Good afternoon. This is the Costco conference operator. Welcome, and thank you for joining the Avio First Quarter 2025 results conference call. All participants are in listen-only mode, and after the presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Mr. Nevio Quattrin, Investor Relations Manager of Avio. Please go ahead, sir.
Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to Q1 2025 results conference call of Avio. I'm here with Mr. Giulio Ranzo, CEO of Avio, and Mr. Alessandro Agosti, CFO. In a moment, we will go through the presentation we jt uploaded on our website, and in the end, as usual, we will welcome your questions. Thank you for your attention, and I leave the floor to Giulio.
Thank you, Nevio, and welcome to you all. Thanks for joining our first quarter call. I would start from page four with a summary of what happened during the quarter, although I think we updated the whole investor community not too long ago at the occasion of the fiscal year 2024 results. Let's see what else has happened over the course of the last few weeks. First and foremost, the success of our Vega C VV26 mission, launching ESA's Biomass Satellite to orbit with the usual orbital injection accuracy. A very successful launch, very happy customer. We also had the success of Ariane 6's VA263 flight, launching the COC3 French satellite to orbit equally successfully. One other important event was the firing test of the P160 motor, which is the largest version of Vega C and Ariane 6 first-stage propulsion system.
This is important because it will provide more thrust to both Ariane 6 and Vega C, providing, therefore, more payload performance and competitiveness to both launchers, as we expected. We were, for a long time, waiting for the firing test. We have performed that successfully, and we are quite pleased with that. We also achieved quite some increase in the revenues and EBITDA compared to the first quarter of last year, although let me tell you that the first quarter, as always, is not very indicative of what happens. You can follow that, let's say, sequentially, that over the quarters, we've been increasing speed towards the growth that we have anticipated to all of you in our guidance, and we commit to growing revenues and profits and such. I think we are in the direction of travel is the one that we have set for ourselves in the guidance.
We have distributed dividends on May 7th, and therefore, all in all, I'd say that on the first quarter, we think we are in the right direction towards what we committed to for fiscal year 2025. On page five, just something on the last launch of Vega C, I think it was important, first of all, because we launched a very peculiar satellite from the European Space Agency that is monitoring the way the large Amazonian forests capture CO2. A very relevant topic for the public, I would say, a very precious satellite with radar technology, a very large antenna under our fairing, a very delicate parcel, therefore, to launch to space. It was perfectly delivered the way it was supposed to be. Now we have information from the customer that it's being operated as expected, and therefore, there's nothing better than a satisfied customer, I would say.
The European Space Agency Earth Observation Directorate is quite pleased with that. As far as we are concerned, this launch was equally important. We achieved three launches, three successful launches in a span of about eight months. We have another one coming in July, which means that we are now performing at a rate of slightly more than four per year, which is one of the near-term objectives we had, which was to recoup a certain speed in flight frequency and so on. I think we are going in the right direction. It's early to say this is consolidated, but I think we are demonstrating we are on the right direction with a competitive product. On page six, we report the successful firing of P160.
That is very important because it shows you also the flexibility we have in improving our technologies and delivering more results for the customers. In this case, we have taken our first stage for P1, for Ariane 6 and Vega C, the P120, and we have basically made this motor longer by about 1 meter and with about 15 tons more propellant, which means delivering more boost to the first stage of both Ariane 6 and Vega C, and therefore increasing the payload performance by about 10% for both Ariane 6 and Vega C at a very limited incremental cost. Therefore, this definitely adds competitiveness to these launch systems, leveraging the solid propulsion technology that, as you know, it's in the core competency of Avio in particular, but also our partner ArianeGroup. Therefore, we are quite pleased about that. The firing test revealed that the motor fired extremely well.
We will soon introduce this in Ariane 6 in the course probably of 2027, and shortly after also on Vega C. That is very good and important for us. There are no other particular news occurred between our last exchange with you at the occasion of the fiscal year 2024 results and now. More to come in the next few weeks with another launch by the end of July with Vega C, more firing tests, more activities on the development projects, but we have nothing specific to report just in these few weeks. Nothing else that is not being performed as expected. I would say no news, good news, no particular news, good news. We are cruising at the right speed.
I would leave it now to Alessandro to walk you through the first quarter financials, as I said, knowing that they are typically not so relevant for us, but still, I think Alessandro can walk you through the details. Alessandro, can you?
Thank you, Giulio. Good afternoon, everybody. On page eight, we reported the overall backlog evolution over the last six years, which shows a compound annual growth rate higher than 20%. 2025 end of first quarter backlog is substantially in line with the 2024 year end, and it is the highest in the company's history and about four times the yearly revenue, thus providing strong visibility in the medium term. In Q1 2025, order intakes amounted to approximately EUR 9 million, including for the major portion of about EUR 75 million delivered service provider activity for contract transferred by Arianespace to Avio, and the remaining EUR 14 million for ESA contribution for the ramp-up production of P120 motors. Following such intakes, payback backlog represents approximately 50% of Q1 2025 backlog, and the phased propulsion, as you can see, 25%. Production backlog is about 60%, and development backlog 40%.
The phased backlog is nearly, as you can see, three times this time, the Arianespace backlog waiting for the ramp-up, following the successful maiden flight of Ariane 6 in 2024 and the first successful mission last March 2025. On page nine, we reported the revenues, which significantly increased by about 35% compared to the corresponding period, first quarter of previous years. Such increase has been principally driven by Vega production following the return to flight of Vega last year and Ariane 6 production with the P120 motor and turbopump, following the maiden flight in 2024 for Ariane 6 and the first successful commercial mission last March 25. As you can see, Vega revenues account for 50% of total revenue, and the phased propulsion revenue for about 17%. 60% of revenue comes from production activity like the backlog, and 40% from development activities.
On page 10, we reported the main key performance indicators of the first quarter 2025 compared to the corresponding first quarter of 2024. Significant increase in revenue, higher than 35%, has been principally driven by Vega production following the return to flight and the higher production rate of P120 motors and turbopump following the maiden flight of Ariane 6 last year. EBITDA and EBIT increase are principally driven by increase in revenues. Non-recurring costs are lower, as you can see, than Q1 2024 for the exploration of new potential business costs, which were reported since Q1 2025 in less recurring costs. This led to an even better improvement in terms of EBITDA and EBIT reported compared to previous year. Net cash position is, as expected, lower than 2024 year-end.
For the flow down to contractors and suppliers of cash advances received towards the end of 2024, as typical business cycle of our company. On page 11, we reported the quarterly pattern of EBITDA and cash generation, which confirmed, with some exception on the net financial position, the concentration of the contribution toward the end of the quarter of the year. On page 12, we have reported the shareholders' dividend distribution. Shareholders' meeting of April 25 unanimously approved the dividend distribution of EUR 3.75 million, which is about 6% payout ratio and 0.8% dividend yield. In 2025, the total shareholders' turns benefited from such dividend distribution and for about 40% capital gain based on the stock performance, which is more than 60% over the last 12 months.
As a result of this, on page 13, as Giulio mentioned before, we confirmed the guidance for the financial year 2025 with an order backlog between EUR 1.7 billion and EUR 1.8 billion, with growth mainly in new orders from the phased propulsions and Vega launch service provider. Revenues between EUR 450 million and EUR 480 million with growth in Vega production and the phased propulsion activities. EBITDA reported between EUR 27 million and EUR 23 million, which with more than 15% growth versus 2024, including the business development cost of Avio U.S.A. reported as general expenses as before. This implied EBITDA adjusted, ranging between EUR 30 million and EUR 36 million, assuming EUR 3 million of no recurring costs. Finally, net income is expected between EUR 7 million and EUR 10 million, with some 30% growth versus 2024, also considering a higher tax rate expected compared to previous year. We have completed the presentation. I leave the floor back to Nevio.
Thank you, Alessandro. Thank you, Giulio. Now we can open the Q&A session.
This is the Costco conference operator. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on the touch-tone telephone. To remove yourself from the question queue, please press star and two. Please pick up the receiver when asking questions. Anyone who has a question may press star and one at this time. The first question is from Martino D'Ambrogi. Please go ahead, sir.
Thank you. Good evening and good afternoon, everybody. Very, very quick questions on the tactical propulsion. If you can provide an indication on sales and order intake for the current year. I don't know if you can share with us what is the potential order in terms of the overall size of the negotiations ongoing for this division and that you expect for the rest of the year going ahead. I clearly understand Q1 is typically the weakest quarter of the year, but Q1 showed a significant improvement. Just a quick comment on this. On the P120, just to have an update on the round rate and the expected contribution going ahead?
Okay. Martino, I think Alessandro and I will be straight on responding to these questions now regarding P120/P160 because now we have a blend of production of the two. Last year, production volumes were extremely low in aggregate, about four to five units in the year. This year, we target overall to have more or less 15-16. It is a substantial increase in production rate. Still far from the 30-35 that we should achieve at steady state, but a good increase in production. The reason why we do not grow any faster in production is, as you recall, we have quite some stuff in the warehouse sitting in inventory, still to be taken out of inventory. Therefore, we go this year at rate production 15-16, more or less.
In terms of the expectation for the order intake in defense this year, Alessandro, correct me if I'm wrong. I think in the order intake of 2025, we should assume that we add another EUR 150 million, give or less, in terms of order intake. Then we will have some revenues that obviously will be larger than last year, but we should land at the end of 2025 with a larger net order backlog in defense with respect to what we had in 2024, more or less. Okay? Therefore, I think that's pretty much what will happen in defense. I'm looking at some figures with Alessandro on this talk. So order intake defense this year, I would say target something like EUR 150 million, give or take.
Now, the point on the timing of the orders is something to be watched with a little bit of caution because the fact that maybe it slips by one quarter does not mean that the order is not coming. What we have in the pipeline, as you know, goes well beyond another EUR 150 million in order intake. We are pitching for a lot more in the U.S. and a lot more in Europe. Given the acceleration that we are seeing on the sector, we know that more orders are going to come. We do not know exactly when they are going to materialize and how big they are going to come, but they may be a few hundreds of millions worth of additional order intake.
Now, on the European front, the effect of the Europe plan is still to be determined in terms of the quantitative impact on the programs that are relevant for us, namely Aster and CAMEAR. There is no doubt that more volumes will come in the course of 2025, 2026, 2027, 2028, all the way towards 2029. I think all of this is currently in the making across the European customer, particularly between Italy and France, and for some of the export activities that we are doing with Aster for sure and partly CAMEAR. In the U.S., we are addressing new customers, a broad set of new customers. We have identified the programs, two of which are already signed, as you know, on two programs with Raytheon and the US Army. There is probably a possibility for more from the US Army, and definitely there is the possibility for more with Raytheon.
In addition to which, we are obviously working the commercial pipeline also with another customer, at least possibly more than one additional customer. There is a lot of stuff in the pipeline. Now, what will materialize in terms of further order this year, as I said, order magnitude EUR 150 million and so on. In terms of sales from defense, last year, we achieved something a little bit less than EUR 70 million after all. This year, we expect definitely a double-digit growth in terms of revenues from defense. Now, how far we will go with that depends also on our ability on the new programs to demonstrate technical viability of the production activities, in particular for US Army, for example. We want to go fast. We do not want to rush too fast that we are not ready and not ready for it.
We are not anxious, quite frankly, because we know the order is in the bag. Now we just need to execute safely. You will see a double-digit growth in defense revenues anyway. Alessandro, is there anything else we left? I think we're over. Martino? Is that fine, Martino?
Yes, thank you. On the P120, the 30-35 units, is it achievable in 2026, or it takes longer?
Probably we will achieve that by 2027, considering that now we are also spreading production across a mix of P120 and P160. In the meantime, we also have to take stuff from the inventory, which is completely filled at the moment, in particular of fully cast motors. I do not think we will achieve a steady-state production before 2027. At the same time, ArianeGroup is expecting to accelerate in the rate of flight quite substantially. We hear from them faster demand expected. Now they will fly in August. More flights will occur. Another two to three flights will occur in the second part of the year. Depending on how fast they consume the inventory, we can accelerate production. Between now and 2027, we should be pretty much at 30 motors. Whether we are at 30 or 35 is going to be irrelevant.
I think what is important is that really by 2027, we should be at 30 order magnitude, at which point the degree of capacity utilization will be such that will positively impact profits substantially. That's pretty much, I think, the path we have in mind. However, Martino, we can see the benefit on the EBITDA gradually before now, as you can see right now in the first quarter, considering the better economies of scale as long as we increase the production rate of the P120, having already incurred all the CapEx for the production.
Okay, thank you.
The next question is from Andrea Bonfá from ACOS. Please go ahead, sir.
Please go ahead, sir.
Can you hear me now?
Yes, we can hear you.
Okay. Sorry. I mean, some of my questions have been already answered. Maybe Giulio, if you can elaborate a little bit more on the timing of the Greenfield plant in the U.S., how that project is developing. The second one is related to the traditional space activities. I mean, the Kuiper constellation of Amazon, which is partly set to be launched by Ariane and the new Ariane 6.2, 6.4, has got some tight deadlines in order to, let's say, keep the license. I mean, how is the state of the art from your standpoint? How do you see Ariane being able to deliver the amount of volume, I mean, the number of launches requested? Thank you very much.
Thank you for your questions. First of all, on your last question on the Kuiper project, I think the positive test of P160 was an extremely important piece of news for Amazon, more than for anybody else, because for them, having more performance on Ariane 6 is crucial in order to be able to launch 34 satellites per launch. Now, considering that they launched the satellites with us and with Ariane 6 and with ULA Vulcan, ULA Vulcan has had a little bit of a problem on their second launch that they are fixing, so no big deal. Being reassured that Ariane 6 will be ready for them to launch over 30 satellites per launch, I think it's great news for them and in turn for us as well. I think we are on track to deliver their satellites in time.
I don't recall when the first Kuiper launch is scheduled for Ariane 6. I honestly don't remember. This is more for Arianespace to announce. I think we are on track with what they expected. On the timing of the Greenfield plant in the U.S., obviously the answer would be as quickly as possible. I think we need at least three years to put in place an infrastructure of that type. Between the second half of 2028 and the first half of 2029, it's when the plant should be fully in operation. This is our target, at least. Obviously, to motivate the kickoff of such projects, we need to do a number of things. We need to secure customer commitments. We need to secure funding support and lots of things. I think the demand is there. The capabilities are there.
We have completed the preliminary design of the plant. We have identified our target site and location in the U.S.. We have been funded by U.S. government funding for the preliminary design and factory planning. All the parts of the puzzle are coming together. I think the timing is good with respect to what the customers expect. We are now working on the programs and with the customers to define what type of commitment they can come up with with such a long time span in mind, because this practically means that we cannot start processing work in the U.S. before 2029, right? It means that we have to have a very long-term span in terms of what we look for, but that's a fact. What is very positive is the relationship we are developing with US Army because that program will be processed entirely in Italy.
That does not have problems to go into revenues and profits immediately. Therefore, will be effectively a gap filler before the U.S. plant is ready. If, as I expect, the relationship with US Army will develop into possibly working also on another program, this will further add into the gap filler, so to speak, generating more revenues and profits while we work on the U.S. factory construction. That is pretty much the status so far. The U.S. team is working on it. It is a lot of conditional commitments to be lined up, but I think we are, again, on the right track on that as well.
Thank you very much.
Once again, if you wish to ask a question, please click on the Q&A icon on the left side of your screen or press star 1 on your telephone. As a reminder, if you wish to ask a question, please click on the Q&A icon on the left side of your screen or press star 1 on your telephone. The next question is a follow-up of Martino D'Ambrogi. Please go ahead. Oh, sorry. So we have Marifano Carlo from Intermonte. Please go ahead. Please click continue on the pop-up window.
Can you hear me?
Yes, please go ahead.
Hi, good afternoon, everyone. Just have a question. I know that maybe too early, but I was wondering if you have any idea of what would be the funding for the space launch activity at the next ESA Ministerial Conference. On the competitive landscape, do you imagine the ESA will continue to provide funding for other launchers to increase competition for European space? Thank you.
The discussion on the Ministerial Conference is ongoing. I think for us, the topics are clear. We have to possibly continue on the development programs for cryogenic propulsion on liquid oxygen methane along the lines of what we have started with the PNRR technology development projects. This would be our wish.
Most importantly, we need to make sure that we are properly supported on Vega C for further work to be done on strengthening the industrial robustness and supporting the rate increase not only for us, but also for our supply chain. The topics are clear. We have discussed that with the European Space Agency. Now, the European Space Agency is discussing with the various space agencies across Europe to stimulate them to participate in subscriptions by November. I think objectives are clear. We will see what happens on the real subscription by the end of the year. I mean, by now, I have seen at least four or five of these Ministerial Conferences, and I have rarely seen surprises. I expect that we will be covered on our objectives. As I told you before, in terms of the total amount, the last Ministerial was particularly large.
This might be slightly smaller. I am not concerned about that at all, knowing that we are moving in terms of the revenue mix more towards production, which is what we should be doing, by the way. Therefore, I do not expect particular issues on that.
Once again, if you wish to ask a question, please click on the Q&A icon on the left side of your screen or press star one on your telephone. For any further questions, please click on the Q&A icon on the left side of your screen, star one on your telephone. The next question is from Gabriele Gambarova from Intesa Sanp aolo. Please go ahead, sir.
Yes, good afternoon, and thanks for taking my questions, two, actually. The first is on the overall, let's say, scenario with the new U.S. administration. There have been frictions between Europe and America, and many politicians have been vocal about buying more European products when it comes to armaments. I was wondering if you are aware or you saw any kind of, let's say, change in the European decision-maker's attitude when it comes to buying, I don't know, air defense systems or something similar, or it's too early to say. The second one was, again, on the U.S. programs. I was wondering if you have, let's say, an idea of when, let's say, these couple of programs may get the green light from the client. That's all for me. Thanks.
A couple of things. First of all, the effect, the impact of the new administration in the U.S. on the policy for defense procurement is yet to be seen. I don't have the crystal ball in this particular case to know exactly what's going to happen. I can just observe that the amount of money being spent in space and defense is set to increase very substantially. We have evident signs everywhere. The launch of the Golden Dome, for example, in the U.S. in space, I don't know if you noticed the procurement of national security launches. I have never seen in my life a single procurement for launches from SpaceX, ULA, and Blue Origin of $14 billion in just one day. $14 billion. This is a huge procurement of launch services. The U.S. government purchased in one day 59 launch services. That's incredible.
The amount of money being invested by the U.S. government in both space and defense is just beyond even imagination. I think the winning factor of our proposition is that we do no export of any product. We do not intend to sell European products or Avio products to U.S. customers. We are not selling any of our products. We are making ourselves available to work in the U.S. on their U.S. products, not on our products. Therefore, what we do will be safe from any argument related to tariffs, to trade tariffs, and will be safe from any discussion between import and export because we do no export, right? Even for the US Army, we do not send the product back to the U.S.. We design and manufacture a product for US Army on European territory, and we deliver it here within European territory for NATO.
We do not have any export, re-export. We are away from this logic of the tariffs and of this logic of defense system procurement because we are not selling any European product to the U.S. or buying any product from the U.S. We are just working directly on the products. The fact that we work not only with OEMs, but also with end customers, meaning the U.S. Armed Forces, is an incredible added value. As I probably told you in the past, our authorization to work for the Department of Defense was sponsored by the U.S. Navy. We are working closely with the U.S. Navy, with the US Army, potentially with the U.S. Air Force. This is where the things happen. This is not intermediaries.
We think this is a winning proposition for the U.S. government and even for this administration because what this administration demands for is an increase in manufacturing activity in the U.S. and so on. Most importantly, if you follow what was on Meloni and Trump joint statement, there is a sentence that talks about joint production of defense articles, okay? This means practically what we are doing at the moment, right? Meaning that we will manufacture some of the U.S. products in Europe, manufacture some of the U.S. products in the U.S., but the logic is to make our capabilities available to the US needs practically, okay? In parallel, we will continue to do our job with our European customers, namely in defense and BDA, serving the European market.
The U.S. administration has been extremely vocal in expecting European parties to increase production of defense articles within Europe. We are just following exactly what is being asked by the new administration. I think we want to credit ourselves that we had this strategy before the new administration came in in the U.S. We had thought about this strategy because we knew it would have been safe to any change in administration because this is in the best interest of both parties and does not involve import or export flows.
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Yeah. When are these orders going to come? Good question. Now, the honest answer is I don't know precisely. It depends on many things. Obviously, the change in administration has definitely slowed down some of the administrative processes to get contracts signed and so on. It doesn't mean that they have changed their mind, but people are changing, points of contact are changing, and we are wasting a bit of time. I expect, as I said, to deliver some EUR 150 million worth of order intake in defense this year. Something will come. If not in the second quarter, maybe at the beginning of the third quarter, but we should see more orders coming from the U.S. in this time frame.
Moreover, we also expect additional orders coming in Europe from incremental procurements of our current products for NBDA in the wake of the early phase of the European rearm plan. In this context of very rapid acceleration of demand, it's very difficult to bet on the timing of new firm order backlog. There's always something in the administrative procedure that can make it slip by a quarter, but I wouldn't be anxious about it because demand is coming. Trust me.
Thank you very much.
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