Welcome to the event of the presentation of our outcomes in the first half. In a very complex scenario, people have managed to achieve a big growth, focusing on profitability areas and also watching out overseas markets. Before giving the floor to our director for relationship with investors, I would like to remind you that you can write your questions on the bottom right-hand side. Thank you very much, and welcome to all of you. Before giving the floor to our president, chairman, I would like to focus on our market, on the market where GPI is working. We are actually leader in the technology for the healthcare industry. The healthcare industry is actually evolving and focusing on very important topics like aging or the lack of doctors and nurses.
But to tackle all of these issues, this means also to put in place some reforms and shifting towards a more and more preventive and predictive healthcare. So, we can be a really a strategic partner for the healthcare industry in this respect. Also, in terms of the evolution towards a more sustainable healthcare. So digital health, this means that we can tackle different the different issues to the healthcare market is faced with, so integrated resources for the treatment of people. Through automation systems, we are able to upload, for example, ophthalmic images and AI, and through software, we can find the best blood back for the patient. We managed to connect more than 100,000 patients, so for remote healthcare.
More and more artificial intelligence has also been used in the healthcare industry. A recent example was AI helping with a very specific and complex algorithm, helping doctors to understand better, for example, in the postpartum stage. And also possible new models can be developed. We can transfer millions of data regarding the health of people and animals as well, for a global approach to healthcare. GPI, therefore, and we're celebrating... Actually, we celebrated on the first of October, our first 35 years of business. We have a very good management team with an excellent track record, and we managed to gain more than 3,000 customers, and we are also present in more than 70 countries. So, really, we're also able to offer multi-channel solutions there.
We don't only, we don't only want to offer technology, but also services to optimize the clinical, administrative, care and social processes. And of course, that we care for the health of the people. We have a patient-centered approach. So as you can see on the right-hand side, we have peaked to EUR 360.2 million in revenue, with a very high growth rates as you can see. I'll give now the floor to our chairman, and thank you very much for your attention.
Good morning, and thank you. Thank you very much for being here with us in the presentation of the first half 2023 outcomes.
It shows all of these figures actually show that GPI is able to tackle with all of the challenges that are out there on the market. So we have achieved important figures of revenue, EUR 193 million and EBITDA of EUR 26 million. We have a double-digit growth rate on revenues and the EBITDA. This is thanks to the mix of the different strategic business-... So as for M&A, transformative action, we have already taken out different steps. And as you see, the most important step that we wanted to make, and today we are in an important market as the French one. I think you mentioned the recent acquisition of Evolucare, so a software company diversifying its portfolio that has a wide range of customers. They work in France and Germany.
This company is so important that we also had to go through the screening of the finance ministry in France, because they consider this company to be strategic for the country. So the fact that now GPI acquired it, and of course, we have a very successful history behind us, and we are familiar with the market. And so the finance ministry in France gave the okay for our acquisition. So the acquisition of a French company by an Italian company were the important strategic steps that we're about to make. Of course, this company is also used to acquisitions good cash generation. We have a large population of employees that focusing on research.
So we do think that, of course, we can further a deeper dialogue to tackle the challenges ahead of us. We are faced with a foreign market, i.e., France, but this is a very important strategic step on our side. We're very pleased that we did it, and it was a tough sort of battle to conquer this French company. But now it's high time for us to focus even more on the software area, which is our core business, too, by trying and integrating further the different business areas within the software and together with Evolucare. We then also want to enhance the organizational processes so that we can increase our cash. And then also, another important decision has been taken.
We've started exploring out, and so, see what we will be doing with Argentea. Mm-hmm. And it's a business that is quite profitable, so cash conversion, and if we disinvest, also if this will have a positive impact on the group's net debt position. Now focusing on the main activities. So well, we're very proud to announce that we are the first Italian player in this very special market niche that is software, and we've been signed a very prestigious contract in Italy.
The famous Consip 1 Contract, so this amounts to over EUR 900 million overall, of course, and EUR 42 million orders out of a day, as the quote for the agency, for the in the, partly in 2022 and also in the first half of 2023. There are also other contracts that as, as prestigious as these, for the Lombardy Region, the electronic medical record for the Lombardy Region, the pathological anatomy software for the Veneto Region, and telemedicine platform for Friuli-Venezia Giulia. Also, in terms of the regional contact center for the Lombardy region, we're talking about EUR 280 million in total and 6,000 of cash in order. Apart, we have, haven't stopped here, and we have started the further investments.
So as I said, this contact center is very important. We're talking about EUR 280 million, 70% of the share that we have taken, and this has always allowed us to start the year with good margins. We also won the tender for the software for HR management, again, for the Lombardy Region, a small amount, EUR 7 million in seven years. Then as for the new international contract, Canary Islands, Germany, Switzerland, Hungary, China, and Japan, with our technology, we are present. We then offer our products to these high-tech countries like Germany and Japan, and this as far as automation is concerned. And then again, software, GPI for Blood, new contracts were gained in the USA and Spain for about EUR 2 million.
So ordinary business is moving on very well. So now let's look at the figures. As you can see, very strong improvement in revenue and profitability. So our revenues increased by over 14%, but especially we have increased our EBITDA year-on-year by 50%, as you can see on the right-hand side. We're talking about the Adjusted, so the EBITDA on adjusted revenue. So you can see that we moved from 11% of last year to 14.4% in the first half. Let's now look in more detail to the different strategic business areas. Now, as you can see, software moves from EUR 57.7 million-EUR 81.8 million, so quite an important increase in terms of revenues.
Part is organic and part is due to M&A. Also, the EBITDA margin is constant, and this is good for us because it keeps on year on year. And then, Care, in this case, we've had a decrease in revenues. Of course, it's hard to compare the first half of 2022 with the first half of 2023. In 2022, we still had COVID there, which allowed us to achieve a high revenue. Whereas, of course, in the first half of the... And then from the automation area, we have increased with a +23.1%, and also the EBITDA margin is improving. As for ICD, as you can see, quite an important increase, right? Nearly 7%.
But now, also by knowing better our customers, we've managed to improve both turnover and the margin. And then the Pay area, Argentea area, we are increasing also here, and we have those 4% of EBITDA increase. Now by looking on the whole situation, on the left-hand side, you have the revenues. As you can see, we have achieved hundreds of millions of euros . But what I would like to highlight is that software moved from 34%- 42%. So with the Evolucare acquisition, then the software will certainly be the main driver of our profitability. So this 42.9% is organic, and 22.1% is inorganic. Right. So this allows us to achieve a very important outcome.
As far as EBITDA is concerned, and I invite you to look at the right-hand side, you see that in 2022, the software accounted for more than 55%. In the first half of 2023, we're up to 75%, which leads to a major reduction in the other S.p.A. s, which is linked to the increase of software compared to the other areas.
... The care experience is declining due to the end of the tail of COVID-19. But for sure, in the second half, we will see different results. But as far as the others are concerned, as I anticipated, automation fees had increased by 39% in revenues, and it increased its EBITDA margins from 20%-23%, which it is continuously on the increase. As for ICT, it increases in terms of revenues and especially in terms of margin, which is up to over 30%. As to the last three S.p.A.s, we see a major net growth.
Another area that gives a lot of satisfaction is the following: We always said that we want to be less city-centric and increase our geographical footprint, but we see 13.8% of our export up by 68%, half year on half year. This is mainly due to acquisition, but also to the development of Contract Riedl and Jennifer Castle on foreign markets. This accounts for 25% of foreign sales. Evolucare will allow us to increase our revenues from foreign countries. This tells us that GPI is becoming an increasingly more international company, mainly a European company. This evolution leads us to record a sharp increase in cash generation, because our revenues will be linked to other economies other than ours, which allows us to better manage our liquidity.
Let us come to the composition of profit and loss accounts. So we've experienced an increase in tax success. EUR 12 million of these was achieved by investing in R&D. This is one of the main drivers that we have, and they will leverage this for development. Other investments are linked to R&D, EUR 16 million, then the net working capital. But the main part of our increase is linked to R&D. We have commercial credits that have an impact. There have been some slowdowns in terms of trade credits. Then, amounts due to employees have an impact. In the first half, they are certainly higher, and then there are paid holidays to be taken into account. We have a distribution of dividends that have an impact, coupled with EUR 42 million for the acquisition of minorities.
Now, let us focus on cash generation and the cash flow data. Next slide. So from EUR 142.6 million, EUR 73 million of which was for the acquisition of minorities and IFRS, and EUR 65 million was debt to banks. Our cash flow generation of EBITDA is about EUR 63 million. We have a net working capital, which is EUR 22 million. So EUR 22 million plus EUR 6.7 million is due to increase of taxes mainly linked to the increase in interest rates, and secondly, to the fact that since we had an increase in corporate capital, we didn't use the 442 capital increase, because we have a mid-long term view. So we didn't have the benefit of assets generating cash.
So we had to invest our capital only in August when we acquired Evolucare. So from then on, we have acquisition and margin and cash flow for the use for the, acquisition of the company and related interests. Then capitalization is in line with the strategic plan and the desire to continue along this path. The dividends of those agreed with the partners, with the shareholders, so we have EUR 1 million of extraordinary investment for the purchase of a very small company. And then we have some financial adjustments. As of 30th of June, we had a net cash position of EUR 164 million, but only EUR 119 million were due to banks, whereas 42 are retained for the minorities, and 13 is linked to IFRS.
So to summarize, to really understand what our focus is for the future, we will see some prospective data until the end of the year. So the focus is, first of all, the software industry and the European market. The competitors in Europe within the software market, especially through the integration of acquired companies. So we really want to be a big player in Europe, as is the case at the moment in Italy. Then disinvestment of non-strategic business. This is no longer a strategic area for its size and for the decision made by the company to only continue in the software S.p.A. So these investments in Argentea. The sales in 2022 was fourteen million, so it's a lot, and the EBITDA margin was 5.7 million.
Then we focus on the organization and on cash generation, so strengthening of the AFC area. Here we have a new person, CFO Alessandro Poletto, who's been onboarded recently. He's a professional with a longer experience. He's a capable, reliable person who's already faced integration and internationalization processes with other companies, even bigger than GPI. Now, I invite Alessandro to give us a quick presentation of who he is.
Thank you very much, Andrea. Good morning, everyone. I'll just take a few seconds to introduce myself. There will certainly be opportunities in the future to meet in person. My name is Alessandro Poletto. For a few days now, I have joined GPI. As Andrea said, I have 30 years of professional experience. I cover the administration, finance, and control as a focus of my activity.
I've been working with other groups or groups working in regulated markets, both in Italy and abroad. Just to mention a few names, Marzotto, Moleskine, and Design Holding was my last employment. My background includes an IPO, Marzotto, and GVS . Marzotto Moleskine was listed on the German Stock Exchange. With all this professional experience, I can only say I worked with Italian groups with a European and international foothold. For the future journey with the company, I will continue along the path designed by GPI. Thank you very much, everyone, and I hope I will meet you soon in person. I hand back to Andrea. Thank you very much. Good luck, and welcome to GPI. You will certainly have a lot of work to do with us.
In fact, the organization of operations for credit management and for the improvement of the net working capital will require a lot of work. For sure, an integration of cash pooling on all companies of the group, but also the launch of a project to have a single management system focused and based in Trento, which will allow us to have a single coordinated management, and a single point of reference. Let us come to the guidance for 2023. We have depicted our expectations considering the introduction of Evolucare. Based on the forecast, it should be more than EUR 40 million of turnover and more than EUR 16 million of EBITDA. The group is aiming at the important threshold of EUR 500 million revenues for 2024 that we have planned for us.
We should reach EUR 460 million of revenues in 2023, to then reach an EBITDA of EUR 88 million, which means improving the cash margins and EBITDA remarkably. Considering our forecast, we believe that also the investment for the acquisition of Evolucare, about EUR 160 million, we will find a net financial debt of less than EUR 340 million. But EUR 50 million will be for the acquisition of minorities and, of course, the impact of IFRS 16. We didn't expect this result in 2022 when we designed our business plan with the introduction of GPI, but the acquisition of Evolucare was unexpected, but it was a good deal. So our results, especially for 2023, are certainly positive and remarkable.
Now, here you see some investment information. I don't know, Lorenzo, if you want to provide an update. These are data provided by our analysts. We are in a performing very positive position that they see as penalized by the market, which at the moment probably is not really capable of understanding the strength and the importance of having a company such as GPI, owned by Italian players, still listed on the stock exchange. We are seeing too many companies delisting themselves from the stock exchange. So if we look at EBITDA and our backlog, we do believe that we can go internationally with no major issues.
So before moving to the Q&A, I'd like to remind you that those of you who have been following us for a long time, you will certainly notice that the steps that we undertook are in line with our plans. We never took unexpected steps. We have a company that we are proud to have. It's an Italian company which is doing well. We have sound and clear basis, and we are strategic players for the healthcare system. Number one, players in Italy, sound growth in both revenues and EBITDA, and we are improving in all our strategic areas. The company's strategy is clear and sound, and it's confirmed by every action that we undertake. Also, the acquisition of Argentea, if you remember, was one of the factors that we really care for. It was a big opportunity for us.
So the business is there, and we grew considerably, thus improving our position. So I think we are key players in the Italian healthcare market and also in the European market. So the shareholders of this company can be proud of our business, and I invite them to believe in our company, not because I'm telling you to do so, but because the facts underpin this statement. If you can leave the slide with Q&A, so we have some sort of a frame of reference. Now, before reading the questions, I would like to take the opportunity to tell you that as Andrea underlined many times over this too, we do what we say, and before saying that, we make sure that we are capable of doing it. Now, I'm gonna read the questions in order of receipt.
So the care division showed a decrease in margin in the first half of 2023. In 2022, the division was impacted by the cost inflation, and by the market had been overturned because of the increase in fees. But if I remember correctly, we're to be shifted to the next financial year. So the increase of rates on the care, is it expected to face also 2023? What should we expect for the next half? Have you changed the target, and what are the actions that you are planning to put in place? Andrea, over to you. So I would say that the issue of rates, of fees, I mean, there wouldn't be initially, then with the increase of rates, if the customers accepted that, but the majority of customers had did not accept the rates.
We don't have much of a margin to control rates, but we should record an improvement linked to seasonality, which however pays the price of contract that we lost. We decided not to participate in tenders where the contracts were not profitable, so that's the position for the rates. As for the margins, I don't believe that a 9% target can be confirmed. Otherwise, our margins for the second half of the year would be huge. So at the moment, it's 9%, but the, for sure, it's gonna be better than the margin of the first half. So it's gonna be improved, but not as much as to reach the target. Let me read the second question on cash generation. In the first half, it was negative, which is also due to a working capital, but also CapEx.
Can you give us some insights on the working capital and CapEx? CapEx includes the acquisition of land to build the new headquarters, almost EUR 4 million, and a share of investments in clinics in Basilicata. It's a company that is building a clinic in Potenza, so there is more than EUR 5.5 million in tangible investments, whereas for the other share, we had another three, four, millions being invested. Again, on cash generation, if we take the value of the acquisition of EUR 173 million of Evolucare, is the guidance indicating the stabilization of cash generation in the second half of the year?... Well, on face value, certainly you're right. When we write down our guidance, we are always very prudent. The improvement of the guidance is certainly linked to the improvement of credit collection. We are focusing on that.
As from the arrival of the foreign components, we expect an improvement. But since we want to be cautious and we want to confirm this data, I'd rather give information in terms of improvement at the next meeting, rather than sharing negative information. So we wanted to be cautious. Let me read the last question, which contains two, in fact. The first is about the guidance. "I imagine the contribution of Evolucare is included in the guidance for 2023. How will it evolve in the second half, and what will be the impact?" As I said, the contribution of Evolucare in the guidance is important, that we expect EUR 40 million of revenues and EUR 16 million of EBITDA.
It's not so exposed to seasonality as GPI, so considering that we have four, five, the four months, by May, we can consider the values that we stated before, a bit less than half. So I guess the forecast cannot be confirmed in the short term. So we have expectations for Evolucare. The forecast is good in terms of EBITDA, but we rather keep the forecast that they made. At the moment, we do not have a monthly statement, but especially IFRS compliance, because they are still producing results on the basis of other accounting standards, so we cannot confirm the equivalence, but then we confirm the guidance for the whole year. So there's no other question. Maybe we can wait a few more seconds to see whether other questions are coming in.
Let me remind you that, if you write to Investor Relations, we are always open and willing to provide answers to any questions. If you deem it appropriate, we can organize personal group meetings to update, to give you updates on the evolution of GPI and everything that is happening. We obviously, obviously expect the best for the future. One last question has just come in: "Is there an intention to continue distributing dividends despite the debt situation?" Now, the dividend policy includes a dividend distribution approach in view of cash balance and in view of the situation of the company. So again, the dividends will be distributed depending on the cash available. So if we can, certainly we will proceed with cash dividend distribution. No further questions.
Thank you very much for attending, and thank you for your attention. The recording of this video conference will be available to you, and it will be uploaded on the investor relations page of GPI. Thank you again for your attention, and have a good day. Thank you.