount trend tells something different than we guided for in our press release. We said there's a delay in projects.
The mix in headcount is slightly different with a bit more work in countries with a slightly lower day rate. So the revenue impact is not as significant as the headcount development might suggest. And the delays on the projects are especially in China where we have a very full pipeline on projects that should have started in Q1, but are now postponed till the end of the year or early next year. So this is a small hurdle in their development, but on the strong performance, they will manage. And also taking into account the cost savings, they will stay at a decent level. Revenue is pretty stable, slight decrease in EBIT, but with the cost savings, they will get back to that pretty soon. And the final region, the Rest of the World, also there you can see that headcount development is pretty stable.
This graph still shows the divestment of our Russia region in 2022. So almost getting rid of that part of the graph. The toughest part in this comparison is that the first half year last year for telecoms and the perm market was still very strong. We are returning to that level. So where the comparison was really tough in the first half year, that will be easier for the second half of the year. As a result, also their results will start improving so that they will contribute to EBIT as well. Then the overall numbers, more or less same EBIT as last year against eight percent revenue growth. Operating costs stable now, but you will see them going down slightly already in Q3 and Q4, slightly in Q3 and more in Q4. But I'll get to that and we'll elaborate more on that.
So the outlook, most regions will continue this trend. And we are mindful of the challenging markets, especially in automotive in DACH. So that probably will mean that the headcount will remain pretty stable. And in Asia, we might see a little bit lower revenue until the new projects start. But we are in a very good position to also take cost initiatives to improve our conversion. Our IT projects are well underway. And of course, all those come with KPIs on cost savings. And we're measuring that and acting on that as a movement. And with the IT implementations also comes process improvement. So we're not impacting our sales power. So that remains at the same level to make sure we will benefit from all the opportunities in the market. But we will do that at a lower cost level because we are a more efficient organization.
We expect to achieve the full EUR 20 million cost savings on a yearly basis with a one-off cost of approximately EUR 4 million. The cost savings in this year will be especially in Q4, but that will already offset the one-off cost that we will incur largely in Q3. We're well underway in executing that project with only minor items to come. It will be fully completed in Q3. Then you can imagine if we achieve more than EUR 4 million cost saving in this year and the annual level is EUR 20 million. If we do the same revenue and gross profit as this year, that also means that our EBIT for next year will go up with, yeah, largely EUR 15 million because of the cost savings. Next year, we won't have the earn-out cost related to the Telecom Consult acquisition.
So that will help us back on track for our long-term plan that we guided for in Capital Markets Day. And we'll get us fully in line for next year. So very happy that we are in a position to achieve that. You already mentioned it. Clearly, still sitting next to me. So business as usual. Then our balance sheet, for the first time in a very long time, we are in a net debt position. And that's the result of the continued increase in our working capital. But as we guided already for a long time, our cash flow, our free cash flow is turning from negative to positive. Already was around zero in the first half year. And we always have a stronger cash flow in the second half of year. So still very strong and resilient balance sheet.
Then the gross profit per vertical, there you can see in the first half year, we managed to grow in all our global verticals. So conventional energy, renewables, mining, and life sciences. And that's despite the tough comparisons in the perm market in telecoms. So our position in our core markets is supporting our continued success and growth. So that's a brief summary of our Q2 and half year results. Now, I would like to invite you to ask any questions you might have.
Thank you. If you would like to ask a question, please press star followed by one on your telephone keypad. If you change your mind anytime, please press star two. And as a reminder, it is star followed by one to ask any questions. And when speaking, please ensure your phone is unmuted locally. We have the first question from Konrad Zomer with ABN AMRO. You may proceed.
Hi, good morning, Jilko and Peter. It's Konrad here. I have quite a lot of questions on the EUR 20 million of cost savings. I'm positively surprised by the fact that you will execute the full project in Q3. But I'm really interested to hear what specifically you've done or will do by region, by type of activity. Is it just a reduction in headcount? What are the specifics of the EUR 20 million, please? Thank you.
Yeah, Konrad, thanks for that question. As we explained, there are a lot of IT and optimization projects ongoing. As Peter already said, which is not touching our sales capability, our sales muscle. In general, before Peter mentioned something specific on some regions, in general, what we are applying is some ruling on with the new technology, what would be the good ratio of manager to team? Because you have now better tools to manage your team. Let's look at do we have the right ratio there. What is the support needed for, let's say, 100 professionals out on a job? How much support do you need in the support teams? If we digitize certain solutions, certain training solutions, can we use the digitized solution more than the human solution? And we, let's say, listed all these opportunities that we invested in over the last years.
That brought us to this significant opportunity on the cost side.
Yeah, and cost savings related, for most regions, it's more or less in line with their cost compared to the total cost. So almost all regions are contributing equally to the cost savings with the Netherlands and DACH doing slightly more.
It is almost.
It is almost.
It's not really related to the recent performance.
No, no, like I said. I finished your question, Konrad. Sorry.
No, no, sorry. If you say it's broadly in line with your geographical split, if I understand correctly, it assumes that the savings are not really related to the recent performance of the geographies. Like, for example, in Americas, you did really well in Q2. In the Middle East, maybe because of a delay, a bit less well as you would have liked. But that doesn't mean the savings you're putting through now are going to be related to that recent performance. It is across the board a EUR 20 million saving.
Yeah, it is. Yeah. And the key driver again is all the efficiency improvements we have achieved so far. So that's why it's more or less equal in each region. And of course, we're also looking at for our expectations for the next 6-12 months that we have an organization in place that is fully capable of delivering on all the opportunities, but no significant differences there.
I think it's important to call out the fact that we announced that we are pretty far on our way executing this project and will definitely finish it in Q3. It indicates also that we started already a while ago preparing this. So this is purely related on the optimization that we can do based on our investments. Every day, you have to look at your performance and also manage to performance or manage to underperformance. And that can also lead to adjustments, of course, in cost. What I'm trying to say is this is a one-off project and it's not the limit of the company. We still have agility. We still have flexibility if needed. If in certain specific locations, results are off or underperformance appears, then we can still adjust our cost because then it's fully the alignment of the infrastructure with what's happening in the market there.
This is sort of an additional opportunity for Brunel to reset the conversion ratio.
Yeah, yeah. Okay. And then a slightly different question on your balance sheet. You mentioned you've turned into a net debt position of roughly EUR 12 million. It looks like you're still going to end up the year in a net cash position given your free cash flow characteristics in the second half. But I'm particularly interested to hear a bit more about the link with your dividends because your payout ratio has been good. You are likely to remain profitable for the year. But I'm just wondering if your, let's say, a flat dividend pay or, no, sorry, flat dividend as an absolute number was going to turn you into a net debt position for the full year, would you still consider that or is that like a natural floor that you wouldn't go below?
No, the dividend policy is not linked to the cash position. Let's start with the first point. You are right in assuming that by the end of the year, we will be in a net cash position instead of a net debt. But our dividend policy, yeah, is linked to our results and our payout ratio of between 60%-100%. We always said that we will continue that unless we will do a very significant acquisition.
Yeah, yeah. But so would you consider taking on debt on your balance sheet in order to pay for the dividend?
Yeah, we would. Yeah, absolutely.
I think it's a theoretical question if you look at the current growth rates and the reverse of the positive cash that we see now in the first half of the year and expect definitely in the second half of the year. I think the cash position will support the continuation of our dividend policy.
Yeah, yeah. Okay. Sure. Thank you.
Thank you. We have no further questions. I'd like to hand it back for some webcast questions.
1. We have a question from Wolfram Fels. Is that our facial expressions convey little optimism? And he also asked if the problems in the DACH region are homemade.
Now, let me respond to that. First, let me call out that Wolfram is an ex-colleague of ours. So thanks for listening in and being interested still in Brunel, Wolfram. The facial expressions are important, but I can tell you they are not connected to any deeper worries that there might be. But when you have a little bit of a headwind, you have to be very serious in what you're doing. And I can tell you when you take out EUR 20 million in cost, you know in a service industry that impacts people. And that's not the fun part of the job. The job needs to get done. And that's what we need to do once in a while, being in a business that, yeah, sometimes faces headwinds, then you have to do that. And as we said, we are in the middle of executing this project.
Outside of today, where we announced numbers, we are in some more difficult conversations with people. If you look at the DACH Germany market, as Peter said, we are extremely positive about the new management and the approach that the new management is taking. The issues we have in the market with some sort of a flat headcount, a little bit declining in June, but some sort of a flat headcount seem to be actually fully market-driven. Our performance might even be better than the market. Depends always on the market definition and which competitors you take into the equation. We're also still proud of what all our locations and our teams are doing in DACH. The market is big enough.
We have to reset our focus to other industries as well, embracing other industries as well to find the growth that there's definitely possible in the market. But I would say, long answer short, it looks like more market-related than anything internal.
Okay, then we'll move to the next question. One moment. Maarten Verbeek from The Idea states that the cost savings are apparently necessary to improve the conversion ratio and achieve the 6.5% EBIT margin. And then he asks, is it also necessary because Brunel's goal for revenue and gross profit of high single digits is at risk? The cost savings or the improvement in the conversion ratio was always part of our plan, as we also explained during the Capital Markets Day. And we are happy to see that we can execute earlier and faster than we had planned. And we have to agree there that that comes in handy now when the revenue growth is not at the high single-digit level for now. But again, the pipeline of projects is still very full.
So we still expect, on average, the revenue growth up till the target year 2027 to be at high single digits. So to answer your question, it's not necessary, but we are able to do it because our organization is in a good position. Yeah. Maarten also asked whether your EUR 20 million cost savings is all indirect personnel-related. While looking at our cost structure, that's by far our biggest cost.
So a large part is personnel-related. But we're also looking into other areas for cost savings. We're looking at our office infrastructure to see how we can optimize that. And there are a lot of personnel-related costs that we're also where we can save. So if we have fewer employees, then it automatically also results in lower license fees for software, less motor cars, all those types of things. But yeah, the largest part is obviously employee-related. Any other questions?
We have another question on the phone line. We have a follow-up from Konrad Zomer with ABN AMRO.
Hi, yeah, thanks for taking another question. I made a bit of a mess about my previous question. I just want to give it another attempt. Let's say, according to my numbers, you're still on track for earnings growth for the full year 2024 versus 2023. You did EUR 56 million of EBIT last year. And I think, and you don't have to comment on it, but I think you will do more than EUR 56 million in 2024. Your dividend last year was EUR 0.55 a share. And that was the equivalent of around EUR 27 million, I think. If your net cash position at the full year 2024 is less than EUR 27 million, but you still have an EBIT level which exceeds last year's level, would you still consider paying out the EUR 0.55 that you paid out last year?
Yeah, I can repeat Peter's answer. The answer is yes, Konrad, because we want to continue with our dividend policy until further notice. Further notice could be a larger acquisition or a Capital Markets Day with a strategy change, which we do not see coming at the moment. I know in Outlook we don't give numbers, but I can definitely say to you that we expect to outperform the profitability of last year. So we agree with your analysis. We continue to state that with the positive cash flow that we expect in the second half of the year and probably improved collection, if I look at where we are now in the discussion with many of our clients, we are confident that we can continue our dividend policy. Any other questions?
The speakers can resume.
Yeah, I think we lost connection for a while, but no further questions from me. Thank you.
Okay. Thank you very much, Konrad. One more question in the chat.
I think we have no further questions on the phone lines.
Maarten Verbeek asked whether we can share our view on Taylor Hopkinson's market developments. Yeah, of course we can. We're very optimistic about that. Our contracting revenue continues to grow. The unique combination of Taylor Hopkinson's vertical expertise and Brunel's global infrastructure is really working well. That's looking very positive, and especially with all the projects that are still to come with a significant increase in investment in the next couple of years. We're very positive about that. We're actually quite impressed with the recovery of the perm performance of Taylor Hopkinson. In our Capital Markets Day, Tom Hopkinson highlighted that he only was expecting that, yeah, around now to happen to see the recovery. The recovery is already happening at the moment, also driven by focus on slightly other areas at Taylor Hopkinson, where historically they only focused on perm placements in offshore wind industry.
They're also now looking at hydrogen, solar, and onshore. So overall, very happy with the market developments and especially on everything that's yet to come.
Thank you. That does conclude the Q&A session. I would like to hand it back to Jilko Andringa, CEO of Brunel, for some final remarks.
Thank you very much. And I will finish the call with a smile, maybe learning from the comment of our ex-colleague. You guys look very serious. Yes, of course. When you announce numbers that are a little bit below our own expectation, then you're serious. And when you are touching the infrastructure of your company, which is people, then you're also very serious. But when I look forward, I'm very optimistic. This might be my last call, depending on how fast the Supervisory Board has a solution for my succession, then this might be my last call. And I want to say Brunel is situated in the right place, in the right markets, with the right management team, the right people that know how to be an entrepreneur and know how to serve the client. And I had a lot of fun in the last seven years at Brunel.
I believe that we only reached A level, and I believe the organization can go to the next level. With that, I hope to see you all soon in the market again and have a very nice day. Thank you very much.
Thank you. Thank you all for joining.