Welcome to everyone here in the room and following us by stream for the update of the H1 2025 results. I will start first with the business review. Pieter-Jan will follow with the financial review. I will be back then for the outlook, and together we will be ready for your Q&A. First of all, we made 2.2% more visitors in the first half. This is in the background of, as announced and predicted, a rather weak first quarter, with especially a weak month of March. Lilo & Stitch and Minecraft changed for us the scene and made that we had a strong second quarter. We continue to work on premiumization, and we see still increasing demand in more premium products, as well in box office and essentially in theater sales, so the shops that we operate in our theaters.
Despite some negative impact due to currency impacts from Canadian and U.S. dollars, Pieter-Jan will elaborate more on that. We increased our revenue with more than 6%, and a strong cost performance and management made that the EBITDA after releases increased with 22.6% compared to the same period in the year before. Last year, 2024, we were just in the black in terms of net results. This time with $7.5 million, that's a tremendous increase in percentage. Free cash flow is strong with $20.7 million compared to $12.5 million or 64.9% more. Net financial debt is slightly up, but our financial leverage is lower and resulting in 2.14 compared to EBITDA. Here you see essentially the same results, but with some more information on percentage. I think a very strong performance as such for the second quarter.
This is essentially caused by, as I explained already, a couple of blockbuster movies. We always have, we have around 400 movies on average a year, and we always have a layer of customers coming to see those mid-sized movies. Of course, blockbusters are the cherry on the cake for the week or the month you are in. Yes, of course, more American Hollywood blockbuster movies make a difference for us, and that's what we witnessed in the second quarter. Revenue increased, as I said already before, with 6.2%. Let's say it's the main components, some inflation compensation, and then more sales in our theaters per customer. Essentially, we see a very strong increase in all markets as well in what we call in-theater sales. Belgium has been the champion, and we were very successful with different popcorn dispensers going from Formula One helmets.
That's something that we will roll out in other markets. It makes that there is a big and/or bigger boost than in other markets in terms of sales per visitor. It becomes a collectible. It's part of the experience. Experience, that's what differentiates us in the industry and what gives more willingness to pay from the customers. The operational fundamentals remain strong. We know how that works after all those years and our teams as well. Not a lot of surprises there. That makes that the adjusted EBITDA surged by 22.6%. I think it's a strong performance. End of next year, that's something that we highlighted in the previous presentations. We were going to be confronted with a wall of debt. We do have an obligation of €225 million, a bond coming to its maturity.
That was going to be the same period that our revolving credit facility of €120 million was going to come to maturity. Given the geopolitical uncertainty of today, given the fact that we wanted to anticipate a little bit more on all of this, and preparing for having the firepower if needed in the internal or external expansion of the group, we decided to anticipate, and we have been very successfully renegotiating our credit facility with the banks. We were able to increase the amount from €120 million - €160 million at deal terms that are very, very close to the one we had before, with the possibility to extend in amount, to extend in duration. Not all the banks that were candidates have been served. There is the possibility even to add more banks to the party.
Top five movies, someone told me before coming in, a lot of family content. Disney and other providers of family content remain very strong and successful. You see that four out of the five top five movies, as were in the first half, are family content. Minecraft, of course, closer to the gaming world, and more content closer to that gaming world or related to that gaming world is announced for the future. Visitor dynamics, I would say nothing very special from our point of view here. France, the comparable with last year, was difficult. You will remember that last year, a first half that was essentially impacted by the Hollywood strikes the year before. We saw that France was almost flat because of a strong local movie, Un P'tit Truc en Plus. Joking a bit, I would say this year it was Un P'tit Truc en Moins.
There was almost no local content on the screen, and that impacted as well the French-speaking part of Belgium that often goes together with France in terms of local content. U.S. and Canada remain strong, but we see in all the markets where we are, if we have the right content, the demand is there. We are still struggling with Hollywood that is building up. It's a lineup, more about that later on in the outlook. As part of our strategic pillars and our company strategy, focusing on premiumization as part of our, in the meantime, known 5% exercise where we try to focus as well on what can we do more for the customer, what can we sell more, new revenue initiatives.
This made that we decided to extend the agreement with IMAX with nine new theaters, of which a couple have been built and successfully opened, essentially the one that we opened for Mission Impossible in France in Lomme. ScreenX theaters that are successful, and I hope that if you have seen the Formula One movie that you saw within ScreenX, it was absolutely an experience. Coming from the U.S. as initiative where the first rows with recliners are closer to the screen, we transformed them to give them extra attractivity into luxe loungers, a kind of beds. Very successful. We are testing them in Europe, in the Netherlands, and in Antwerp as well. Quite successful as well. Not my cup of tea, but successful for many customers.
Adding experience, we see as well that theming some of our theaters is as well attractive and makes that customers choose for that theater or for Kinepolis. You have here a couple of pictures for the X room for Minecraft and then the immersive ScreenX screen for customers coming in for Jurassic World Rebirth in a couple of theaters. In the case of Minecraft, we saw that it was the number one grossing theater in the world for that movie just by adding that kind of experience. We have some footage from the opening of the IMAX theater in Lomme. As we have been explaining in the past, we work every year on lowering our break-even point, our so-called 5% exercise that we combine with our profit plan exercise.
Where we hypothetically, based on 5% less visitors for the next year, again, not as a target, just an approach, we try to make the same EBITDA. That's one of the sources why with 2.2% more visitors, we just showed you 22.2% more EBITDA. There we are, let's say, filling the gap. That's how we call it internally, the EBITDA gap that would result if you would do nothing with 5% less tickets, with measures that are proven concepts where we know that it will have immediately an impact. We are as well working on what within two or three years. That's why we established years ago our so-called Innovation Lab. We came with a new and other approach since two years, the Innovation Lab Summit.
It's a little bit inspired and based on how the Eurosong contest is organized, where every country comes with an idea and is trying to go home with the award of, or the most promising and more important, the most impactful idea. You need to have first an idea that looks promising, but it's only in executing it and measuring what the impact is, which brings you something. The main award is the most impactful idea. We have been organizing this for the second year in a row with an international jury of all the country managers of the different countries, as well as those participating. You can only count vote for your own country and your own idea. We combine that with, you know, what about our strategy, some trend watchers.
This year, it was essentially the impact of artificial intelligence on our business and the potential out of that that was on the agenda. We saw again because, you know, last year it was an amazing summit, just something to be proud of. This year, the bar was high and we came out with even more, let's say, promising and impactful ideas than the year before. You still see there a growth of our talents and the capability of managing those ideas. The selection of ideas that are in the meantime in execution. It's the self-service kiosks, we call it internally the frictionless concession, inspired a bit on the McDonald's screens, which is essentially in Canada and the U.S., an opportunity in mid-sized theaters, often a little bit too small to put a big mega candy into it. Keep in mind that in the U.S.
and Canada, we have a lot of hot food in the offer, and that needs to be prepared while the customer is waiting. Essentially, here there are two impacts. The customer is more relaxed to make his choices. There is no waiter waiting for you ready to register what you want to consume. That translates in a higher take-up rate on the one hand. On the other hand, we win time because we only need to serve, prepare, and serve the customers. That's a win of time. We are testing this at the moment in a couple of theaters in Canada and one in the U.S. So far, successful. We are learning and fine-tuning as we speak.
Another idea coming from the MJR team, they built a RP1, Ready Player One entertainment and gaming lounge, five or six depending on the size, spots where four to six people can play together on individual screens, big screens. You can as well rent the whole lounge for birthday parties or it can be a capacity up to 25. It starts rather promising. It has a couple of goals. We fill up square meters that we don't use. We generate more traffic and we generate more results as well. That's something that we are testing and following up for further rollout. We appointed as well Hans Van Acker, the former General Manager of Kinepolis Film Distribution.
I can tell you every new movie that you need to launch is a new project, is a new, let's say, source of creativity, how to make that you create word of mouth with your movie. We invited Hans to become Chief Strategic Businesses and Development. He will oversee BrightFish, our screen advertising company. He will continue to oversee Kinepolis Film Distribution. He will be responsible for the further development and rollouts of our Sing Cities, our karaoke initiative, and other innovations or projects that don't fit immediately into the operations or sales and marketing from the cinema business as such. Last but not least, we published our first CSRD-compliant annual report, and that was very well done, something we are proud of as well. We have some footage of the RP1 entertainment lounge. Let's have a look. No footprint changes in the first half of the year.
I know that some are impatient and expecting that we are going to grow the company. We told you last year that most of the potential sellers are waiting for more content to come. We told you in the beginning of the year that we started to sign NDAs. Stay tuned. Pieter-Jan, the floor is yours.
Good morning. Good afternoon already, everyone. I will take you a bit more in depth to the financial figures of the first half of 2025. Actually, very proud to present you those performances over the first half. We're happy with it. The teams did an unbelievable job. As Eddy mentioned, 14.3 million visitors in the second half. To be honest, Q1 was challenging, as you have seen in the earlier release of the trading update of Q1. In Q2, we have put the booster on. Thanks to those big blockbusters that helped us to fully compensate and more than compensate even the visitors we have lost in the first quarter. That gave us a sales of just below €260 million. An increase of almost in cinema revenue of 7.2% higher, also showing there some growth in box office and ITS per visitor.
Going a bit more in depth in that performance and the revenue and visitors. As you can see on the table on the left side, 85% of our revenue is still cinema revenue, consisting of around 52% of box office revenue and 32% in total of ITS. The increase in total from €242 million to €257 million. €14.7 million is related to cinema revenue, roughly 50/50 ITS and box office. If you look into the dynamics of the cinema revenue, what you see there is two main elements. One is, of course, increase in volume, the 2.2% increase in visitors. That gives us around roughly €7 million of increase in revenue. The second one, even more important, there you see the €9.2 million. That's a combination of two main facts. One is inflation compensation, which is an important element.
We try to compensate inflation in our ticket price, but also in our ITS food and beverage price. The other one is also the increase in premiumization, which also kicks in. Roughly estimated around a bit more than €2 million of the €9.2 million is premiumization. Also a very important element, which also shows back in our EBITDA increase also. On top of that, €1.9 million. That's a bit of a change in scope. We added Windsor and Almeria, which are the main elements of an increased revenue also on top of the H1 2024 performance. Unfortunately, U.S. dollar, Canadian dollar gave us a bit of headwind. There we lost €3.4 million in comparison with 2024. Even more important then, this slide, this is a nice illustration of the increase in box office and ITS per visitor.
What you see there on the right side is the increase versus the full year 2024, already the first year half. You see +2.1% and +4.7% in ITS. Plus one to one. This is including a headwind we have in U.S. dollar and Canadian dollars. Actually, the real increase is even bigger. Even if you compare our box office increase per visitor compared to the first half of 2024, we are at 3.3%. ITS is even more astonishing there. We have, even compared to H1 2024, a 7.7% increase per visitor. Very good performance driven by that inflation compensation, but also by the premiumization and by those premium popcorn buckets, which also play an important role in our sales of ITS. Going to our operating cash flow, EBITDA. Here also, very proud on this performance, showing our operational leverage in full. What you see here is an increase to 80%.
You have seen 2.2% increase in visitors. Returns to us almost 22%, 24%, 23% increase at EBITDA, meaning that if you calculate this from an increase on EBITDA per visitor, we go more than 20% up versus H1 2024. Just to give you an idea, H1 2024, we have around €2.7 EBITDA per visitor. If you compare that with today, we have €3.25 per visitor. That increase is really a very good performance of our teams. On top of also focusing on the one hand on that cost control, which makes our operational leverage kicking in even stronger, really our teams convincing the clients and customers of that experience and of that premiumization strategy.
Very nice performance on EBITDA for the first half of the year compared to last year, which of course, if you go down the P&L, returns also a much better first half net result compared to 2024, €7.5 million. Summarizing a bit, not going through this. This is indeed the P&L, showing that performance versus H1. CapEx, also important. As you can see, almost €18 million of investment. We can continue investing in our theaters and in our complexes. A large part is their maintenance. We invest quite some money in maintenance, €9.4 million. This is really keeping our theaters up to standard, improving, and making sure that the customer gets what he wants and pays for what he is expected. Nice number there, €9.4 million. Also in the expansion, premiumization is not coming for free.
It brings us money, but we also need to spend some to get that experience up to level. There we have around €7.7 million invested, meaning cozy seats, IMAX experience, laser ultra, and so on. We are on track for our investment level for 2025. Which brings us to our evolution of net debt. There is a small increase from $319 million year end to $324 million net financial debt, excluding IFRS accounting at $36 million. So mid-year, there is always a seasonality effect we see here at year end. We always have a lot of cash in, but do not yet pay our suppliers. At the end of June, this is a bit less. That's why we're always a bit higher. In the end, very happy with that cash generation, $2.7 million versus $12.5 million last year. Strong cash generation where, of course, Q2 was the main driver.
This brings us to our leverage. Also there, we're generating cash less in H1 than H2, of course. We also have some exceptional cash outs in H1, of which, of course, are dividend payments and so on. Nevertheless, we managed to get our leverage down. 2.25 end of the year. We're now at 2.14, expecting to further decrease this first towards year end. Very nicely leveraging for the first half and expecting more of that towards year end. As Eddy already mentioned, we do have some bonds that come to maturity in the near term. It's also seen, if you look at our maturity today, 1.6 years. It's very short. We are anticipating there also to cope with that. We had an early renewal of the revolving credit facility, which brings our current revolving credit facility, so committed line, from $120 million - $160 million. Very happy with the terms.
Also a possibility to extend after five years, another two years, and some flexibility in also extending the revolving credit facility itself, but also adding some terms in the rest. That gives us a bit of comfort and also creates a bit of flexibility. This is a first step in our refinancing. More to come there. We look on how we're going to also towards the end of 2026. We have the $225 million maturing. Also there, we need to see how we do this. This is the very first step we have taken where we also had a lot of support from our banking partners. Happy with that. Maybe on the maturity, of course, as such, this revolving credit facility doesn't have a direct impact on our maturity, but more importantly, the liquidity headroom that it creates.
It enables us to pay off the maturing bonds in the short term. Which already brings us to the outlook. Eddy, I'll leave the word to you.
Thank you, Pieter-Jan. Outlook is essentially about what will be coming in in terms of content and Hollywood blockbusters in the short and mid-long term. First of all, maybe important on this slide is for those who missed it, that Skydance succeeded in the meantime to acquire Paramount. As we speak, they're working on the future plans and on replacing management and implementing their strategy. Part of that will be recapitalizing Paramount for more for the future. If you look at the landscape, Universal, Walt Disney, Sony being a small player, and Paramount are back and quite strong from a financial point of view. We expect that Warner Bros. will need to happen something to get that company stronger for the future and to make them allow as well to build up the lineup like they had pre-pandemic.
Apple Studios, not really publicly, but during the Cinema Convention in Las Vegas, confirmed their commitment to the theatrical window and production with an ambition of a lineup of 6 movies- 7 movies on a yearly basis. Some were hesitating a bit after that Napoleon and Killers of the Flower Moon, despite extensive productions, were maybe not the most successful ones. Now with the Formula One movie, they realized their first really big movie that is still today in our charts and in the top five in most of the markets where we are active. Lionsgate is a strong player as well, less known in Europe because they distribute essentially through the other studios. Amazon as well during CinemaCon confirmed their ambition next to MGM Studios, Uli Home, to start with Amazon Studios as well.
Their plan is to bring 11 movies - 12 movies on a yearly basis to the big screen. For this year, again, and you know, last year we made €133 million rounded adjusted EBITDA. We made in the first half €40 million of it. It all happens in the second half and essentially in the fourth quarter. This quarter, July was good with a lot of good releases and cinema weather in some markets. August is not as strong. September is still to come. We have a strong fourth quarter in terms of lineup despite that Michael, where we had uncertainty in the beginning of the year, is finally postponed to a later date. We have Avatar, we have Zootopia, Five Nights at Freddy's, and a couple of other strong movies like SpongeBob, Now You See Me, and Wicked, part two.
Wicked, that was in several markets, part one last year, very successful, but was a little bit in competition in the slipstream of Moana. That won't be the case this year. We think that we have a strong lineup for the fourth quarter, and each of those movies as well addresses to different customer groups. While last year, in the month of November, December, we had Mufasa and Moana and Wicked, part one, attracting the same customer cluster as such, that's better spread this year. 2026 looks very promising. Since I'm in the company, you know, the box office department has always been telling me next year will be a good year.
I tend to believe them this time as well because we really have, and not all of it is on air, but we have very strong franchises coming or coming back with a Toy Story 5, with an Ice Age 6, Dune. We are rather convicted that last year or next year will be a year coming closer again in terms of movie lineup to the pre-pandemic Hollywood lineup we had. We have trailers for some of the upcoming movies for the fourth quarter. Let's watch that together, and then we are, Pieter-Jan and I, available for your questions.