This is the CONUS call conference operator. Welcome and thank you for joining the Rai Way first hub 2025 results analyst presentation. All participants are listening on your remote, and after the presentation, there will be a Q&A session. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Mr. Andrea Moretti, Head of Human Resources of Rai Way. Please go ahead, sir.
Thank you, operator, and good afternoon. Welcome everybody to our full year financial results call. Today's speakers will be, as usual, our CEO, Roberto Cecatto, our CFO, Adalberto Pellegrino, and Giancarlo Benucci, our Chief Corporate Development Officer. Let's start with Mr. Cecatto, please go ahead, sir.
Thank you, Andrea. Good afternoon to all of you. Let me start off from positive news in terms of results that we are delivering. Revenues were up to 2%, accelerating from 1.7% performance in the first quarter, underpinned by both media distribution and digital infrastructure. Considering the CPI inter-contribution equal to 1.2%, the additional boost was provided by DAB network coverage extension for Rai, rising tower hosting volumes, in particular from radio broadcasters, and the initial contribution from diversification initiatives. Adjusted EBITDA hit EUR 96.3 million, up by 3%, also helped by some non-core items that Adalberto will cover in a while. Scrapping them, adjusted EBITDA underlying trend was in line with our expectation and full-year guidance, providing for a constant growth in traditional business compensated by the top operating expenses of diversification initiatives.
Net profitability was in line with last year's, as were investments, but with a significant difference compared to the first semester of 2024. Out of EUR 16.1 million CAPEX in the first six months of 2025, the majority was represented by maintenance activities. Indeed, as anticipated during the last call, this year we are undergoing some extraordinary maintenance activities. Just to give you an example, in the Apulia region, we are investing EUR 2.7 million, of which EUR 1.5 million already spent on a crucial 17-year-old transmission site in order to decommission two older transmission towers while building a brand new 120 m high tower, one of the tallest and more modern Rai Way towers ever engineered. That will rationalize and renew one of our major infrastructure lapses, while enabling synergies and efficiencies and guaranteeing the continuity of the TV and radio content transmission in full security with higher quality standards.
On top of that, the maintenance components of our CAPEX also reflect a phasing skewed in the first half of certain investments on the IP network. As for the development component, the lower first half level reflects, first of all, the completion of the first phase of the rollout of the certification initiative, second, the current focus on marketing of the existing assets, and third, the design of new assets, in particular the new edge data center in Bari, as well as also incorporated in the guidance, the slight shift to 2026 of certain activities related to Bari initiatives, mainly in the traditional business. Let me say that this must not be misunderstood. Our view of the markets we are investing in remains confirmed, as does the company's commitment. Optimism and commitment are clearly reflected in our operational program.
In fact, in the last two years, the CDN market has experienced a very rapid evolution, also driven by consumption dynamics during the COVID period. In fact, after a phase of tremendous volume growth followed by a period of traffic stabilization, but very high competition, the market is now approaching a new normal, let me say, with a more balanced supply and demand and a more rational and stable progression in both volumes and price. On the one end, this evolution has led to the acceleration of certain dynamics that we initially expected to be more gradual. On the other end, it has created a context in which, with decreasing competition, the performance and the quality of our solution can truly be a differentiating factor. To summarize, a more gradual growth curve, but with the same landing point in the long run and greater customer interest.
Not surprisingly, from a commercial standpoint, we are reaching the players that we aimed to reach. After a long trial period, which is normal for a newcomer, let me say a long trial, not so much long, because at the end, it is really a few months that we have the infrastructure already on running. Our natural architecture currently distributed across multiple distributed injection points and interconnected via a proprietary high-performance network, and the quality of our application partners have led to sign framework agreements with at least three of the main operators offering live streaming in Italy, with further negotiation underway. By allowing us to pick one of the two to three CDNs used by each of these clients, these framework agreements will bring streaming traffic, thus revenues, on our network from now on.
On the edge data center side, we maintain the view of a growing regional list of megawatts, today largely underserved or currently sorted from the Milan region due to the lack of high-quality alternatives. Considering size, location, and features, our commercial foot spot is represented by mid-size enterprise and digital players, which is exactly where we are focusing our efforts. In the region where we already operate, apart from Milan, that are Veneto, Liguria, Tuscany, Piedmont, and later on part of southern Italy, research estimates over 30 megawatts of additional demand in the coming years from this spot. We have to compare with the 1, 2 megawatts that we currently have available in the pipeline with relatively limited competition.
While receiving positive client feedback on proximity, quality, information, and national footprint, we keep working on a few key points, particularly in terms of client targeting, which must be consistent with the typical commercial footprint of an infrastructure company, and on the effectiveness of the go-to-market. Apart from patience, as many enterprise IT projects, we see that the long decision and implementation time is sometimes up to 12, 18 months. Around half of the medium enterprise data center requirements originate from private cloud applications, applications that luckily are largely channeled through system integrators and which we have chosen as our partners. However, system integrators integrate solutions provided by private cloud operators who are the ones who ultimately decide where to place the servers. Therefore, a diluted experience is what we see in these past months of the approach in the market.
To avoid being disintermediated and better intercept this underlying demand, we are expanding our offer to include IaaS services, basically virtual machines for storage and computing. Let me say, still infrastructure-based, but with more value-added features. This solution became even more competitive, first, because when backed by distributed interconnected networks like ours, and second, when powered by smart, cost-effective software such as that of CABIT, an Italian cloud storage startup that will support our service under a strategic business value. Going forward, we will therefore focus on expanding the service range, growing partnerships, including the private cloud players, and using our direct presence in a more targeted and effective way.
Considering on the other side the hyperscale projects, following the positive outcome of the so-called conferential resolution, the last step is the signing of the concession agreement with the municipality, so that there is the final authorization and the agreement with the municipality. We have already finalized the draft document. Barring any unforeseen delays, we expect to sign the agreement within the next few weeks. Taking into consideration the upcoming summer breaks, let's say by September, more or less. Finally, putting us in the position to move forward with the final design and procurement activities. Now going back to the numbers, I would also like to underline the financial performance resulting in the generation of more or less EUR 63 million in the semester, and let me say in line with last year.
The combined effect of free cash flow generation, investment activities, as well as the payout of dividends, drove our net debt at the end of June to around EUR 178 million, which is less than our last 12 months' EBITDA. Looking ahead to the remainder of the year, we are pleased to raise our adjusted EBITDA guidance for the full year, together with a minor rephasing of some investments that I mentioned earlier, but I will elaborate more on that at the end of this call. To conclude, I would also like to share a brief update on the analysis currently underway regarding the potential consolidation within eight hours. To date, we have mainly worked on industrial aspects, and the activities are now progressing also on other relevant elements that you could easily imagine. Now it's time to deep dive in our first half of 2025 financial results, which will be discussed by our CFO. Please, Adalberto. Now the floor is yours.
Thank you, Roberto. Good afternoon to everyone. I would skip to slide six to focus on core revenues, where you may see that we have an increase of 2%, reaching EUR 140.3 million in the first six months of the year, with both business lines on a positive trend. Media distribution increased by 1.8%, more than CPI, whose contribution was more or less 1.2%. The organic increase is due to the coverage extension of the Rai DAB network that gave us a positive impact in the first semester, and that is included in the line new services to Rai that increased up to 20%. We have also the first positive contribution from the commercialization of our CDN services. Regarding the digital infrastructure segment, revenues amounted to EUR 16.4 million, with a growth of 3.6%, mainly thanks to the tower hosting business.
In particular, we have seen very interesting volumes from radio broadcasters, growing 50% out of 50%, as well as also in this case, the first positive contribution from the commercialization of our edge data center. Moving to OPEX, next page, page seven, we see an increase of 3.7%, landing at EUR 14.9 million in the first six months. Breaking down the OPEX, personnel costs were up 10%, which drops to approximately 6% when excluding capitalization that are lower compared to the previous year. The residual increase is due to the planned growth of our workforce, in line with the assumption of our industrial plan, and also in the increase in the average cost per FTE, due to the impact of the renewal of the collective level agreement and to other items. Other operating costs were down by 3.3%, positively affected by non-core benefits.
Excluding these items, the underlying basis grew by approximately EUR 2 million, driven by diversification initiative, which contributed approximately EUR 1.2 million, higher energy tariffs, adding more or less EUR 0.7 million. We have a broadly stable level of our underlying cost basis in the traditional system. We may move to the following slide, slide eight. We see the adjusted EBITDA that reached EUR 96.3 million with a 68.6% margin, impacted also by proceeds from asset sales that we have included in the line other revenues and income. Slightly below, we highlight non-recurring costs, mainly related to M&A, as well as D&A, which consume the growing trend as the result of our development CAPEX and financial charges that are improving vis-à-vis last year's figures due to lower interest rates. Net result amounted to EUR 47.3 million in the first six months of the year.
Moving to slide nine, let's have a look at our net debt, as usual, including EUR 40 million of IFRS leasing. Net debt closed at EUR 178 million, close to one-time adjusted EBITDA generated in the last 12 months. Compared to the end of 2023, the net debt increased by approximately EUR 50 million, including, of course, the impact of the statement of our dividend, EUR 89 million, with cash generation, therefore, remaining healthy and in line with the previous year. Free cash flow to equity stands at EUR 63 million in the first six months. As per the outlook, let me turn the floor back to our CEO. Please, Roberto.
Thank you, Alberto. In terms of expectations for the full year, considering the trend and the results recorded in the first semester, we are now in a position to raise our profitability guidance for 2025, mainly to reflect more favorable electricity tariffs and higher non-core benefits compared to the initial expectation. Non-core benefits that, by the way, really never come for free, but are actively targeted by the management to maintain the usual levels of growth despite the temporary impact of development initiatives. Excluding the non-core impacts and other factors not under company control, the underlying trends are overall confirmed with the progressive growth of traditional business, driven, for example, by contractual indexation, DAB coverage extension, rising tower hosting volumes with radio broadcasters, and so on, partially offset by the already anticipated absorption from the startup phase of diversification initiatives.
As per the CAPEX, we confirmed the higher level of maintenance investment following some exceptional activities such as the one that I mentioned before. While we now foresee a lower level of development CAPEX compared to last year, when we spent around EUR 40 million, mainly investing in diversification projects. No doubt, we will keep on working on our main projects, such as DAB radio network expansion, the additional edge data center in the south of Italy, and the other internal projects. Therefore, as commented in my initial remarks, this update follows just a slight shift to 2026 of certain activities related to the various initiatives, mainly in the traditional business, in particular DAB radio and solar projects related. That's all on our side. We can now open the line for the Q&A session. Thank you.
Thank you. This is the CONUS call conference operator. We will now begin the question and answer session. To answer the Q&A questions, please click on the Q&A icon on the left side of your screen. When announced, please click continue on the pop-up window. If you are connected in the audio only, please press star and one on your telephone. The first question is from Fabio Pavan Mediobanca. Please go ahead.
Yes. Hi. Thank you for taking my two questions. The first one is on the potential sector consolidation. I was wondering if you can share with us some more details, especially on what are the activities run so far and the expected timeline for this process. The second question is on hyperscale data center following the green light, and we had this expected signing of the concession. What are the next steps on this project? Thank you very much.
Concerning the consolidation, the exceptional operation, consider that we are under a mountain of NDA availability. You could consider this. I could give you some information, but not so much. Let me say that there is a large effort by all the parts involved, especially Rai Way. We have worked a lot on the industrial evaluation, especially on synergies. Of course, now we are progressing on the other aspect because the synergies are one of the items, of course, of this kind of analysis and review. The work is going on for sure. Considering timeline, let me say that the timeline I could allocate only say that the process, also, as I mentioned in the first call, is quite complex. We have to spend a lot of efforts to overcome this complexity, let me say.
Concerning the timeline, we cannot give particular information up to now, also because there was a reference given by the shareholders that is public.
Okay. Fabio, on the hyperscale data centers, these steps that you recall are correct. We expect to sign the concession with the municipality in the coming weeks, I would say. The draft concession has already been agreed, so there are now some formal steps. After that, in particular after having reached full visibility on timing, we will start on one side all the pre-marketing activities, also because any sort of fee agreement will be, or some sort of soft agreement will be more than welcome, also in terms of de-risking. We will start also the final design and procurement activity. The focus is to finally close this, I would say, never-ending authorization process.
Thank you. Fabio, let me add also that we spend a lot of effort, also thanks to our, let me say, institutional brand, to speed up a process that was really a nightmare. The fact that we really are arriving at the final step, really the final step, I think that gives us a very good opportunity compared to any kind of other subject that would like to approach this kind of adventure in the region of the center of Italy.
The next question is from Giorgio Savoini in Piemonte. Please go ahead.
Thank you. Thank you. Let me take my three questions, please. The first one is a follow-up on the NDA timeline. We appreciate that you can't provide specific information at this stage on the timeline, but should these steps be very definitive and, let me say, irrevocable, going to go decision by when you will make this decision. The second question is on the adjusted EBITDA guidance. I was wondering, you said clearly that the non-core benefits do not come for free, but I was a little bit surprised to see the EUR 1.5 million non-core benefits supporting the adjusted EBITDA performance. I was wondering if you can clarify if the adjusted EBITDA upgrade will, of course, benefit or be driven by the EUR 1.5 million non-core benefits booked in H1, or if the performance is pretty underlined, so stripping out this EUR 1.5 million.
The third question is on the CDN services and the edge data center revenue breakdown. For this year, you guided during the first quarter call for around EUR 1 million revenues. I don't know if it's fair to assume an equal split between the two initiatives. Looking forward to your business plan target of EUR 10 million revenues by 2027, I was wondering if you can, let's say, give some indication on the mix. Would it be, let me say, 70% edge data center, EUR 7 million, or less. Thank you.
Let's start on the EBITDA guidance. The EUR 1.5 million you mentioned was already embedded in our guidance. We have seen in the first half some additional impact, mainly impacting on other OpEx, as commented previously. This is the one-off that we are referring to. As concerns the CDN and edge data center guidance, yes, we mentioned in our last call the figures that you just remind in your question. Giving some more details on this, yes, we may assume more or less half and half, probably I expect a little bit more from the CDN rather than on the edge data center.
Okay. Concerning the first question, as I mentioned, I cannot answer completely. You could understand. In my opinion, there is no deadline, let me say. It's a process that is flowing. The work is progressing, this is what we could confer.
Okay, thank you.
The next question is from Andrea Devita in Intesa Sanpaolo. Please go ahead.
Yes. Hello, everybody. Very simple question on your level of investment. As it is, volatility on maintenance CAPEX and development CAPEX. Just to understand in the second part of the year whether we will have maintenance CAPEX more in the region of single-digit or low-digit or double-digit million euros, and the same for maintenance CAPEX. We have very different trends and very different levels for FY2024, and we would like to understand the absolute likely number for FY2025 portfolio.
Okay. As concerns our maintenance CAPEX, in fact, this semester we had high figures compared also to the past, but this is nothing impacting the overall figures we expect to have at the end of the year. Simply, we have some activities that we finalize in advance, keeping in mind that our overall guidance for the present year is an increasing trend, but this trend will be exactly consistent with the trend of our business plan that, as we remember, has an increase in the mid-year of our industrial plan to go back at the end of the plan at 6.5%. All in all, for sure, the first half figures confirm the fact that we will go above the previous year figures. This is something that should be consistent with the trend of our industrial plan that includes some non-recurring activities. As overall guidance, you should assume 6.5% of our revenues, of our core revenues on the long term.
Sorry to interrupt. Is this a 6.5% mid-term average?
6.5% is the long-term value. We should consider, on top of this, in 2025 and in 2026, an additional, more or less, EUR 15 million, EUR 20 million of additional extraordinary and non-recurring CAPEX that we will have to put in place, as this is presented in our industrial plan. Andrea, just to be very clear on one point, you mentioned a long-term target, the 6.5%. I mean, it's not a long-term target in the sense that it's something that we need to reach through efficiencies or others. It's the usual average level of maintenance CAPEX that we have in our business, around 6.5%. The only difference in this plan is that this year and next year, we are booking some extraordinary activity. The usual, let me say, run rate, recurring level was, is, and will be around 6%.
Just to understand whether the extraordinary portion was, let's say, concentrated in Q2 or if we will have a sale in Q3 or Q4.
No. We had an impact in the first half, but it's quite limited. We could expect some other CAPEX, extraordinary CAPEX in the second half, but this is something that could impact mainly 2026 figures. The same for development CAPEX. I understand this is a story with the delays and postponements for hyperscale. Just to understand the likely ballpark figure for H2 this year, actually, the delay in the development CAPEX level in 2025, as we commented on the guidance, is related not to the hyperscale initiatives, but to some other development initiatives in relation to the photovoltaic project, in relation to the edge data center, in relation to some activities with some key customers on the tower hosting. The hyperscale is something that was included in our industrial plan starting from 2026. Just essentially work on this.
Considering the timeline we just commented, we believe that the amount of CAPEX that we included in our business plan for the construction of the hyperscale, of the first part, of course, of the hyperscale, amounting approximately EUR 76 million, EUR 77 million, and that at the time we plan to finalize in 2026 and 2027, because of this timeline, we expect to have the majority of this CAPEX in 2027. We could have some NA but limited in 2028, but I'd say the majority should impact 2027 figures.
To give you an example related to this shift of the hyperscale, consider that we already have the order ready to dismantle two antennas that are towers that are in the site of the hyperscale data center, some building, that we are ready to activate as we finalize, as told in the next weeks, maybe before September, more or less, to start the real operations of the hyperscale. Of course, we have all the activity ready to start, but we need, of course, the permission to go on.
Just to understand, you had EUR 40 million development CAPEX last year. We had a few million in H1. Are we going to have EUR 10, EUR 20, or EUR 30 million by year-end? I suppose you have some number in mind, if you can share with us.
Sure. No, no. We expect the reduction is not significant. We're not talking about EUR 10 or EUR 20 million. Our development CAPEX are still expected to be, I would say, we could have a decrease vis-à-vis 2024 figures of 20%, 25%, just to give you an idea of the magnitude. Thank you very much.
You're welcome.
The next question is from Vino Silvestre , Etiqueta .
Good afternoon, everybody. Two questions from my side. The first one concerns a follow-up on edge data center and CDN as well. If you can elaborate on the target for the full year, it's still assuming EUR 1 million of revenues. The second one, on hyperscale, the target step by the business plan is to have it in operation by 2027. If you can elaborate on that timing and if you think that it's still achievable. Thank you.
On the data center, actually, we talk on the overall diversification initiative that we include in the overall diversification project. We would expect to reach at least EUR 1 million, as commented also to give an answer to a previous question. It's an overall guidance on both CDN services and edge data centers. On the hyperscale revenue timing, actually, in our industrial plan, we really had a very, very limited impact in 2027. Even if, as I mentioned before, we could have a slight delay starting the activity in 2028, to be clear, there is no significant impact on our industrial plan.
Good afternoon.
You're welcome.
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That's fine. Thank you. Thank you, operator. Thank you all. We just wish you a happy summer holidays. Goodbye.
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