This meeting is being recorded.
Go on.
Okay, thank you. Good afternoon to everyone, and welcome to the El.En.'s Fiscal Year 2023 Financial Results Conference Call. Today's call will be recorded, and therefore will be an opportunity for questions at the end of the conference call. With me on the call are Andrea Cangioli, El.En. CEO, and Enrico Romagnoli, El.En.'s Chief Financial Officer and Investor Relator. Before we begin, please note that there is a remark the management makes on the conference call about future expectations, plans, and prospects, and forward-looking statements. Certain statements in this call, including those addressing the company's beliefs, plans, objectives, estimates, or expectations of possible future results or events, are forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements involve known or unknown risks, including general, economic, and business conditions, and conditions in the industry the company operates, and may be affected should the assumption turn out to be inaccurate.
Consequently, no forward-looking statements can be guaranteed, and actual future results, performance, or achievements may vary materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. The company undertakes no obligation about the contents, nor to update the forward-looking statement to reflect events or circumstances that may arise after the date hereof. If you need to ask a question, please book your question on the chat of Bianca Fersini Mastelloni, and she will be pleased to introduce you according to the booking order. At this time, I want to give the floor to Andrea Cangioli. Andrea, please go ahead.
Thank you, Nicola. Thank you, Bianca, for hosting the call. Thank you for joining us in this conference call we are holding after the release of the draft 2023 financial report and of the 2024 guidance. On this call, myself, Andrea Cangioli, and Enrico Romagnoli that will be commenting the financial part of the report. 2023 turned out to be a fairly challenging year, but the EL.En. Group managed to face the circumstances that have been making our business environment less favorable without interrupting the revenue growth trend and limiting the decline of our profitability within the guidance provided throughout the year. For the 14th year in a row, the group registered a year-over-year sales volume increase. This year, revenues ended up growing by 2.8%. 2.7%. We are very satisfied with this outcome, which sets at approximately 10% the average revenue growth for the last three years.
Consolidated revenues were approximately EUR 692 million, an increase of approximately 3% compared to 2022, and EBIT was approximately EUR 73 million, equal to 10.5% on revenues. In the 4th quarter of 2023, record sales volume was just shy of EUR 200 million, and EBIT margin stood at 10.5% as well. Foreign exchange was detrimental of revenues. If we had maintained the same foreign exchange rates of 2022, revenue would have exceeded the threshold of EUR 700 million in 2023. Enrico will show you the details of certain cost accounting, highlighting how non-recurrent and non-monetary expenses hit our Q4 and our yearly financial results. For the moment, I would like to share with you that removing the non-recurrent expenses, our financials would have looked significantly better in the 4th quarter and in the year.
Net of stock-based non-monetary expense, the EBIT margin gap between 2022 and 2023, 2022 and 2023, would have been quite lower. In fact, this 2023 has been very positive for most of our business units. Enrico's business was off to a very strong start of the year, benefiting from the momentum of the strong 2022 order intake, and managed the normalization of the market demand, progressively reducing its growth compared to 2022, eventually registering a volume decrease in the 4th quarter. At the same moment, since the order intake normalization and sales volume reduction mainly involved the hair removal, which is the most competitive and therefore lower margin-bearing application segment, overall margins on sales improved over the year. Sales were strong in surgical devices, namely in neurology and ENT, and were strong in anti-aging skin treatments, where product innovation provided our product range with significant improvements.
Marketing support to sales activities was extensive and expensive. The times when traveling was banned and sales and marketing expense was virtual network activities only is gone, and we are now back to the traditional approach. Even though the P&L increase of the sales and marketing line is evident, we are quite pleased with the effectiveness of the expense in supporting the success of our sales activity as the help in appropriately positioning the products and the brands in the high end of our markets. Just to give you an example of the extent of our investments, the presence of our three medical aesthetic brands and companies, DEKA, Quanta System, and Asclepion, at the World Dermatology Congress held in Singapore last July. By the way, Singapore is probably the most expensive venue for a similar event.
By itself, it involved a market investment in excess of EUR 500,000. Good news here is this kind of congress takes place once every four years. The industrial business managed to achieve an overall sales growth in line with the consolidated sales growth. This fell below the initial expectation that were largely tied to the recovery that everybody was expecting from the Chinese markets. The reality on the trend of the Chinese economy turned out to be much different, and instead of being our revenue growth driver, our Chinese business was, in fact, our downward profit dragger in 2023. I would like to leave China to the end of my presentation and keep looking with you to the other business areas and comment their success in 2023.
Cutlite Penta, active in the sheet metal cutting business on, let's say, the Western world markets, managed to weather the weakness of the Italian market and to achieve a year-over-year sales increase due to its international sales expansion. In a year where most of the machine suppliers in manufacturing struggled, revenues were up 9.3% and EBIT was up 5.5%, notwithstanding the non-recurring cost that will be hopefully reversed in 2024. Cutlite offers a product range that maintains its attractiveness on the market for its cost effectiveness and also for the variety of the product range, ranging from compact, low-cost, but high-performance systems to complex systems with extended cutting surface combined with handling and storing automations.
LASIT, active in the identification laser marking markets, is benefiting of a favorable market and of the long-term investment planning, which was initiated with the acquisition of the new large production plant and is now moving forward with the creation of a network of distribution subsidiaries aimed to better control the market and better serve the end user on the most significant international markets. Subsidiaries were set up in Poland, Spain, Germany, and the U.K. The good news here is that after the startup period with the needed investment and subsequent losses, we are experiencing the transition to profit generation in these new entities as well. We are talking of a business unit that won't be able to overcome EUR 30 million size in 2024, so not a game changer for the group, but an interesting business bearing EBIT margins well in excess of the sheet metal market.
The other businesses within the industrial sector performed fairly well given the economic environment of the year, basically confirming the financial results of 2022. We are talking of the marking systems for decoration of large surfaces, the sale of mid-power CO2 laser sources, and the sales of innovative marking systems for selected application in the manufacturing world, ranging from solutions to the so-called hairpin stripping for the widely defined market of electric vehicles to new approaches to the packaging markets. The activities undertaken by the group in the field of sustainability continued and were also included among the performance indicators for management compensation. A new five year sustainability plan was released targeting climate change in terms of emission reduction, circular economy, promotion of a responsible supply chain, valorization of the people, and contribution to the community.
It's a major commitment, and we are happy to see positive feedbacks to our extensive work in the improvement of our ESG ratings provided by primary rating agency and in the awards that we have been granted. One of the most positive financial trends of the second half of 2023 has been the return to massive cash generation, well beyond the seasonality that sets our 4th quarter as the main cash generator quarter. We had shared with you how the supply crunch of 2022 tied to a demand pressure of unprecedented intensity had forced us to several emergency actions in order to preserve our capability to meet the requested and projected delivery plans. Long-term purchase plans were granted to vendors to secure product availability. Advance payments were allowed to scale up and allowed vendors to scale up in their short-term delivery priorities. Purchasing volumes were adapted to the projected growth.
This action led to the rapid increase of net working capital as an effect of heavier inventories and lighter accounts payable. When the demand initiated its normalization phase in the first months of 2023, we also remodulated our purchasing policies, and the excess of inventory took some time to enter into its progressive release phase, which is now fully in place with evident benefit to our cash positions. One relevant factor of our financial position is still lagging behind in realigning to the standards of a couple of years ago. I'm talking of the customer down payments accounts. Its decrease, their decrease by EUR 24 million in the year explains by itself the full cash consumption accounted for in financial year 2023. This decrease in down payments paid by customers is mainly affecting the sheet metal cutting business.
It is hitting the Italian business of Cutlite Penta, where the tax cuts that were requesting a timely down payment are not in place anymore, and therefore customers are returning to the original customs that do not foresee the payment of significant down payments. It is equally hitting the Chinese business of Penta Laser. In this case, as a direct effect of the reduced demand and subsequently of down payment bearing backlogs. This introduces us to the Chinese topic, the most disappointing in 2023. Not only China wasn't the revenue and profit driver we're counting on, but by registering an 8% sales decrease and an EUR 8.5 million negative EBIT, it was almost entirely responsible for the variance of the 2022 results from the ones achieved. Excuse me, of the 2023 results from the ones achieved in 2022.
Moreover, the sales decrease was obtained gross of the incremental sales volume brought by the acquisition of KBF, which was worth about EUR 14 million of euros of revenues in 2023. The Chinese domestic market for our system is not growing as expected, tainted by the evident unease of the Chinese economy and becoming very competitive due to the large number of participants that are effectively and aggressively covering every niche. We are expanding our overseas volume, sales volume, in order to benefit of both higher margins and increased volumes. Good results were achieved in the 4th quarter of 2023, which marked a good recovery out of the negative trend of the year, still not sufficient to materially improve the annual results.
For what concerns the IPO application in mainland China, we updated you throughout the year on how the weak financial results were unsuitable for the filing of a successful IPO. During 2023, the listing project was therefore suspended while waiting for the countermeasures adopted in China to once again outline growth and profitability prospects capable of supporting listing aspirations. In the first week of 2024, having found it impossible to proceed with the subscription of an IPO application with reference to the 2023 results, the private equity funds that had invested in Penta Laser Zhejiang during 2022 forwarded the withdrawal requests they were contractually provided with. Meetings are underway in which the funds are evaluating the opportunity to extend the stay in their shareholding structure in light of commitments and guarantees that are currently being negotiated.
Confirmation of the exit by the funds would determine the interruption of the IPO process and the need to identify alternative solutions for the business unit. Another more specific event occurred in late February 2024 and affected our 2023 financials. A customer of Penta Laser Zhejiang initiated a lawsuit claiming reimbursement and damages of a fairly large and complex systems we custom manufactured for him. We are planning to countersue him for payment, but in the meantime, and in the light of the initial state of the dispute and the uncertainties about the probability of succumbing. In closing the 2023 financials, we decided to prudentially set aside an amount equal to CNY 25 million renminbi, roughly EUR 3.5 million euros expensed in Q4 2023. As mentioned, we have seen some material improvement in the business performance in China.
After the cost reduction activities, the 2024 plan we in 2024, we are planning to improve our business performance compared to 2023. This leads us in the topic of 2024 guidance, but I will be back on this after Enrico's report. One last point. Before I give the word to Enrico, I would like to make a comment on dividend distribution, sticking to our rationale of distributing dividends proportionally to the generated income. The board of directors is proposing to the shareholders the distribution of a EUR 20 dividend, which is 10% less than last year. Like roughly 10% less was EBIT and net profit. Please, Enrico, go ahead with your section.
Thank you, Andrea. Good morning, everybody. As usual, I'm going to give some comment about our financials released yesterday. The group achieved in 2023 a total turnover of EUR 692 million, up 3% compared to the last year. In the medical sector, the increase was approximately 3%, the same for the industrial sector that recovered the decrease of 4.1% until the end of September 2023. The impact on sales of the two sectors remained the same as for last year. In Q4, a record turnover was recorded close to the threshold of EUR 200 million with an increase of 5.3% compared to the 4th quarter 2022, with an operating result of EUR 21 million of euros. The main increases were achieved in cutting and marking business, while the performance of the medical sector showed a tendency towards a progressive slowdown during the year.
Having exhausted the residual push of the large order acquisition of 2022 and gradually being confronted with market conditions made less favorable by the uncertainty induced by the wars in Ukraine and Palestine and by the high level of interest rates, which does not facilitate investment in capital goods. On a yearly basis, the gross margin stood at EUR 261.4 million, up 4.7% compared to the EUR 249.7 million as of last year. The increase was higher than in sales thanks to the recovery in sales margin from 37.1%- 37.8%. The better margin is essentially due to the sales mix of the medical sector, while the margin in sales in the industrial sector suffered a slight decline.
The margin of the industrial sector is also influenced by the non-recurring cost of approximately EUR 3 million due to the damage caused by the November flood in Italy and to an accrual for prudential impairment on inventory value in relationship to the legal dispute in China, as already mentioned by Andrea. Operating expenses increased, and the impact on sales up from 8.4% 8.6%. The main reasons are the sales and marketing expenses for the trade fair and congress incurred both in the medical and in the industrial sector. Staff cost increased of EUR 13 million, up as the impact on sales from 14.6%- 16.1%. The cost for stock option and share-based payment to employees contributed to the cost increase. In 2023, the amount was EUR 3.5 million compared to the EUR 1.5 million in 2022.
The total stock option expenses in 2023 were EUR 3.9 million compared to EUR 1.6 million in 2022 because EUR 0.4 million referring to the BOD was accounted in G&A expenses. The impact on sales in 2023 was 0.6% compared to the 0.2% of 2022. As of December 2023, the group had 2,082 employees lower than last year. The decrease affects the Chinese companies, apart from the newly acquired KBF of Shenzhen, whose numbers were not included in 2022 totals. As a result of the adaptation of the workforce to the current different needs of the market, the staff employed in China without considering KBF went from 894 units at the end of 2022 to 663 at the end of 2023. New hires instead mainly involved Asclepion in Germany and Quanta System in Samarate. EBITDA was EUR 90.9 million, down by 4.6% compared to the EUR 95.3 million of 2022.
The impact on sales decreased marginally: 14.1% in 2022, 13.1% in 2023. The cost for depreciation and provision show an increase going from EUR 14.2 million- EUR 18.1 million, and the impact on turnover goes from 2.1% to 2.6%. The legal dispute already mentioned for the Chinese company with a customer in Q4. In Q4, we did an accrual for risk for EUR 1.6 million, which combined with the EUR 1.7 million inventory devaluation for the system involved in the supply and still booked within our inventories, brings the cost allocated to the dispute in the 4th quarter to EUR 3.3 million. EBIT marked a positive balance of EUR 72.7 million, down compared to the EUR 81 million as of December 2022, with a 10.5% EBIT margin compared to the 12% in the previous year.
We remind you that in November 2023, Cutlite Penta and Ot-Las suffered extensive damage from the flood that hit their plants. Damages to the goods in the warehouse, to the system in progress, and to the equipment forced us to account expenses for approximately EUR 1.7 million. If acknowledged, insurance reimbursement and any state compensation will be accounted for upon collection. Therefore, in Q4, EBIT on the next slide was affected by EUR 1.7 million expenses booked for the flood, EUR 3.3 million for the Chinese legal dispute, total EUR 5 million of non-recurring costs. In addition, compared to 2022, annual EBIT was hit by higher non-monetary costs for stock-based compensation for EUR 2.3 million. The overall non-recurring expenses were equal to 2.5% in Q4 revenues and 0.7% on the year's revenues, while the higher non-monetary costs accounted for 0.4% of annual sales.
This means that current Q4 EBIT margin would have been 13%, current annual EBIT margin would have been 11.2% instead of 10.5%, and that half of the 0.8 percentage points gap between 2022 and 2023 EBIT margin was due to an increase in stock-based compensation expenses. Annual income before taxes showed a positive balance of EUR 71.1 million, with a net decrease of 9.9%, and the group closed the 2023 financial year with a net income of EUR 48.2 million compared to the EUR 55.1 million last year. The impact on turnover for the period was equal to 7%. The net income of 2023 was negatively affected by Chinese activities that accounted for a net loss of EUR 6 million compared to an income of EUR 1.3 million for the last year.
Talking about the balance sheet, we can see that the net financial position recorded in the year is a EUR 20.8 million decrease from the EUR 75 million at the end of 2022 to EUR 54.6 million as of December 31st. We also remind that in non-current assets are included mid-term liquidity investments for EUR 23.8 million, and so this amount is not included in the net financial position. Capital expenditure was EUR 13 million, a significant amount but well below the average of the previous year in which substantial investments aimed at increasing production capacity were undertaken. Looking at the cash flow in the second half 2023, the group returned to generating cash from its operational activities, recording an improvement in the net financial position of approximately EUR 45 million in the period, reversing the trend of cash absorption highlighted in the first half of the year.
In the main cash absorption, you can see on a yearly basis the net working capital of EUR 34 million, even though there is, you can see in the second picture, a reduction during the year. The other receivable payables for EUR 25 million, the other receivable and payables mainly referring to the down payment already mentioned by Andrea. There is also a payment of EUR 19 million of dividends in the month of May. For what concerns the revenue breakdown by business in the medical sector, revenues were EUR 392.4 million with an increase of 2.7%. The growth derived from the good performance of sales of systems for surgical application and after-sales services and consumables, which more than offset the decline recorded in the aesthetic segment.
The aesthetic, which is the most significant segment with a 58% share on the total medical turnover, marked a 5% decline with a sales amount of EUR 226 million, affected by the weakness of some important accounts for hair removal systems. The fastest growth was recorded in surgery, +25% with a turnover of EUR 77.2 million compared to the EUR 61.9 million in the previous financial year 2022. In surgical application, urology systems constituted the most significant share of turnover and also the fastest growing one. There was also a slight growth in the therapy segment, +1%, and the turnover in after-sales services and consumables recorded approximately 10% growth, with a relevant contribution of optical fibers for surgical application, which represents a significant and recurring share of after-sales revenue.
In the industrial sector, revenue growth was approximately 2.9%, up to EUR 300 million compared to the EUR 291.5 million in the same period of the previous year. An excellent fourth quarter contributed to the result, plus 22% compared to Q4 2022, which was particularly encouraging for sales in China for the laser cutting, plus 58% in the quarter in euro, plus 71% in renminbi. A sign of market relaunch, which, however, did not prevent Chinese activities from recording an 8.3% decline on annual basis in euro, 0% in renminbi, despite the acquisition of KBF at the end of 2022, which brought in organic growth of approximately EUR 50 million. In the average exchange rate of renminbi, devalued compared to the euro today, it was 7.6% in 2023. The laser cutting sector continued to grow in Italy, Europe, and the Western markets thanks to Cutlite Penta, plus 9.3%, and Cutlite Brazil, plus 2.8%.
Cutlite Penta almost entirely based its growth on the expansion into international markets, particularly those outside Europe. In the marking application segment, the activities of LASIT and its subsidiaries emerged significantly in 2023, recording the best growth in turnover, +27%, and profitabilities, +123% in EBIT. The activities controlled by LASIT of Torre Annunziata, which include distribution branches in Poland, Spain, Germany, and the U.K., recorded an excellent performance exceeding EUR 26.7 million in revenues. Atlas, also operating in the marking sector, recorded a reduction in sales of 8%, and therefore the overall increase in the marking segment was 22%. The sale of laser sources and activities mainly carried out by the industrial division of EL.En. and Florence registered a good performance, +33%.
In addition to the increase of installed base for laser systems, the provision of services, system rentals, and consultancy has taken a prevalent role in the art conservation, which contributed to the rapid development of revenues for the after-sales service in the industrial sector, which marked growth around 15% with revenues of EUR 20.4 million. Sales by area: the sales trend by macrogeographical area for the two sectors confirms the best performance in four-area markets for the medical sector, while in the industrial sector, the excellent sales performance in Europe contrasts with the slowdown in the rest of the world caused by lower sales recorded in the cutting sector by Chinese companies, -8%, a contained slowdown thanks to the rapid development of sales by the other group companies involved in the industrial sector, especially Cutlite Penta.
At a constant exchange rate, industrial sector revenues in the rest of the world would be increasing. Andrea, please go ahead on the rest of the presentation.
Yes, thank you, Enrico. I would like to confirm that the positive mid-term outlook for the growth of our markets, both in the medical and in the industrial sector, is confirmed by several researchers available on the market, which, even if certain specific outcomes of each of them are arguable, they all converge to expected average growth rates around 10% for the medical sector and just over 6% for laser industrial applications. The needed corollary to these figures is that growth is driven by demand, but also by innovative supply that stimulates demand.
This is why R&D activities are so vital for us, and we allocate an increasing budget to make sure we maintain the capabilities and the resources to continuously improve the performance and the effectiveness of our product range in order to be able to effectively compete on these growing markets. During 2023, demand pressure normalized, and the group returned to operating according to the canons that have historically characterized its activities. As much as 2023 started with a strong increase based on the momentum of a very strong year in 2022, the sales results of these first months of the year 2024 seem to be aligning with the normalization trend of 2023. But the order collection for the following months is to date encouraging and outlines the expectation of a progressive acceleration throughout the rest of the year.
This allowed us to release a revenue and EBIT growth guidance for the year 2024. Given the uncertainty of the global market environments, no further detail on the extent of such growth can be released today. Obviously, the achievement of our revenue and profitability targets that we are sharing with you today also depends on the possibility of meeting the plans defined for the industrial sector in China, which in the recent past has shown high instability and unpredictability. We are done with our prepared comments, and so I believe, Bianca, we can initiate our Q&A section.
Thank you, Andrea. We can now open the Q&A session, and we have just two, at the moment, two investors. I give the floor to Giovanni Salvetti from Berenberg. Go on, Giovanni.
Hello, everyone. Can you hear me, Andrea, Enrico?
Hi. Yes, we can. Yes, yes, we can hear you. Hi.
Thanks for taking my question. And first of all, congratulations for the set of results, not easy given the circumstances. So I have a couple of questions, some more broad and some more specific. I'll start with the broad ones. I mean, you were actually just mentioning now that research seems to point to a 10% growth in medical and 5% in industrial. So my question was really that, so how would you, in terms of, let's just say, division, what can we expect? So growth in both divisions, and what's the assumption for China for this year? And again, on guidance, is it fair to assume that aesthetic division is expected to grow in 2024 after the inflection? And how is Cure going to contribute on that? The second question is on China. I'm very glad to see that China is recovering in Q4.
Given the strong top-line growth in Q4, is it fair to assume that in the last quarter there was also a positive contribution at the EBIT level after three quarters of negative impact? Staying on China, from the press release, I struggle to understand whether the project of listing the IPO is definitely off the table or it's off the table now because the private equities are actually going out. On that, if it's possible to say which one confirmed that they're going to stay and which one they will leave and how much this corresponds in monetary terms. I have two other questions, very specific, very short. If you can, I was looking at the P&L after eight years of positive figures. The change in inventory of finished goods and work in progress was negative with a big figure in Q4. If you can explain that.
The second one is more technical about the accruals for the lawsuit with Penta. So this impact below EBITDA and explain why the weight of EBITDA on sales in Q4 is so high. And does it also increase the reserve for risk and charges in the balance sheet? And my very last one, I promise, is the growth for Cutlite Penta, you say that it's mainly due to the expansion in the international market. Is this mainly US? And who are you competing with there? Thank you.
Giovanni, I will ask you the last question. I'll have Enrico answer the other questions, the other, let's say, numbers question. Well, the last question, the growth is on the international market. Growth in the United States is significant for Cutlite Penta, but it's not the only growth driver. Also, Europe is significantly helping in the growth.
Enrico, I got the answer about the accrual for the lawsuit. I got it. I didn't get your first question. I don't know if Enrico, you got it. Sorry? Yeah, yeah. I don't know if you got it. I can repeat it otherwise. No, I don't know. I don't got it. So the first technical question was why there was a big change in inventory of finished goods and work in progress in the last quarter of the year. If I look at the P&L, 2023 was the first year after seven where this figure was negative. This is typically at the end of the year, higher sales. We had inventory of finished products with discharges in the fourth quarter. This is quite normal. Yeah, no, no, but it was negative on the year as well. That's why I asked.
And probably the same could be applied to the year. We had probably higher, it means that at the end of 2023, we didn't send everything out, and we had something more staying in inventories than last year. Probably this is mainly the reason. I believe we are lighter in terms of finished goods this year than last year. While on the EBITDA, on how the accrual hits EBITDA and EBIT, Enrico can tell you. Yeah, the accruals of China had hit the gross margin for CNY 13 million, so more or less EUR 1.6 million-EUR 1.7 million. And for CNY 12 million, so around EUR 1.5 million, the accruals. And so we did a provision for risk, and the CNY 12 million is accounted in accrual for risk and depreciation, so below the EBITDA before the EBIT. Going backwards, China fourth quarter was strong.
Actually, it was very lossy due to this accrual. Would have been slightly lossy anyhow. The issue is that we are moving, we're trying to move our revenues to higher margin-bearing revenues outside China. We are progressively doing it, but the process is ongoing. And so for the moment, we are still struggling. The budget for 2024 underlined the guidance for China, foresees a revenue growth, but does not foresee a profit contribution to the consolidated results. This is where we are today. For what concerns the medical market growth, yes, you're right. We are looking forward to be back to growth in aesthetics, also thanks to the expected recovery of certain large accounts that were quite slow in 2023 in hair removal. But we are expecting strong results a little bit over the board in all our medical applications, especially, again, in the skin tightening anti-aging application.
So we are not disclosing the details today, but of course, having plotted growth in 2024, medical and aesthetic are expected to grow. Accure is going not very fast. I wouldn't attribute to Accure a significant part of the expected growth. Quanta System, which is the company that manufactures the system, is expected to grow once again. But the impact of the growth of Accure is not the main driver of growth for Quanta System in 2024. The IPO, your question about the IPO, I was as precise as I could in my exposition about the IPO.
Of course, the request of withdrawal by the private equity funds, if accepted or enforced, would cause the technical suspension of the IPO because as much as we had to take on board the private equity funds to be able to file for an IPO with a financial shareholding by local investors, should they leave, we wouldn't be in this condition. So this would technically suspend the IPO. They all asked to withdraw, and we are discussing to see if we can convince them to continue to believe in the plan. The point is that we need also to be able to show them a strong financial recovery that would support an IPO project. In this moment, the results are very weak, and also the additional issue of this lawsuit is not helping under this direction.
Very precise now. Thank you.
You're welcome.
Now we have Carlo Maritano from Intermonte. Go on, Carlo, please.
Hi. Hi. Good afternoon, everyone. I have a couple of questions, both related to cash generation. So in this year, you reduced CapEx to around EUR 13 million. So what do we have to expect in the next couple of years? So we do have to expect a normalization compared to the high level of the previous year. And the second one is on working capital. So you have reduced by a lot the working capital in the last two quarters. I was wondering if we have to expect still some quarters of reduction given the delay in the efficiency in working capital that we usually see. So if we have to expect a first part of the year with still quite good and robust cash generation. Thank you.
First, CapEx is well below the average of the previous year because we do not have in this moment the need to expand our production capacity or at least to expand it with very large investments. China, which was one of the main investment drivers in terms of capacity, is not needing any more capacity. In the rest of the world, in Italy here, we are undergoing smaller projects. Here in Florence, we have some investments. LASIT will continue to spend on the new building. Quanta will do it. But I believe that the order of magnitude of the CapEx investment of 2023 will more or less be confirmed in 2024.
Cash generation and net working capital, there is a seasonality behavior which usually sees the fourth quarter as the best quarter, not only because we sell the most in the fourth quarter, but also because our planning are typically tied to year plans. And in the first quarters, we try to be richer, let's say, safer. So we buy more, and we then tend to divert, to reduce purchasing in the second half where purchasing was in excess. For this reason, I do not expect to see a strong net working capital reduction as we have seen it in the last quarter in the first quarters of 2024. Though I do not expect a trend in the direction of what we have experienced in 2023.
Thank you. Just a follow-up on the aesthetic business. So you said that you expect growth in 2024.
I was wondering if you expect a start to the year quite weak given the exit speed from 2023, and you expect a stronger recovery in the second half, maybe also thanks to interest rate decrease. So if this is also a driver that you have to look at in 2024.
Thank you. Yes, this is what I confirm what I was saying. We expect a weak start compared to the strong start of 2023. We see it. I mean, it's March 15, so we are quite in the first quarter of 2024. And we expect a progressive recovery given what we see in order bookings. So we have seen throughout 2023 what I called normalization, which is a slowdown of this massive order intake to a normalization of normal volumes.
With this beginning of 2024, we have seen an increase, a good vitality that makes us expect good revenue results starting from the second quarter and forward.
Thank you. And now, Andrea, we have Andrea Bonfà from Banca Akros. Go on, Andrea, please. Andrea? Andrea Bonfà? Hello? Yeah, sorry.
Now you can hear me. Okay. Okay, sorry about that. No, I do apologize. My connection is very poor, but I mean, and most of my questions have already been answered. But I was wondering, again, Andrea, if you can elaborate on your guidance because, I mean, you are counting on a recovery in medical, but we got this -6% exit. So I was wondering if that is more because of a new pipeline or products or because on the commercial side, you got these accounts which are supposed to recover.
And if you can maybe elaborate more, maybe what are the geographical areas on which you are counting, let's say, this recovery coming from? And the second one is on the industrial laser. You already anticipated that you do not expect China to contribute to profitability recovery, but are you anyway expecting industrial to contribute to your EBIT growth guidance? Thank you very much.
Yes. Let's start from the second question. Yes, you're right. I said that, in fact, I don't expect China to contribute to the profitability while I expect China to contribute to the profitability recovery. This means that I don't expect big profits coming from China this year, but I expect a strong reduction in the losses. Concerning the medical, you are right. Our expectation of growth, especially in aesthetic, is based on specific facts.
The first and most important transversal fact is that we released an impressive set of new products and of new improved products starting from the half of 2023. I'm talking just to make an example of the PRO line of DEKA, which started with the release of Again PRO, Onda PRO, and RedTouch PRO in July, and finished with the release of Tetra PRO, Motus PRO, and SmartXide PRO in the month of January 2024. So we are renewing the product range, and this is expected to stimulate our customers. Then we have important new products for our large OEM customers in the US market that should hit the market in the first and second quarter. We are talking of new products for hair removal and new products for body contouring.
There's great expectation, especially for hair removal, where we were weak throughout the year, also due to the slow performance of certain large U.S.-based accounts. Third, we are seeing recovery from an area which had been extremely brilliant in 2022, which marked a slowdown for geopolitical reasons in 2023. We are talking of the Middle East, which is a very significant market for hair removal. We are seeing good recovery signs as of today for this specific market.
Thank you very much.
And now, Andrea, we have Emily Da Silva from Eiffel Investment with a question about China. Go on, Emily, please.
Thank you. Just a quick follow-up on China. So you mentioned the recovery you're expecting for 2024. I have a question on the Q4 figures in China. This recovery was mainly driven by volume.
How were the prices also in China, and what are your expectations in terms of volumes, mainly new clients or new contracts? Just to elaborate a little bit more on the dynamics there. And what is the level of revenue you have to reach in order to be profitable there?
Thank you, Emily, for the question. It's not easy to answer because we have exact plans which show volumes per area, price per area, margin per area, based on the margin that we expect to obtain in the past. Not always, let's say, these plans have proved to be reliable due to the very quick changes in the market. So today, what's sure is that we reduced the cost base, and so our break-even point is much lower.
And so I believe that while the internal plans call for a very large recovery, a quick recovery, I am more prudent, and I believe that slightly beating 2023 would be good results in China this year. We expect that the revenue mix will be much more weighted on overseas where we have higher margins, and we expect even lower margins in China currently. The whole mix would anyway be able, as I mentioned, also answering Andrea Bonfà's question, to strongly reduce the losses or also to see a profit for the end of the year.
Okay, thank you.
You're welcome. Andrea, we have one more question from Giovanni Salvetti from Berenberg. Go on, Giovanni.
Hello, hi. Thanks for the follow-up. Maybe one about the market. Recently, there was a big merger in the industry between Cynosure and Lutronic.
Now, given your historical partnership with also Cynosure, I was just kind of wondering what's the potential impact if revenues from Cynosure had to go to zero?
It's a good question. Cynosure was our company, was our partner, and so this is quite an important change. Currently, Cynosure is buying from us on an OEM basis their high-end hair removal device. Currently, we have orders in place for the whole year 2024, and there has been no sign by Cynosure in trying to get out from their commitment, which is a firm commitment. In the midterm, Cynosure with Lutronic might work out an internal solution, being Lutronic, a very good manufacturer of high-end hair removal devices based on Alexandrite laserheads.
The order of magnitude of the sales volume to Cynosure, which has been accounted for in 2023 and which is expected to be accounted for in 2024, is well below EUR 20 million, just to give an order of magnitude. On the other side, I would like to discuss that a merger of two large players, of course, puts on the market a very strong player, which might combine distribution capabilities to technical capabilities. But on the other side, as we have very often seen on the market, faces the merged company with the challenge of managing the two different teams. And not always companies have been able to successfully manage that kind of mergers. Typically, the merger synergies that show up in the financial support for the board direction decision to the merger are not achieved.
This also leaves on the market several professionals, which in the merger are sacrificed because you select, for instance, a distribution in a certain country rather than the other one when you have to choose whether to go in a market with a distribution of Company A or Company B. And so we believe that even though we will have a large competitor, we will also have an opportunity to further penetrate certain markets by taking advantage of what is left aside by the merger.
Very exhaustive, Andrea. Thank you. Grazie.
Then, Andrea, we have not any other question in our list. Then I kindly ask to the floor if there are some other questions. If there are no more questions, we finish this conference. And if you have some questions to investigate, please do not hesitate to contact Enrico Romagnoli. He will be happy to answer your question.
Thank you for attending this conference, and we hope to have you all again next time. Good afternoon to everybody.
Thank you, everybody. Thank you.