Hello everyone, and welcome to GN's conference call in relation to our Q3 results announced yesterday. Participating in today's call is Group CEO Peter Karlströmer, Group CFO Søren Jelert, and myself, Rune Sandager, Head of Investor Relations. The presentation is expected to last about 20 minutes, after which we'll turn to the Q&A session. The presentation is already uploaded on gn.com, and with that, I'm happy to hand over to Peter for some opening remarks.
Thank you, Rune, and thank you all for joining us today. In the third quarter, we have continued to execute in line with the strategic direction we put forward at our Capital Markets Day in May. We are happy to see the benefits to margins and cash flow as expected, but saw a top line that was weaker than what we anticipated. In hearing, we continue to deliver very strong performance both in terms of growth and profit, delivering continued double-digit organic revenue growth and further improvement of profit margins, even on a high comparisons base from last year. With this strong execution, we are now back at historical healthy margin levels, highlighted by our 21% EBITDA margin in the core business in the quarter.
In enterprise, we are navigating in a difficult European market currently impacted by some economic pressure in parts of the region, including Germany and France, that is putting pressure to our sell-in numbers. On the positive side, we are seeing good developments of the U.S. market and the APAC region, and are globally defending our market-leading position well. Despite the sell-in challenges and top line, we see continued benefits from the company-wide synergies, as well as pricing discipline, leading to continued strong profit margins. As for the sell-out, this was stronger than the sell-out in the quarter, which will provide support for our business as we move forward. In gaming and consumer, we delivered well on the Elite and Talk wind-down process, making us comfortable that we will be concluding this by year-end within the estimates we have given.
In SteelSeries, we experienced a temporary slowdown in growth, which was a result of a slightly declining market and some quarterly fluctuations, including some delay in order deliveries. We have been adding SteelSeries to our common operations and IT system setup, which most likely have caused some delays. With what we have seen so far in October, we are comfortable that we will be back in growth again in Q4, even though end markets continue to be somewhat challenged. We have also launched our first gaming earbuds and our new keyboards that will support our growth in Q4 and onwards. Despite the temporary slowdown on the growth, our margins were fairly strong in the quarter as a function of the well-controlled wind-down and company-wide synergies.
On group level, the one-year transformation continues to develop favorably, and in the quarter, we delivered another DKK 115 million in company-wide synergies. In summary, we saw uneven growth across our divisions, but we are pleased to see the company transformation continue well. We are in the quarter delivering margins improvements and a free cash flow of DKK 786 million, further reducing our leverage. With this introduction, I'm happy to hand it over to Søren for further details on the group performance during the quarter.
Thank you, Peter, and thank you all for joining us today. On a group level, we delivered a - 4% organic growth, and if we exclude the wind-down, organic revenue growth would have been flat. Despite the decline in top line, our strong cost focus and company-wide synergies led to a 29% increase in EBITDA. In terms of margins, this translated into an EBITDA margin of 13.3%, which is 3.6 percentage points higher than the same quarter last year. So, in summary, despite a mixed quarter for the top line, we delivered a substantial margin expansion, all leading to a free cash flow of DKK 786 million, excluding M&A, and a further reduction in our leverage. Moving into financial details on slide six.
Despite the negative development on the top line, our strong focus on cost and synergy realization resulted in a gross margin of 54.8% compared to 50.1% in Q3 of 2023. R&D was slightly up year over year, which was primarily a reflection of ongoing investments in consumer-centric innovation and in driving synergies across the R&D organization. Management and administrative costs decreased, while sales and marketing costs were essentially flat compared to Q3 of last year. Consequently, EBITDA grew 29%, equal to an EBITDA margin of 13.3%. The strong improvement in margin reflects the gross margin improvement and some leverage on OpEx, despite the top line development. Our solid earnings level led t o a substantial positive cash flow generation of DKK 786 million, driving a further reduction of our adjusted leverage, which ended at 3.5x
in the quarter.
With that, let's move to slide seven and more details on the free cash flow generation. As mentioned, the free cash flow ended at DKK 786 million in the quarter, reflecting a solid earnings level, but also a positive impact from change in working capital, mainly due to the decrease in trade receivables, which is partly offset by a one-off impact from the wind-down of the Elite and Talk product lines. Moreover, we did see somewhat lower investment levels across R&D as a result of timing of product launches. The cash flow generation of DKK 786 million marks the strongest third-quarter cash flow ever for the group, which underpins our strong focus on cash flows and margins in general. With the solid cash flow generation, our adjusted leverage ended at 3.5 times, another important step in our deleveraging plan. Moving on to slide eight and a brief status on the one-year transformation.
We remain on track to deliver around DKK 600 million in cost synergies by 2026, of which around 400 million expected in 2024 alone, and during the quarter, we managed to realize synergies of around 115 million. Year to date, we have thus realized total synergies of slightly more than 300 million and are therefore on track to deliver as expected for 2024. We remain confident about our ambitions for 2026, which mainly involves the realization of further improvements in efficiencies and processes, which should further de-risk the company's profile over the coming years. Moving to slide nine, where we would like to give you a snapshot of the development in our supply chain. As you might recall, at our Capital Markets Day in May, we provided an overview of our operations strategy for the coming years. We have continued to execute on this agenda.
Due to the strong recent growth in hearing and to support future growth and optimizations, we are in the process of relocating to larger and more streamlined facilities across the U.S., Australia, and Malaysia. In addition, we have now moved SteelSeries to the same system and product flows as enterprise, which will further support company scale. Moreover, as illustrated by one-year progress, we are continuing to see strong benefits across our operations team to drive margins by ongoing supplier consolidation. While we're certainly happy with the development so far, we have also been executing well on our diversification strategy, which allows us to be competitive in the future. And with those group highlights, I'm happy to hand you over to Peter for some additional color on the three divisions.
Thank you, Søren. Starting with our hearing division. During the quarter, we continued to drive market share gains thanks to the recent Nexia’s continued success. As a result of our strong execution, we grew organically by 10% on top of a very demanding comparison base from 2023, when we grew 15%. The gross margin increased strongly compared to last year, despite the retail disposal we made, including BelAudição. This was driven by group operations synergies, as well as the continued success of recent Nexia. Sales and marketing costs decreased slightly compared to last year, supported mainly by retail disposals. As a result of our strong top line development and prudent cost management, we delivered a divisional profit margin of 34.8%, which is an improvement of six percentage points compared to the same quarter last year.
Let's move to slide 12 to let me share some more detail on the region and performance. Year to date, we have delivered 11% organic growth, positively supported by all regions, channels, and countries that have all grown faster than the market. In Q3, the organic growth was also supported by market share gains across regions, with particularly strong performance in several independent markets, including North America, Italy, Germany, and Australia. Following several Nexia family extensions during the year, we marked the completion of the Nexia family within this quarter. It has, in broad terms, been well received by the market, and we expect continued strong momentum for Nexia. With this brief overview of hearing, let's move to enterprise. The enterprise division delivered negative 7% organic revenue growth in the third quarter, driven by volume sell-in pressure in parts of Central Europe.
Our sellout in the quarter was stronger than our sell-in, which likely will support our business as we move forward. Despite the negative top line development, gross margin improved compared to last year, primarily driven by group synergies and pricing discipline, keeping ASPs intact. Our sales and marketing costs increased slightly, reflecting certain channel investments to prepare for an improving market, while also executing with good cost control across the business. As a result of the top line pressure, our division al profit margin decreased slightly by 0.7 percentage points compared to a year ago, ending at 33.8%. I think it would be helpful to take a step back and look on the development of the enterprise business in the first nine months. Encouragingly, our largest segment, our headset business, has experienced a relatively flat growth for the year as a function of a slowly healing market.
Also encouragingly is that we've seen double the growth in our video business, where we gained share but from a relatively small base. What has been a challenge is that our speakerphone business has declined significantly due to difficult comparisons with last year when we launched new products and a declining market which has meant that room investments now are moving into integrated audio and video solutions rather than audio only. So, while we're not satisfied with a negative 4% growth for the year, this has essentially been driven by the structurally declining speakerphone category and the difficult comparison base in that category. Let me move to slide 15 to take a further look at the performance in the third quarter. With this slide, we have tried to provide more details on the development of the enterprise business in the quarter.
From a regional point of view, we have been impacted by the pressure on selling volumes in parts of Central Europe, which has led to a substantial year-over-year decline for the region. More positively, we recorded growth in North America and a relatively flat development in the rest of the world. When looking at the sellout data, the development has been much more balanced, with a flat growth in North America and APAC, and only a slightly declining European market. Sales per product category has largely followed the trends we have seen during the year and that I just went through. In Q3, headset and video were slightly declining, while our speakerphones declined significantly. Sellout-wise, we saw a somewhat stronger sellout than sell-in, driven by headsets and video that were approximately flat.
So, while we are somewhat disappointed by the reported organic growth number, we remain encouraged by the relatively stronger sales of headset and video, as well as a somewhat stronger sell-out than sell-in, which likely will support the recovery of our business as we move forward. This post-COVID adjustment process has been difficult, but we are likely experiencing at the end of this with the market finding its way back to structural growth. We remain confident of the attractiveness of the enterprise market and our opportunities ahead. Moving to gaming and consumer. In our gaming and consumer division, we delivered organic revenue growth of -20% compared to last year, mainly driven by the wind-down of our Elite and Talk product lines. Our gaming business declined 4% organically in a slightly declining gaming market.
Following several quarters with strong positive growth and continued market share gains, the slight negative growth in the quarter is mainly a reflection of the difficult market and some quarterly fluctuations, including delays in certain order deliveries. Our consumer business declined 50% organically, purely driven by the wind-down of our Elite and Talk portfolio, which is going according to plan. Our gross margin for the division increased 9 percentage points to 33%, despite significant promotional activities related to the wind-down. The improvement is reflecting group synergy, and it was further supported by a release of earlier recognized provisions in relationship to the ongoing changes in the supply chain integration. Sales and distribution costs grew 7% as we have deliberately been preparing for the important fourth quarter of the year. Altogether, the division of profit margin ended at 4% for the quarter, negatively impacted by the wind-down effects.
Moving to slide 17 and a few exciting launches in the gaming space. During September, we have launched two new important gaming products. Building on the utilization of the GN Earbud know-how, we introduced the Arctis GameBuds by the end of the quarter, representing a form-factor extension of our Arctis line of headsets into buds. The first-of-its-kind earbuds provides a true gaming audio experience augmented by the recently launched Arctis Companion App, which allows gamers to adjust the sound profiles to the games they are playing. Within our keyboard category, we are launching the Apex Pro Gen 3 series, which is the world's fastest gaming keyboard that will provide gamers with an unrivaled experience and competitive advantages. We are very excited about these launches that are receiving very well among leading gamers, and with that, I'm happy to hand it back to Søren for our guidance.
Thank you, Peter. As you all saw, we updated our financial guidance yesterday evening. In total, we are currently expecting an organic revenue growth of 1-2%. Remember that this is including the negative effect of the consumer wind-down. Looking at the recurring part of our businesses, this would translate into an organic revenue growth of closer to 3-4%. Due to our increased earnings power and company-wide synergies, we can confirm our reported EBITDA margin of 12-13% despite the negative revision of the top line. Again, please remember that the reported margin includes around 200 million in wind-down costs, while the underlying EBITDA margin is roughly 1% higher. Finally, due to the strong cash flow generation we have delivered in the first nine months, we have upgraded our free cash flow, excluding M&A guidance, to now DKK 1.1 billion.
With that, I'm happy to hand you back to Rune.
Thank you, Peter and Søren, for the updates. And with that, I'll hand over to the operator for the Q&A. Please limit your questions to two at a time, please.
We will now begin the question and answer session. To ask a question, you may press Star, then 1 on your telephone keypad. If you are using a speakerphone, please pick up your handset before pressing the keys. If at any time your question has been addressed and you would like to withdraw your question, please press star, then two. At this time, we will pause momentarily to assemble our roster. The first question comes from the line of Martin Parkhøi with SEB. Please go ahead.
From SEB. And two questions. First, just Peter on the speakerphone category, which you stated is approximately 10% of enterprise. What are the phasing if we look into 2025? I know it's early, but have you seen a bigger deterioration in the second half than the first half of this sales? And then secondly, on the hearing aid business, I think that at least I got the impression that you saw slightly lower growth towards the end of June, but now you're still delivering strong organic growth in Q3 as well. Has anything changed or picked up in Q3 versus Q2?
Thank you so much, Martin, for the questions. I mean, first in Speak, as I mentioned briefly here in the intro, I mean, there are two effects. I mean, it's a structurally declining market due to different behaviors in conference rooms. So that is probably a relatively stable effect that we're estimating is probably around a 10% declining market over time. The other effect is that we last year launched the Speak 2 product lines, and we launched that in March that then supported our business with quite some additional volumes of businesses. So it is those tough comparisons we are meeting at this point in time also that is kind of amplifying that kind of speakerphone effect.
So as you move forward and model the business into next year, I mean, have in mind that March and onwards, the tougher comparisons will start to get out of our way, so to say. Then the question on hearing aids, I think we've seen a fairly stable environment for our business throughout the year. I think it's difficult to comment on it month by month, but in the quarter here, we continue to see a strong kind of demand for Nexia, I would say, around the world. I think it's encouraging to see it continues to do very well in the U.S., but also to do well, in particular in Europe, it's been picking up, providing very healthy growth also. So we, of course, are very pleased with the progress here on the hearing side.
The next question comes from the line of Julien Ouaddour with Bank of America. Please go ahead.
Thank you. Thank you. Good morning. So thanks for taking my question. I asked too as well. I mean, the first one is for Søren. So we learned yesterday Trump won the U.S. elections. And let's say, as you know, part of this program is to put in place tariffs with China and probably also elsewhere in Europe. You mentioned in your presentation that you have some provisional relocation. You mentioned the U.S. Have you, first of all, started to assess what could be the potential impact from the tariffs on your business? Because I think you and your third-party partners have also a manufacturing footprint in China. And so roughly, would you say, I mean, it could be negative into next year? And the second question is that, I mean, you seem to be encouraged by the stabilization in enterprise for headset and video categories.
I mean, my perception is that it's very similar to what you told us over the past quarters. I mean, so far, we haven't seen really a proof that the market is ready to get back to growth. So what's your real visibility in terms of when the headset market could really return to growth? And do you expect, I mean, when do you expect the market to return to roughly mid-single-digit growth at some point? Thanks.
Thank you so much for the questions. It's Peter. I actually take both of them here. So if we start with the tariffs, I mean, at this point in time, we, of course, acknowledge the election in the U.S. and the speculation around tariffs. I think it's too early to tell exactly what kind of policies that might be changed and how they would change. But I would say in more general terms, over the last 12 months and a bit more, we have really diversified the footprint of our manufacturing across our businesses. So at this point in time, we have a hearing manufacturing in a significant way in different places around the world. And also for enterprise, we now are manufacturing products also in different places around the world. We still need to take some further actions on gaming in that direction also.
But I would say we feel well prepared for the different scenarios that might play out, but I think it's a little bit too early to give the financial estimates, but we believe we have flexibility enough to handle this in a manageable way, so I feel relatively good about it, then in terms of the visibility on the enterprise market, headset and video in particular, I think that as we talked about before, we have seen a market which, I mean, has improved throughout the year. I appreciate it's a little bit difficult to correlate to the top line development fully, but throughout the years, we've seen a stabilization of volumes. We've seen, I mean, the adjacent industries, including PC shipments, are somewhat strengthened. I mean, all but have been slowing down a little bit over the summer period.
We also talk a lot to the distributors and our customers, and that is what's forming our point of view. What we've seen in the last months here on the sellout data, I think it is encouraging because, I mean, that's very closely related, of course, to the sell-in. And if we look on the quarter, I mean, I just shared here in the opening that the sellout data has been approximately flat here for headsets and video. And I can also confirm that that positive trend has continued into October. So we continue to see improvements. We feel better. And the way we see it is that the stabilization improvement trends is something that will continue to move forward. As we're looking into 2025, it's too early for us to give the guidance, but in the base case, we are expecting the market to be in growth for 2025.
Thanks a lot, Peter. Maybe just a quick follow-up on the first question. I mean, can you maybe provide the percentage of enterprise? What do you still produce in Asia and in China in particular? And for gaming, I mean, did you say that roughly most of it is still produced in Asia? You're working basically to extend the footprint into maybe Europe or the U.S.?
No. I mean, in hearing, we are producing in a balanced way, so we don't see the real exposure there, so I think it is more for the enterprise and gaming business. Enterprise, we have already moved volumes. At this point in time, products are being produced in places outside of China, and the exact volumes, I don't have them here with me on top of my mind either, but it's enough of volumes outside of China to supply the U.S. market for the majority of the product categories. There are some products which we have less sales of that we're still doing fully in China, but we think that when you model this out, we're in a good place, and for gaming, we are in the process of moving at this point in time, and we have the capabilities to move.
And it's something we're going through at this point in time and started like a couple of months ago. So I would say that we feel relatively good about the flexibility we have. And we need to understand, of course, what new legislation that might be put in place, but feel good that we can manage this well and also do it in a way that financially is manageable.
Perfect. Perfect. Makes a lot of sense. You also mentioned provision, if I'm correct, in gaming. Have you talked about the amount, the exact amount and the impact on gross margin?
We've basically said that part of the good gross margin in gaming, part of that is actually also a reversal of the provisions made in the first two quarters also surrounding the change in our setup on the system setup for gaming. So we have not commented on it, but I think we are sort of closer to a more 32%-ish on a going rate in the gaming. So that's the way you should model it. But of course, if you look at it year to date, it hasn't fluctuated. It's more a change from what happened in the first two quarters into what happened in third quarter isolated.
Perfect. Thank you very much.
The next question comes from the line of Martin Brenøe with Nordea. Please go ahead.
Thank you very much. Some of the questions have been answered. So I'll just ask into the solid profitability that you provided here in Q3 and maybe just help us understand a little bit how much of this is structural and how much of this is some temporary wins that you had. For example, in the G&A, I see that's been coming down quite a lot both year over year and sequentially. Would be helpful to understand how we should model that going forward. Thank you.
I think fundamentally, I think it's been a really, really good quarter for us in terms of profitability, and I think it follows also the trajectory we have seen on gross margin improvements as we have been coming through the year. In that sense, I think it is definitely a proof point that we consistently now are improving our EBITDA margins. In that sense, I think it's not a special quarter that is really impacted by major one-offs. In that sense, I think it's solid. When it comes to the admin as such, I think we are probably a little notch lower there than what we normally would see in a quarter. Actually also, if you go back in time, traditionally, we seem always to drop a little bit in quarter three, essentially over quarter two.
So I think a mix between these two is probably a relevant measure for where we think it's going. And I think that should give you guidance enough. But overall, importantly to understand that the synergies are definitely working and we are seeing it coming in on multiple cost lines. And of course, especially the gross margin is still one of the key parameters of our synergy plan toward 2026.
Thank you, Søren. And also congrats with the really strong cash flow. I think that's quite impressive. Some of that was driven by net working capital, and just to have a quick follow-up on that. Historically, we've seen that Q4, the inventory level also typically goes down to more like 15% of 12-month trailing revenue. Do you also expect to see that in Q4? And also on net working capital, I've been hearing through some channel checks that you have been doing a program where you try to release a lot of cash in each individual divisions as part of your synergy plan. Should we expect receivables to be lower than the 25% that we saw last year in Q4 that rose up, or is that sort of the cyclical trend that we will see in Q4 as well?
I think in my humble world, cash is of course king, and I think it's been really nice to see the cash we have been able to focus on. I think this has been a journey for GN that we've been on since we started the transition essentially. I think people pay attention to cash within the company these days, and I think that's rubbing off on us right now. When it comes to the quarter four, I think we will continue to focus on it. I think we will see an improved inventory balance, but I also think that some of the receivables that we have seen come in low here in the third quarter will go a little bit the other way based on the phasing of how fourth quarter would come out.
That's of course why we overall have said DKK 1.1 billion in cash flow is the upgraded version, appreciating that we are at DKK 980 million coming out of third quarter. So you should expect there is this balance, and you should also expect that we continuously invest in R&D also in fourth quarter. And that is behind the scenes. But overall, I think it's reasonable to say that we are pleased with the free cash flow year to date and the way we are operating the different business units. And they are actually helping and focusing on getting the cash in.
Thank you. And just a very last question for me. The R&D capitalization was a bit low here in Q3. How should we expect that? Should we expect that to come back, as you say, here in Q4?
Yeah, I think it is a good question, and actually, the way we look at it, it's better to look at the R&D capitalization rates in a year-to-date scale, and in a year-to-date scale, we are closer to the 50% mark. I know it was a little low here in quarter three, and it was probably a little high, by the way, in the second quarter, but year-to-date, we are probably more into the close to the 50%. I think that's probably more a good mark for fourth quarter, and once that is realized, it is actually an improvement in our earnings profiles compared to what we've seen in the past years, so I think here we are in a more balanced situation this year than what we've historically been.
Okay. Thank you very much. I'll jump back in the queue.
The next question comes from the line of Robert Davies with Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.
Thank you. The most minor being asked. I just had one. On the, I think there was a comment in the release talking about a benefit to gross profit in gaming from the release of earlier recognized provisions. Can you just quantify how big of a benefit that was in the quarter? Because it obviously pushed the numbers quite far out of consensus in that one division. Thank you.
I think I spoke to it earlier, actually, where I said that the gaming isolated had a gross margin of 37%, and I think you should consider the run rate of underlying gaming around 32%. Of course, then you can say within that mix, how much of that is then the reverse provision, but a majority of that is linked to that, so that's the way I think you should model it.
Okay. Thank you.
The next question comes from the line of Oliver Metzger with ODDO BHF. Please go ahead.
Good morning. Thanks for taking my questions. I will limit myself to two questions. First, on enterprise. Now your CMD is six months ago, and I can remember you mentioned various data points as indicators for turn to a better, while answering was not a direct cross-read. Now, it would be good to know if also you look at which data points have proved misleading and on which data points you rely currently. You just mentioned the sell-in/out, which is basically a very, very short-term data point, but are there still any data points where you think, okay, they provide some visibility? Or if not, basically, if you say eventually we do not have a visibility, I think that's also fair because that's the situation how it currently looks from the outside. Second question is on gaming.
So over the last quarters, you basically also reported quite solid market share gains in an overall weak market. Now your comments suggest that basically the market was just declining slightly, but your -4% appears that basically you lost some market share. Can you comment about just these short-term dynamics? What has changed compared to previous quarters? Thank you.
Thank you so much for the questions here. So let's start with enterprise. I think that the way we are trying to do this is to look on our direct visibility and then also other indicators as you speak to. The other indicators tend to be a combination of what the analysts say about IT spend and in particular IT equipment spend that we follow closely. And then the industry which tend to be the closest to us with a good correlation is the PC shipments. And I think what has happened here also since we gave an updated guidance in the summer timeframe when we announced the wind down of the Elite and Talk product lines is that I think that the enterprise market has developed a little bit less favorably in the rest of the year than what we anticipated.
And I think that's actually true also for PC shipments that during the summertimes and Q3 saw a little bit of a setback compared to what the industry believed, not at all turning it into a very declining kind of outlook anything, but a bit softer than anticipated. So I think it's fair to say that we see some level of softness in the broader enterprise equipment spend market compared to what we expected in the summer timeframe. But then at this point in time, when we speak to customers, what we see the very large customers are doing that we have a direct relationship with and also speak to our channels, what they see in the market, I mean, we do continue to feel better about the market. And the sellout data is, as you highlight in your question, very closely related to the sell-in.
I mean, the only thing between is the inventory sitting in the channel. And we did see a stronger sell-out than sell-in in the quarter. And the good sell-out data continued here also in October, which is encouraging. So we feel relatively good that the market is moving in the right direction, refraining a little bit to give a point estimate when this is turning to growth. But as I said here before, I mean, our base expectation is that there will be some level of growth in the enterprise market for 2025. Then moving to gaming, the way we read the market shares on our estimates is that we have not lost market share. We are very much maintaining them. I think it's helpful to also recognize that market shares are based on sell-out data.
And in the -4% we report in gaming, we have a couple of larger sell-in orders that unfortunately closed on the wrong side of the quarter. I don't think this has held back the channels from selling our product well. So we do believe we have been holding good shares. And we also believe that over time we will be able to continue to gain shares we have done in the past. So I appreciate it was a quarter a bit deviating from the very positive growth we've seen in the past, but we remain very confident about the growth in this business already in Q4, but also over time.
Okay. Thank you. May I ask a very quick follow-up on my first question? Because you mentioned inventory levels. Which visibility do you have on your customers' inventory levels? Because this seems to be a quite big black box.
No, you're right. It's difficult to know the absolute inventory levels, but in a period where we see a larger sell-out than sell-in, I think it's fair to assume that that is reducing the inventories in the channel. That is more what my comment relates to.
Yeah, sure. But may I just take time? But yeah, thank you very much.
The next question comes from the line of Mattias Häggblom with Handelsbanken. Please go ahead.
Yep. Thanks so much. I have two questions, please. So speaking to enterprise, but a detail in the guidance I've been thinking about. So why is there no range for enterprise, but minus 3% organic growth for 2024 when there is a range for hearing as well as gaming and consumer? Is visibility so much better for Q4 and enterprise? And then secondly, on hearing, you highlight strength with independents, and presumably you anticipate this momentum will continue into Q4. So how do you feel about visibility there, particularly in light of quite aggressive competitive launch ongoing? Thanks so much.
I can take the first one. I think it's right that we have said around -3% for the enterprise, knowing what we know today, and it's also an area where we felt that we had to update in terms of the guidance we had before on enterprise to give you a more specific sentiment based on what we see coming out of third quarter. Actually, when it comes to the other, I think it's actually firming up quite well with what we have said of hearing being in the upper end of the 8%-12%, and actually also when it comes to the gaming being in the midpoint of 2%-10%. So in that sense, I think it's quite precise estimates essentially, but we also felt it would be better for you to get our clear sentiment on where enterprise is going. So that is the reason behind that.
Then if I take hearing, no, we feel very good about the Q3, of course, and the growth there. And as you highlight, I mean, it has been, I mean, strong across the board, I would say, across all channel types, but the independents in particular grew very nicely. As we gave the updated guidance yesterday and for the rest of the year, we do expect hearing to continue a very good growth quarter in Q4 as well, based on the very healthy momentum we see broadly geographically, but also broadly across channels. So I mean, we're picking up, of course, all the signals we can from the market and of course talking very much to the people we have out in the various parts of the world selling our hearing aids. So that is what we're basing our forecast on basically.
But broadly, we feel very good about the value proposition of Nexia and the performance in the market. We do recognize that there have been strong competitors launching also, but we still believe that we will be able to perform very well with Nexia. That is a great hearing aid appreciated by many.
Thanks so much.
The next question comes from the line of Niels Granholm-Leth with Carnegie. Please go ahead.
Thank you. First question on your gaming business. It seems like your recurring gross margin for the gaming business has been around 32% or so for this year. Is that the level we should assume even for the gaming business going forward, or are you aiming for additional margin improvements in that business? And on the gaming business, could you just tell us where we should expect the sales and marketing cost to be going forward? And then just finally on your working capital, which seems to, for the group, still be above the pre-pandemic levels, is there a chance that we will see your net working capital to sales returning to pre-pandemic levels? Thank you.
I mean, thank you here for the question. I mean, as for gaming, we've seen a good improvement of the margin here in the latest periods, which is exactly what we wanted to see. We believe we have a bit more we can do here, so we'd refrain from giving an exact guidance, but expect a few more percentage points of margins improvement in gaming, and that will probably be over time across gross margin and divisional margins, and we need to come back and update you as we're making progress here, but we believe that we should be able to improve the margin a bit here by the right way of launching many appreciated products and operating.
As I mentioned also, we're taking quite some initiatives to move SteelSeries over to the supply chain and operations of the group, which short term has been a bit of an undertaking and maybe some level of distraction. Mid to long term, this will lend very helpful support to margins also for SteelSeries. That is a direction we're taking the business.
And then when it comes to the net working capital question, I think essentially what we should remind all of us that pre-pandemic, there was a very lean way of operating where you never actually saw hesitations of having net working capital at one place and not having to have micro-depots around the world. And you got closer to safety stock levels. I think most of us have probably come to the conclusion that it was too tight back then. I think we've also said as part of the capital plan, we have definitely focused on, of course, improving our net working capital. And I think actually we've also done that. We expect still the inventory levels to come down also from where we are now here in the third quarter. And we will continuously, of course, work to improve that.
But we will also retain the flexibility for us to ensure that we can deliver in a world where there are the regional depots that we also need to appreciate, and it takes time to move goods around. So I think we've come a long way, but I will not promise that we get to pre-pandemic levels. It was a different world back then.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Carsten Lønborg with Danske Bank. Please go ahead.
Yep. Thank you very much. Two questions here. First of all, I noticed that you have 7,281 full-time employees at the end of this quarter, which is actually the same as one year ago. So I was hoping that you could maybe talk a little bit more about where your synergies are actually coming from because it doesn't seem to be from a reduced headcount and also in light of the cost savings you book on general and admin, which I would have presumed would be highly related to headcount reductions. Secondly, the hearing EBITDA margin has come quickly to the 20%, it seems. What does this actually mean for the future?
Are we now going to see that it's the other divisions that will contribute from here, or do you think that could come more from hearing also when taking into account that you maybe, maybe not, will have to spend a little bit more on sales and marketing next year when a huge competitor is pushing very hard for its new hearing aid? Thank you.
I think when it comes to the margin, sometimes it is actually a little bit difficult to compare exactly like for like in a quarter. Also appreciating that, of course, it's at the end of Bel Audiologia, and it's actually also the building up to a restructuring that we did towards the end of the year. And this year is also about, and which I've said upfront, when are all the people out in terms of us relocating to Poland? They're not all out yet. So I think it is a difficult number just to speak on quarter to quarter. I think you should probably rely more on the synergies that we see coming in. And then essentially also part of the synergies we see is also a more structured way of operating and in some areas positions that we did not anymore feel that we would have in the bank.
And that is also a synergy for us going forward. So many figures, I would at least be a little hesitant to exactly track those down. When it comes to the margin, there I would actually still urge you to go back to our Capital Markets Day where we back then said, and it's actually also supported exactly what Peter said a second ago on gaming, that that would be the one where we would be looking for margin improvements. And as you can also remember from back then, we said that we would have to improve margin, and that was actually within consumer and gaming back then. And now, of course, we have taken out the consumer part of it, improving our ability to get to the 16%-17% EBITDA margin in the long haul.
When it came to hearing and enterprise back then, we said, yes, there's probably a little more to be had there, but we were actually definitely faring in the right direction, especially now where we can bank basically the hearing margin that has been suppressed over years, and we are now fully back in the game when it comes to hearing. Enterprise has actually been faring quite well over the past years.
In terms of spend on sales and marketing in hearing, considering the competitive environment going forward, do you feel you're at the right level or?
I think you should. I mean, I think within hearing, I think we should appreciate that we are also a growth within hearing, and as such, we also expect to support and fuel that growth. I think overall the company has been on the journey now where we see a better balance between growth and earnings. That's, of course, the balance we in management are trying to strike the right way to ensure that we actually do get the growth where we believe we can get it at a reasonable price, of course.
Great. Thanks. The next question comes from the line of Maja Stephanie Pataki with Kepler Cheuvreux. Please go ahead.
Yes. Good morning. I have a couple of questions around hearing, please. First of all, if we look at your strong hearing growth performance of 10% organic, would it be fair to assume that your traditional business has been growing in the high single digits? It would be cool if you could confirm that. The second question, since you have been highlighting your strong growth with the independents, could you give us an indication whether pricing was meaningful in the quarter and also year to date when it comes to growth? And then lastly, as many of my colleagues have been pointing out here, we have one of your main competitors with a massive launch out there and definitely beating the drums quite strongly. Could you maybe share some views or some feedback that you're getting from the market on why Nexia continues to do so well? So just to kind of understand what is it that is the one thing that people highlight about Nexia? Thank you.
Thank you so much for the questions here. On your first question, yes, we can confirm that, so if you look on the traditional business, that would be high single digit growth. That's a good way to think about it. If you look on ASP, I mean, broadly for the quarter, it's been a good ASP quarter for us with some growth in ASPs, and I think that is driven also by the continued success of Nexia, that is taking a higher share of our business, and as being an appreciated hearing aid, we're able to price it in a healthy way also, so we are seeing some of that effect. I think it's important also to recognize we are highlighting the independent because, I mean, there we really had a standout growth, but we actually have been seeing healthy growth in other channels also.
The way I think you should think about it is we're growing nicely across channels and regions, and then the independents are a little bit, I mean, standing out with even stronger growth. That is great to see. I think when it comes to the appreciation of Nexia, I personally believe it's difficult to highlight one single factor that is standing out. I think it's a combination that makes it a very complete and appreciated hearing aid. I mean, what we still believe is most important is really helping the users to hear well overall, but in particular in noisy environments. If you add to that the size of it, the battery performance, the comfort, the connectivity, I think it makes a very compelling proposition. We have gradually seen also increased level of audiology support for it.
They like working with it, and there is also good quality and very satisfied users for them. So I think it's been a very good momentum we built up here around Nexia. And to be fair, it started even before in the product before Omnia and Nexia, then I've been taking it to the next level. And that's also where I believe we see the broad-based growth around the world and across channel types. So we do recognize that there have been competitive launches, but we very much believe that Nexia remain a very good proposition in the market. And as such, also we believe we should be able to do well in the market.
Great. And just to have a bit of a better understanding of the ASP impact, Peter, if we assume the market has been growing 3-4% in units, were you still growing above the market in unit terms, or have you been more in line with market?
No, I would say we've been growing faster than the market in volume and then been able to add a bit on top of that with ASP expansion.
Great. That's super helpful. Thank you.
Thank you.
The next question comes from the line of Shubhangi Gupta with HSBC. Please go ahead.
Hi. Thanks for taking my question. So I have a question on the gaming business. So you have mentioned you're seeing slightly declined market. So can you please elaborate? Is it specific to any geographies? And also over the medium term, how do you think about the ASP development in gaming as well as for gross margin? Are you looking at improving it to mid-30s% as some peers already out there? Thank you.
No, thank you. I mean, in terms of the market development, just to make sure to calibrate to get the right understanding across, I think it's a market that's been kind of hovering around flat development throughout the year. And in the earlier part of the year, it was in slight growth in the way we read the market, 1%-2% for our categories. And now it's slight decline, probably 1%-2% decline. So the shifts have not been very dramatic. And as such, also like to downplay it a bit because we should be able to grow in the current market environment. We believe we have strong offerings and strong offerings in the pipeline, and we should be able to grow even if the current environment is showing a slight decline. In terms of the geographic split of that, I think there's small differences.
So I probably would refrain from highlighting those. It's a fairly global phenomenon, what we're picking up. The ASP development, it is something for us that's important. I mean, still, seriously, we position ourselves as a premium equipment manufacturer in gaming. And as such, we really like to be able to command a pricing premium also. And the products we launched, I think we launched them to healthier price points. And I would say margins that help us to further build our business. I haven't seen any kind of negative trends of that. I would say a bit on the contrary. I mean, last year and the year before, there was so much excess inventory in the industry. I think the pricing environment was relatively difficult because there were so many extra promotions to get rid of the excess inventories.
I think we have addressed our excess inventory, and I think many of the other industry players have as well. So the pricing environment is probably a bit better today than it was a year ago in our mind.
On the gross margin, medium-term development?
I mean, on the gross margin, we talked a bit about, I mean, this before. Maybe if I not break out gross margin versus, I mean, the other cost, but we do believe that we're able to further improve our margins of gaming a bit over time. We have made a very healthy improvement already, but are working to further improve that a few percentage points over the, I would say, over the coming year or two as we're taking more initiatives. It also has some initiatives are more short-term in nature, but some also take a little bit longer time related to how we operate our supply chain on a global basis. But we are very keen here to improve the margin a bit further in the gaming business.
The next question comes from the line of Hugo Solvet with BNP Paribas. Please go ahead.
Hi, hello. Thanks for taking my questions. I have a few, please, clarification and sorry if I missed the answer earlier. On audio end markets, just wanted to get some clarification on how do you position against the risk of recovery in those end markets to come with potentially higher discounts and what the guidance can accommodate when we look at Q4. Second, follow-up on Julien's question earlier on the fact that you're moving manufacturing outside of China for gaming. Just wanted to clarify how long that is expected to last and when will you be effectively outside or most of the production for gaming will be outside of China. And lastly, on hearing, thanks for the earlier comment on competitive dynamic. Just when we zoom in into Europe wholesale, can you give us a bit more clarity on what you're seeing maybe by region? That'll be helpful. Thank you.
Thank you so much. So let me start here with enterprise. I think we see in terms of the pricing environment and our ability to maintain our ASPs. I think we have actually been able to do that in our mind in a very healthy way throughout this whole kind of post-COVID adjustment process. And also in the most recent quarters, have been able to price well in the market and protecting healthy ASPs in the markets. So I don't see any major risk there. I mean, in the short term, for sure not. We are very disciplined on how we approach that, and we don't foresee that to change here in the coming period.
Of course, I mean, if you look on Q4, there are some level of ranges for where the quarter can land, but we are, of course, a month into it now when we're giving you the updated guidance, which we have factored in. So essentially, we have two months more to go. So I think we're coming back to the full year guidance for enterprise is around the -3% that Søren spoke to here earlier, and you should probably see some kind of small range around that number for enterprise, but I think, I mean, we're really, I think, working to position as well also from an improving market over time. I mean, we appreciate it's been taking a bit longer than what we thought it would do, and as I think many others have thought as well, but it is still taking place.
As I said in the opening, we're quite positive of what we see in particular on the recent sell-out data. Our base case for 2025 is some level of growth in the market, which we'll update you more on when we're giving our guidance here around the next quarterly call. If I move to hearing, what we see here around the world, I mean, I can speak, I mean, market-wise first, if I start there, the market is holding up relatively well. It's probably a bit of pressure in the market compared to the normal structural unit growth, but still a fairly healthy market in our mind, but probably on the lower end of what's considered normal, so to speak. Our own performance here, we continue to do well in the U.S. It's really been another good quarter for us in the U.S.
But also, I would say a very good quarter in Europe, growing also nicely, supporting the global growth of the business. And then the different channel types, we highlighted independent as extra strong, but it's actually been healthy growth in several other channel types also. So fairly broad-based growth for us.
Thank you. And on outside of China manufacturing for gaming?
Okay, sorry, I missed that for you. So apologies. It's hard for me to give an exact time estimate today, but I think that we work here with outsourced manufacturing. So it's essentially to plan that together with existing manufacturing partners, but also as we plan future launches and future growth, making sure that we have manufacturing partners that can support us in locations around the world. So it is a bit of process to take us there. And we believe we should be able to manage this in a good way. But it's, of course, difficult to comment on exactly before we know any possible change. And the difference there is that for enterprise, we've already been going through this. So here we already have it in place.
Okay. Thank you very much and congrats on the prints.
Thank you so much.
This concludes our question- and- answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to management for any closing remarks.
Thank you very much, Aretha, and thank you everybody on the call. See you on the road.