Hello, and welcome to the Alstom half-year results for fiscal year 2025-2026. My name is George, and I'll be your coordinator for today's event. Please note this conference is being recorded, and for the duration of the call, your lines will be in a listen-only mode. However, you will have the opportunity to ask questions towards the end of the presentation, and this can be done by pressing star one on your telephone keypad to register your question. If you require assistance at any time, please press star zero, and you'll be connected to an operator. I'd like to hand the call over to your hosts, Mr. Henri Poupart-Lafarge, CEO, and Mr. Bernard Delpit, Executive Vice President and CFO. Please go ahead.
Thank you. Thank you. Good evening. Good evening, everybody, and thanks for joining Alstom's first-half results conference call. I'm Henri Poupart-Lafarge, Group CEO, and I'm joined by Bernard Delpit, EVP and CFO. I will first comment on the highlights of the first half before Bernard will walk you through the financial results. I will then comment on guidance before opening the floor for your questions. Let me start with the key figures for the first half. Orders reached EUR 10.5 billion, with strong commercial momentum in Q2, particularly driven by rolling stock in North America. The book-to-bill ratio is at 1.2x, fully aligned with full-year guidance. Sales came in at EUR 9.1 billion, reflecting 7.9% organic growth, with all product lines and regions contributing. Adjusted EBIT was EUR 580 million, up 13% year-on-year, representing a 6.4% margin compared to 5.9% in the same period last year.
Free cash flow was - EUR 740 million, as expected, reflecting typical in-higher seasonality. The solid performance underscores the strength and resilience of our business model. Let me highlight three key competitive advantages that I believe will continue to drive commercial and operational success. First, the multi-local footprint is more relevant than ever in today's macroeconomic and geopolitical environment. It allows us to win business and execute projects effectively, and we are continuing to expand in this direction. Second, the integrated approach across rolling stock, services, signaling, and systems is delivering strong sales synergies. In particular, most of our rolling stock orders are now linked to long-term service contracts, reinforcing revenue visibility. Third, the harmonization of the rolling stock portfolio is delivering results, particularly in high-speed rail.
Progress towards the homologation of the Avelia Horizon platform is encouraging, and we have secured additional orders for the platform in the recent months. In the meantime, we continue to execute on our strategic priorities. With the Bombardier Transportation integration now complete, we are focusing on driving industrial and development performance. The transformation plan in Germany, in particular, is progressing well, and we are rolling out efficiency initiatives across engineering and manufacturing. Looking now at page six, Alstom's addressable market remains stable for the three fiscal years beyond March 2026, at around EUR 200 billion. Europe continues to stand as our first market, concentrating many rolling stock commuter and mainline signaling opportunities. American customers will tender train replacement opportunities in the north, with mainline and urban network expansions being expected again in the south.
Half of America's EUR 31 billion pipeline will be made of turnkey projects, and Alstom stands ready to tap into those. In Asia-Pacific, Australia and India will continue to be our main markets, with India focusing on freight and urban developments, while Australia could see the exercising of several rolling stock optional tranches. Now turning to slide seven, focusing on orders in the second quarter. The Americas region had a very successful semester this year with two landmark orders. This includes a EUR 2 billion rolling stock contract with MTA in New York, a EUR 1 billion rolling stock option exercised by NJT in New Jersey.
In Asia-Pacific, commercial activity was also strong in the second quarter, with key wins such as another metro project in India confirming Alstom's long-lasting presence in the city of Mumbai, a EUR 500 million rolling stock and maintenance contract in New Zealand, in addition to the KiwiRail signaling project signed by Alstom in 2022, a signaling order in Singapore enabling faster travel times from the Shanghai airport. Together with other small orders, Alstom recorded EUR 6.4 billion in total orders for the second quarter. This brings the book-to-bill ratio for the first half of the year to 1.2x. Moving to slide eight, highlighting large orders announced and booked since the start of the second half. Let me start with Eurostar. Eurostar has placed an order for 30 Avelia Horizon double-decker very high-speed trains for a total value of EUR 1.4 billion.
The agreement also includes an option for the purchase of 20 additional units. This is a strong validation of the Avelia Horizon platform, which is now close to homologation and has built a very solid order book of more than 170 trains serving multiple clients, both in France and abroad. On the right-hand side, Polish operator PKP awarded Alstom a contract worth EUR 1.6 billion for the supply of 42 Coradia Max trains together with 30 years of maintenance. This award illustrates the strength of the Coradia platform, as well as the increasing share of rolling stock contracts being bundled with long-term maintenance. The agreement with PKP also includes an option for the purchase of 30 additional trains.
Turning now to the backlog on slide eight, the average gross margin in the backlog stands at 18% at the end of the first half, compared to 17.8% at the end of the same time last year. This represents a 20 basis point increase compared to the end of the last fiscal year. Considering the weight of holding stock orders in the first half, the increase in the gross margin in backlog demonstrates the quality of the order intake across all product lines. Our commercial wins this semester have shed a particular light on the North American rail market, as explained on slide 10. We have seen over the recent years ridership increasing closer to pre-COVID activity, with Amtrak ridership in the U.S. already exceeding the pre-crisis level.
The need for enhancing passenger experience and upgrading aging train fleets remains a powerful commercial driver, with 50% of the U.S. installed base needing replacement in the short to medium term. The U.S. railway supply market, as addressed by Alstom, has witnessed further concentration, with the three largest players accounting for about three-quarters of all orders in the last three years. Finally, in Canada, Alstom enjoys a unique position thanks to five main sites and 5,000 employees. Continuing with North America on page 11, on the delivery aspects, we celebrated in August the debut of Amtrak's high-speed, Next Gen Acela on the Northeast Corridor. These are the fastest and most technologically advanced trains in the U.S. that Alstom manufactured at its Hornell hub. This facility in upstate New York is the largest dedicated passenger rail manufacturing facility in the U.S.
Hornell is also where the trains from the newly signed MTA's M-9A order will be delivered, with further investment made there to manufacture car body shells. On the West Coast, the Bay Area Rapid Transit, BART in California accepted the 1,000th car from the Fleet of the Future. This rail car came from Alstom's Plattsburgh facility, where the group is also manufacturing the NJT Multi-level III double-decker EMUs. Turning our attention to France on page 12, the first MF19 metro entering service on Paris metro Line 10 has brought the focus back on the widest generation of train innovations that Alstom has seamlessly matured. Within the time frame of only five years, no less than five new train platforms will have reached operational service stage, among which MF19, RER NG, and Avelia Horizon for high speed.
The RER NG, in particular, commuter trains have been running on the RER E line since November 2023 and on RER D line since December 2024. Combining single and double-decker cars, this train embarks numerous capacity, comfort, and accessibility innovations. Last, the Avelia Horizon platform witnessed several further milestones, with TGV M starting endurance tests in France following completion of certification tests and with another high-speed commercial success achieved with Eurostar. On page 13, we reflect again on car production levels, providing insights into the rolling stock business, which, together with the train components, represents about 50% of sales. Production volumes were broadly stable in the first half compared to last year. Some projects saw an increase in production, including RER NG and TGV in France, commuter trains for BART in the U.S., or several German projects where volumes are on the rise.
At the same time, some large projects that contributed to volumes last year have now been completed. This includes some tire metros in Paris, some metros in São Paulo, the Tren Maya project in Mexico, or the Avelia Liberty for Amtrak in the U.S.. In addition to a favorable mix of cars on sales, it's worth noting that more cars produced in the first half were part of projects in ramp-up phase compared to the same period last year, which also contributed to holding stock sales growth. Overall, we continue to expect stable production for the full year. Let me now pass it on to Bernard. We will comment on the first half results.
Thank you, Henri. Good evening, everyone. Let's start with the order intake as shown on slide 15. We recorded EUR 10.5 billion of orders in the first half. The book-to-bill ratio that was 0.9x for the first quarter accelerated to 1.4x in the second quarter, resulting in a book-to-bill of 1.2x for the first half, of which 1.4x for Rolling Stock. The backlog reached EUR 96.1 billion, up from EUR 95 billion at the end of March. This increase was driven by the strong book-to-bill, but partly offset by negative currency effects. Looking at the regions, the Americas had their best semester ever, with large orders from New York and New Jersey. Europe remained the largest contributor, supported by strong momentum in France, and the Signalling business had a solid start to the year with contracts wins in Italy, Taiwan, Brazil, and Singapore.
Turning to sales on slide 16, sales reached EUR 9.1 billion in the first half, up 7.9% on an organic basis. All product lines contributed to sales growth. In particular, rolling stock sales totaled EUR 4.7 billion, reflecting 6% organic growth. This was driven by a strong ramp-up in Germany with double-digit growth across multiple regional train projects, continued momentum in France, notably supported by the RER NG programme. In the Americas, increased production volumes for BART in San Francisco offset the completion of other projects, including Amtrak. In Asia-Pacific, the locomotive business in India remains an important growth driver. Service sales reached EUR 2.3 billion with a 6% organic growth, supported by strong performance in Italy, the U.K., Australia, and airport people movers in the U.S. Sales in signaling came in at EUR 1.3 billion with 17% organic growth, driven by robust execution in France, Italy, and Germany.
Reported growth in signaling was more modest at 4%, mainly due to the consolidation of the North American conventional signaling business as of September last year. Finally, systems sales totaled EUR 0.8 billion, representing 10% organic growth. Second quarter performance was impacted by the ramp-down of the Mexico Tren Maya contract, which was not fully offset by ramp-ups in the Philippines, Taiwan, and Brazil. The trend seen in Q2 will continue into the second half. Looking now at inorganic items, forex and exchange was a 3.3-point headwind driven by euro appreciation against most currencies, and scope had a - 1.2 impact due to the deconsolidation of the U.S. signaling business that I mentioned above. Scope will be neutral in H2. As a result, sales grew 3.2% on a reported basis.
Looking now at the P&L on slide 17, gross margin reached EUR 1.2 billion, representing 13.6% of sales, a slight decrease compared to the prior fiscal year. In absence of a scope and FX impact, the gross margin percentage would have remained stable. The improvement in project execution and industrial efficiencies was offset by regional mixed headwind, with, for instance, Asia-Pacific being broadly flat at current FX rates, while Germany grew solid double digits in the first half but at lower gross margin. Net R&D costs accounted for 2.7% of sales, notably due to cost discipline, project phasing, but also to the disposal of the North American signaling business, which was more R&D intensive. Selling and administrative costs have reduced, both in absolute terms and as a percentage of sales, now representing 5.7% of sales in the first half, demonstrating continued efforts on cost efficiency.
We also benefited from a solid EUR 100 million contribution from the joint ventures. These demonstrate both the resilience of the Chinese market and the dynamism of the broader Asia region, to which several of those JVs are exposed. Taken together, the adjusted EBIT increased by EUR 65 million, reaching EUR 580 million this semester. Turning to slide 18 and the analysis of adjusted EBIT margin development in the first half, the 50 bps improvement to 6.4% is the combination of 40 bps headwind and 90 bps performance. On the one hand, adjusted EBIT margin faced a couple of inorganic headwinds. Scope had a - 20 basis points impact, slightly less than the impact on gross margin, due again to the higher weight of R&D for the North American signaling business compared to the group average. FX had a - 20 basis points impact from a translation effect.
On the other hand, these headwinds were more than offset by progress on project execution and industrial efficiencies, contributing around 20 bps to margin improvement. Fixed costs, looking at R&D and G&A together, contributed to a 50 basis point increase. Other elements, including the increase in net interest in equity investors' pickup, contributed 20 basis points overall. Looking at net profit on slide 19, non-operating expenses have reduced further to EUR 37 million in the first half. Non-operating expenses mostly relate to the impact of the German transformation plan and some legal costs. As a reminder, integration costs were nil the first half of this year as Bombardier Integration program was concluded last year. Net financial expenses decreased to EUR 75 million from EUR 107 million as a consequence of the deleveraging plan that occurred in H1 last year.
Effective tax rate came back to a structural level of 28% compared to 37% in the same period last year. Finally, adjusted net profit increased by 51% to EUR 338 million for the half year, and net profit group share after PPA reached EUR 220 million, four times last year's net profit. Turning now to free cash flow on slide 20. Free cash flow came at a - EUR 740 million, consistent with expected seasonality. Let me highlight a few moving parts here. Adjusted EBITDA, including dividend payment from JVs, reached EUR 800 million versus EUR 708 million last year. CapEx and CapDev together amounted to EUR 225 million, or 2.5% of sales, with some favorable phasing impact of investments that will reverse out during the second half. Financial and tax cash out together amounted to EUR 152 million, coming in close to the P&L expense.
This results in a solid increase of funds from operation to EUR 411 million for the first half, up more than EUR 100 million compared to the same period last year, confirming the trajectory observed over the last three years. Finally, working capital was a EUR 1.2 billion headwind, slightly better than expected. Talking trade working capital on slide 21, trade working capital stood at 43 days of sales at the end of September, broadly stable compared to the first half of last year. The increase compared to March 25 represented a EUR 500 million headwind for cash generation in H1 this year. Inventories increased by EUR 315 million over the six months and stand at 87 days of sales, not very different in terms from September 2024.
This is largely explained by the anticipated acceleration in rolling stock production during the second half of the year, with higher value train sets to be manufactured this year. In comparison, days of payables progressed slightly less than days of inventories. Looking now at contract working capital on slide 22, it went from a favorable 89 days of sales to 79 days at the end of September and stands at - EUR 3.9 billion, so generating close to a EUR 600 million headwind during the half. Net contract assets and liabilities went from - 59 to - 48 days of sales, just below EUR 2.5 billion. The vast majority of the decrease in the net position was driven by rolling stock, with three dynamics. First, the increasing share of projects in a ramp-up phase compared to last year.
During this phase, when preserial cars are being built and homologation milestone is not reached, then rolling stock contracts pivot from a contract liability position to a contract asset position and therefore consume working cap. Second, the phasing of down payments this year is very different to last fiscal year. Less down payments in the first half, more to be expected in the second half. Third, a few large rolling stock contracts have only recently reached cash milestones, including, for example, Amtrak with the launch of commercial service in August and cash ins to be collected over the next quarters. We anticipate the three dynamics will remain valid through the rest of the year, but the timing of down payment will largely drive the improvement in contract working cap in the second half. Finally, provisions are decreasing as expected with the execution of the legacy backlog.
Net financial debt on slide 23, it increased to EUR 1.4 billion at the end of September, up from EUR 434 million at the end of March. In addition to free cash flow changes, leases and dividends from minorities combined with the EUR 44 million annual bond coupon paid for the hybrid bond amounted to a nearly EUR 150 million total cash outflow during the first half. The strong appreciation of the euro had a negative translation effect on cash balances held in non-euro denominated currencies of EUR 65 million. This translation adjustment is by definition non-cash, but does impact the net debt in euro terms. You will find in appendix of this presentation the updated bridge computation from EV to equity value reflecting these evolutions.
Finally, looking at cash and debt profile at the end of September on slide 24, cash balances stood at EUR 1.7 billion at the end of September compared to EUR 2.3 billion at the end of March. The amount of short-term debt entirely through commercial paper stood at EUR 400 million, while the balance was nil at the end of March, leading to a net cash position excluding long-term debt of EUR 1.3 billion. These moves are explained by free cash flow consumption as detailed in previous slides, the agreement with the rating agency to earmark a portion of cash to identify future debt repayments, and the need to keep a certain amount of cash to run the business. This concludes the financial review. Let me pass it on to Henri for final remarks.
Thank you, Bernard. Turning to the outlook with first taking stock of the assumptions that we laid out in May and that underpin the full year guidance. First, commercial momentum has been particularly strong, driven by robust underlying demand and Alstom competitive positioning in key markets. Second, car production remains stable in the first half, and we expect this trend to continue through the full year. Third, innovation remains a strategic priority for the group. However, given stronger than anticipated sales momentum, we now expect R&D to present around 3% of sales for the full year compared to slightly above 3% previously. Fourth, exposure to U.S. tariffs remains limited as most projects meet minimum U.S. sourcing requirements, and we have legal safeguards through change in law clauses. Year to date, the vast majority of tariffs paid have been agreed for reinvoicing with clients.
On that basis, and in light of our first half performance, we confirm the objective of a book to bill ratio above [1x], both at the group level and for Rolling Stock. We now expect organic sales growth to exceed 5% compared to 3%-5% previously. We confirm the adjusted EBIT margin guidance of around 7%, and we continue to expect free cash flow generation within the EUR 200 million-EUR 400 million range. Finally, as mentioned in the press release issued earlier tonight, medium term ambitions are unchanged, including the three-year free cash flow objective of EUR 1.5 billion. This concludes the presentation, and Bernard and I will now be happy to take your questions.
Thank you very much, sir. Ladies and gentlemen, as a reminder, if you wish to ask any questions, please press star one on your telephone keypad and just make sure that your line is not muted to allow us to reach your equipment. Our very first question this evening is coming from Akash Gupta, calling from JP Morgan. Please go ahead, sir.
Yes, hi, good evening, everyone. Thanks for your time. I got two, one for Henri and one for Bernard. The first one I have is on the pipeline of projects that you show in the presentation. So we see European pipeline reduced by EUR 12 billion in the past six months. And the question is, is this largely reflecting the awards that we have seen in the period, or is there something else that has moved as well?
Similarly, if I may also ask, what is driving the increase in pipeline in AM ECA region where you see EUR 9 billion increase in next three years award? That is the first one.
No, thank you, Akash. On the first, on the pipeline, first, let me reiterate that the market is extremely positive. As you know, we have still a long-term market growth, which is estimated around 3% by Unife. That is the kind of macroeconomic view. The pipeline which we look at, which is the sum of all the opportunities which we have in front of us, as you have seen, is still very positive. You are right, on Europe time goes, a lot of, as you have probably seen in the press and the media, a lot of orders which have been allocated towards them, but not only in the recent period.
Therefore, there is a slight decrease of the pipeline. On the growth, the second part was on which region you were asking for the growth?
It is AM ECA region where your pipeline has increased by EUR 9 billion.
We have, it is true in AMECA, particularly in the Middle East, a number of turnkey projects which are coming and which have been rejuvenated, if I may say. Riyadh, for example, line seven of Riyadh and so on. We have increasing turnkey jobs which are coming in the region.
Thank you. The question for Bernard is on, yeah, the question for Bernard is on cash flow. When you gave EUR 200 million-EUR 400 million free cash flow guidance in May, you had much lower visibility than what we have today. Now we have roughly six months gone, and the H1 outflow was much better than expected.
You have already announced a couple of large orders for Q3. My question is, how do you feel about the range? Could we say that upper half of the range may be more likely, or is it still too early to conclude that? Thank you.
Thank you, Akash, for that. Frankly, I will not refine the guidance that we have just reiterated of EUR 200 million-EUR 400 million. It is, by the way, quite a narrow range from my point of view. There is nothing really new. It is true that H1 was better than anticipated, but kind of phasing rather than anything else. All the good news that you have seen from a commercial momentum point of view were also in the initial guidance, so no change.
I hope that by the end of Q3, I will be in a position to refine this assumption, but let's keep the EUR 200 million-EUR 400 million range positive free cash flow as our assumption today.
Thank you very much, sir. We'll now move to Mr. Andre Kukhnin of UBS. Please go ahead, sir.
Yes, good evening. Thank you very much for taking my questions. Could I ask about the margin first? You've put in pretty solid H1 performance, and it looks like the revenue guidance increase is coming mainly from service and signaling, judging by the beat in Q2, and that R&D intensity is slightly lower. I was kind of thinking about the 7% now as a number that starts with seven and could be something around seven, but seven one, two as opposed to sort of high sixes.
Would that be the right way to think about the way the margin is progressing? And then I've got another one.
Okay, Andre, I will take this one. No, frankly, we keep the guidance absolutely intact. To tell you the truth, we have some headwinds coming from FX, and we mitigate this negative with the R&D new guidance, but for the rest, we keep it as we issued it in May. I think it's already good to mitigate the FX impact. Sales growth will have limited impact on our adjusted EBIT as well. Here again, I think it's good to keep the same line. I know that you guys are waiting for an upgrade. We have upgraded the sales growth, but when talking cash and adjusted EBIT, I mean, keeping the initial guidance was, I think, a good thing. Let's stick to what we said.
Got it. Thank you. I guess I had to try. Can I just ask a quick follow-up? In terms of, so you've told us the backlog margin has improved by another 20 basis points. Could you comment on where your order intake margin is trending at the moment?
Thank you for the question. I mean, it's a very important and I think very positive development in the first half. We had indeed a very nice gross margin in order intake in all our segments, in all our activities, because as you have seen, as compared to previous years where we had a good gross margin in order intake, but which was supported by the mix, which was, I would say, more favorable to signaling and service, here we have recorded a number of rolling stock orders.
I would say despite that, which kind of mechanical negative mix impact, we have recorded a very healthy gross margin in the order intake, which has enabled us to increase. It is always a slight increase because we are talking a very large order backlog. Of course, six months addition has only a relatively limited accretive impact, but still an accretive impact which reflects the good level of margin in order intake.
If I may, on this, we have also a negative, Andre, we have also a negative FX impact when we translate all those orders in Euro. Having a 20 bps improvement in this environment, including the 1.4x book-to-bill for rolling stock, I think it is a great performance.
Very helpful. Thank you.
Thank you, sir. Next question will be coming from, one second, please. I am just going to remove that one. One second, please. The question will be coming, sir, for that is from Gael de Bray of Deutsche Bank. Please go ahead, sir.
Hi, good evening, everybody. Thanks for the time. Can I ask you again, I'm curious about the free cash flow performance. I mean, what surprised you to the upside in H1 and is not expected to be repeated in H2?
Yes, this one is for me, Henri. Yeah, so it's really a question of phasing. Things that were expected to be in H1 will be pushed to H2. We have also some VAT phasing because some of the cash came later than expected, so we had no time to repay that to the treasury. It's limited, of course, but I mean, when we are talking tens of millions here, EUR 10 million there, it can play. Nothing really changed our view.
I remind you that, yes, we said up to, and in July, I said I had no visibility to improve that. There is absolutely no reason why the way we have described the year with seasonality will not happen like we described it. It is very much like, call it seasonality or cutoff, but as we planned initially, Gael.
Okay, thank you. The second question is on the gross margin development. You said it was about flat if we exclude FX and scope, but is only flat, not disappointing given the higher share of signaling and service revenues in the mix in H1?
I would not say disappointing. It is a combination of many things. Maybe something that was not flagged, we have kind of regional mix impact as we have a strong growth of some LRV programs in Germany, and we have some more flattish situation in APAC, for example. It explains why we have this kind of impact on the gross margin. I would not say disappointing. It was much expected, but I suspect that gross margin will come back to a larger growth in H2.
These regional mix impacts may reverse to a degree in the second half.
I would not say so. No, you will see some improvement coming from performance, from volume, from different things, but the increase of our production for programs in Germany will continue in H2.
Okay, I guess there is no way you could separate the volume and the mix impact, the 20 bps you mentioned?
No, no, it is difficult to refine it more than that.
Okay, anyway, I tried. Thanks very much.
Thank you, Gael. Bye.
Thank you very much, sir. Next question will be coming from Daniela Costa of Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead.
Hi, good afternoon. I have two as well. One is kind of a follow-up, actually, on the topic of Germany and on the topic of the pipeline that Henri commented on on the first question. Can you clarify that pipeline includes the potential opportunities going forward with German stimulus already, or shall we think about a top-up to that once it becomes concrete what those opportunities are and what sizes should we think about in there? And then I'll ask the second one.
Yeah, on Germany, it includes the orders which are today, I would say, under submission and which are part of our actual commercial plan, but it does not include a kind of theoretical view of the German market, which will be triggered by the investment plan of Germany. If it has not been translated into actual tender and project, it's not been included. The vast majority is not included of basically the EUR 10 billion which will flow one way or another on the German market for infrastructure.
Got it. Thank you. The second point relates to Siemens that they're investigating today, was talking about being less interested in pursuing metro and city opportunities, given those were not, I guess, as good on margin for them. Can you talk about sort of how you view the attractiveness of those types of orders for yourself?
Also, I guess, the market share you have and the opportunity that if Siemens pulls out more actively of that market, that could give for you?
Sorry, I did not get what was dropped by Siemens? Which kind of orders?
No, I think they were saying sort of that they were less interested in sort of actively pursuing the metro and the city part and more focused in other segments in rail and so forth.
Yeah, first, thank you. It is a good indication. Yes, it is not new from Siemens' time. I mean, they had always the difficulties in Metro. Their last orders were, for example, in London, where they suffered a lot. We have seen then, and it was not their priority, the metro business.
City, probably, as you've seen, they are still in S-Bahn, for example, in Germany, but they are not our main competitors in that area. As you know, we have different competitors depending on the market. If you are, of course, in India, you have local Indians. If you are in Europe, you are more people like CAF, Stadler is just entering into the metro market. It is not a surprise to us what you say. It will not dramatically change the picture. What was interesting is that, as you know, we are more and more in turnkeys in cities, so in both rolling stock and signaling. To some extent, Siemens may have some difficulties to sustain a signaling business in an urban signaling business if they totally withdraw from the metro one. It is probably more complex.
I would say not totally a surprise, not a radical shift, but a confirmation that the market is consolidating around a few players.
All right, thank you.
Thank you very much, ma'am. Next question will be from William Mackie of Kepler Cheuvreux.
Please go ahead, sir. Yeah, good evening, gentlemen. Thank you for taking the question. A couple, please. Firstly, on cash flow for the second half, I think if I heard you correctly, you said it remains highly dependent on the inflow of prepayments. Could you explain, first of all, how much visibility you have on that and how you also expect the contract assets and inventories to develop in your working capital calculations in the second half? I'll come back to the second question.
Hi, Will. I will take this one. Yes, definitely, we expect a strong inflow coming from new contracts with down payments expected in H2. I would say that we have good visibility. There is still some uncertainty about the amount and the timing of those, but we expect, as I said, a strong book-to-bill in H2. There is always uncertainty, and it could be a couple hundred million by definition, considering the size of certain of our contracts, as you have seen for Eurostar or PKP in Poland. I would not go beyond those comments in terms of visibility, but it is true that there is uncertainty here by definition. It was also the case last year, by the way.
Contract assets will continue to grow as we are in a ramp-up phase for a lot of projects with some homologation dates that will create some contract assets, namely in Germany or for some local markets. I do not expect contract assets to go down in H2. Regarding inventories, it will depend on the quality of execution in our second half. We have a strong ramp-up as well, so we are ordering parts. It is what you have seen in H1. It will continue because we have also a strong Q4, but we expect we will consume part of those inventories. As you have seen in H2 the last two years, we have consumed some part of our inventories. I expect that in terms of turns, it will come back to what we have seen in the past.
Thank you. A couple of questions to clean up some points on the P&L and how you're building the budget and thinking. I note you've achieved a very good contribution in the equity pickup in JVs, particularly from the Sifang JV. Just how are you thinking about the continuity of that in the second half? Should we expect a similar sort of performance the way that you've been speaking to your partners and the sense of how you expect that to develop? On the R&D, I wasn't sure how you were communicating whether the change in R&D guidance relates to higher sales or whether there's an absolute change in the expectation for spend or provision on R&D. If there's an absolute reduction, then what is it that's driving that against the backdrop of rising activity across the group?
Thank you for the question. Two things.
First, let me say that the joint ventures are doing extremely well on the Chinese market. Just one word on the Chinese market. We have seen contrasted trends on the Chinese market. The mainland market is going fast. The urban market is slower, and we are not in the past, I don't know if you remember, there were like 15 lines being opened per year. We are probably half this amount today. There are some extensions and so forth. It is more than it does not mean that the market has half, but it means that it has decreased. As you said, the AST, which is our very high-speed joint ventures, is benefiting from this growth on the high-speed market. Having said that, the phasing of the profitability of the joint venture is such that H2 will be not as good as H1.
But do not take it as a sign of any slowdown of the market. It is just a phasing of the profitability in the year. For your second question, no, it is just a question of relative terms. So, in absolute, R&D is as expected, but sales are higher, so we have slightly revised downwards the assumptions in terms of percentage of sales, but no change in terms of absolute number and investment.
Thank you very much. Helpful.
Thank you very much, sir. Ladies and gentlemen, as a reminder, if you have any questions or follow-up questions, please press star one. We will now go to Delphine Brault of ODDO BHF. Please go ahead.
Yes, thank you. Good evening. Thanks for taking my questions. Sorry, I have been disconnected, so I hope my questions have not been asked already. First, it relates to gross margin. Your gross margin in the backlog further improved to 18%. Do you plan this type of improvement, same kind of improvement by the end of the year?
Merci, Delphine. The name of the game is not to grow it up to, I do not know, 20%. At a certain point, the question is more on the execution of the backlog than growing it, growing it, growing it. We think that will continue to grow the gross margin in the backlog. Now, the magnitude of the growth in H2 might be a little too early to tell you because it will depend also on the mix. We have a large mix of rolling stock on the order intake. By definition, it has an impact on the growth of the gross margin. FX also. It is a bit too early to tell you, but I think that kind of 10-20 bps improvement is what we could see in the next half.
You have heard from us a confident outlook on the order intake. We have a good visibility of the commercial momentum and orders which are already won but not yet booked and which are containing healthy margins. This will support the growth. Indeed, some of the service orders are still being negotiated. It will depend as well on the mix between rolling stock and service during the second half. Yes, it will continue to increase. The gross margin in the order intake for the first half is much higher than the gross margin in the backlog. We still have some way to continue to improve the gross margin in the backlog.
Okay, thank you. My second question is, the European Commission recently called for more standardization in the railway sector, including rolling stock. I'm wondering if you believe that the European operators will follow this recommendation.
As you have seen, there are several recommendations, recent recommendations from the European Commission. We had also a long paper on very high-speed development in Europe and investment in Europe for interoperability. The answer for all these papers, basically, and also to your question, is twofold. On one hand, what says the Commission never occurs as planned. It takes always more time, and it's not, I would say, as dramatic as they would like it to be. At the same time, it pushes the needle in the right direction. Not only when they say they want standardization, it's not only the operators which are at stake. It's also all the national rules.
There is a huge program being made by the ERA, the European Railway Agency, sorry, which is trying to make all national rules progressively converging. This will help, and this is helping the standardization. Now, there are, I would say, some opposite directions because, of course, all the operators, they want to have their own trains. They want to have their optimized trains for 50 years and so forth. They want to have their own dedicated trains. At least the main standards and the main norms are progressively converging.
Thank you.
Thank you very much, ma'am. We'll now move to Martin Wilkie of Citi. Please go ahead, sir.
Thank you. Yeah, good evening. It's Martin at Citi. Just to come back to the question on revenue growth, and you touched upon it already, but just to clarify, the faster growth, I mean, normally, of course, you're delivering largely from the backlog and that's sort of defined by the customer schedule. What drove both the better growth in the quarter and the uplift from the year? Is it sort of alleviating bottlenecks, whether it's labor or supply, or what allowed you to drive the growth in revenue faster than previously expected? Thank you.
You're right. On a number of projects, it's being driven by customer ability to take the trains. On other projects, when we are delivering infrastructure projects in signaling, it's also our own speed, I would say. We have some flexibility in some places where, depending on our own speed, we can deliver more or less fast the backlog.
On that one, we made some progress. Also, we have some short-term orders, and we have put a lot of attention in the recent period on being much better into what we call gardening, i.e., to harvest very short-term orders. This has been particularly positive during the first half. This has led to also a positive move on the sales.
That's great. Thank you. If we could just have one other question on the pipeline. I mean, obviously, you've announced the Eurostar order quite recently. Obviously, there's a lot in the press about additional operators using the Channel Tunnel and not just in London and Paris, but elsewhere. Is that included in your pipeline, that that line could potentially be a lot larger for that particular platform of train?
We are very pleased because, as you have seen, we have been awarded the Eurostar order.
As you have probably seen, it's a very technical decision, but this has quite important consequences. There was a decision by the ORR, so the regulator in the U.K., on the access to Temple Mills, which is one of the maintenance depots in the U.K. This access has been provided to Virgin, and Virgin being our partner also for the Paris to London route with high-speed trains. They are not coming from the same platform, so it's not a double deck. It's a single deck platform, which we are developing in Italy. We have high-speed single deck in Italy and high-speed double deck in France. This has been, I would say, awarded to Virgin, which was competing against other operators coming with other trains from competitors. It is very good news. Yes, we have particular success of our very high-speed platforms.
They are in the pipeline. In the pipeline, you have also a number of operators wanting to go outside their domestic market. You have SBB wanting to go outside Switzerland. You got Trenitalia with some ambition as well in Germany, as well as in France. You have private operators trying to also establish new routes, whether it is Dutch in the Netherlands, Dutch operators, or another French operator. Yes, all that is included in the pipeline.
Great. Thank you very much.
Thank you very much, sir. We will now move to James Moore of Rothschild & Co. Please go ahead.
Yes, good evening, and thanks for the time. A number of my questions have been asked and answered, so maybe I could switch to Germany and German production.
It looks to me like your car production in units is relatively stable in the first half, and you're looking for German production to potentially double this year. Could you talk a little bit about German production? Is that something that's more loaded to the second half, and how's that developing?
Your analysis is correct. The German production is more loaded in the second half, definitely. There has been a start of increase at the end of the first half. If you look, I mean, it's not an excess to monthly numbers, obviously, but the second quarter was higher. We start to see the ramp-up, but it's true that the large ramp-up is during the second half. In Germany, we are, in general, at a stage where we are waiting for some homologation and certification.
We are a project which are what we call the ramp-up phase. It is after a start-up phase where we are just developing. We are ramp-up phase, so we are starting to produce. In parallel, we need to monitor very closely the speed and the timing of the homologation and certification so that we adjust our production schedule to the actual ability to deliver the trains to the customer once certified. We are in this delicate phase, but yes, it is H2 which we see the growth in production in Germany.
Thank you.
Thank you very much, sir. We have a follow-up question from William Mackie of Capital Chambreau. Please go ahead, sir.
Oh, thank you very much for the follow-up. I just wanted to dot the i's and cross the t's on a couple of points.
There's a note where you talk, I think, about customer advances being revised from EUR 320 million to EUR 511 million within the half-year period, but it's not well explained. Could you throw a bit of color on what that advance payment reassessment is within the period that you've put as a note to the accounts? That was the first. Secondly, with regard to the rating agencies, have you spoken to the rating agencies recently in this interim period, and could you share any feedback from your perspective of the input you may have received?
Yeah, I will take the last one, giving time to my colleagues to look for this note because I can't answer on the top of my mind on this advance payment scheme. On the rating agencies, by the way, we should say a rating agency because, as you know, we are only rated by Moody's.
Yes, we've discussed this print with Moody's, and I mean, they are—I mean, it's up to them to react to our print, but nothing new, nothing has changed as they've taken a 12- to 18-month view when they issued the last press release. They are totally aware of the seasonality of our Fricasso, if it's the question, and there is nothing new on that front. We'll come back to you on this note on the prepayment from customers because I don't see exactly what you refer to.
Okay, it's on note 15.2, but I'll try something else then just to answer a follow-up from Andre's question and a couple of points you've made earlier.
You've stated that the gross margins on recent order intake have been significantly better than the 18% in the backlog and that the change in the backlog is going to evolve slowly due to its scale. Can you give us a sense of what sort of differential there is between the average in the backlog and what you're typically booking now, having changed the nature of your sales acceptance and the landscape of the competitive environment, having shifted perhaps to a more consolidated and perhaps sensible or disciplined environment?
Yeah, good question. The scale is significant. Basically, this first half, we are again at a record high, again, despite the mix, and we are talking in the vicinity of four points.
Thank you very much.
On the question of advance payment, I guess it's just an option or something like that.
It's not really a down payment. It's maybe something like that, but we will refine the answer and come back to you. I've just read the note, and I will come back to you with more details on that.
Thank you very much. Good evening.
Thank you very much, sir. We'll now go to Louis Billon of Alpha Value. Please go ahead, sir.
Hi, good. Hello. Just my question on the order intake. Since orders were more weighted at the end of the quarter. Therefore, I guess down payments are not yet reflected in the cash position. Should we expect these amounts to impact future free cash flow and will it be significant?
The phenomenon that you are describing is, frankly, a non-significant impact, very small. We expect a larger amount of order intake during the second half than during the first half.
I mean, we said that it's booked to be above one, but as you have understood from our comments, we are quite optimistic on this part. We expect down payments to be higher during the second half on the back of larger orders in the second half. The phenomenon that you are describing is insignificant.
Okay. Maybe another question. What is the competition in America? Do you see less competition with the tariff in place? What is the competitive environment in North America?
The market, and I think I said it a little bit in the text, the market has consolidated around a few players. We have Siemens still being present. We have Kawasaki specialized on New York. Stadler has a few orders. I would say it's a classical competition. Traditionally, in the Americas, you had the Japanese player.
Kawasaki is there. You had Nippon Sharyo in the past, which is not very present anymore. What has changed recently is in Canada because as they have passed a kind of Buy Canadian Act for example, in the metro of Toronto, they are now discussing a kind of direct negotiation with us because we are the only ones to be able to provide local manufacturing capabilities. This has changed the competitive landscape, of course. In the U.S., I would say it's the usual suspects, plus from time to time some Japanese players that we don't see anywhere else.
Okay. I come back, Will, to the note 15.2 to say that it relates to two contracts with Deutsche Bahn in Germany that are included in a program of hybrid for faiting. It has increased our progress payments in the first half.
Okay, thank you.
It was not for you. [crosstalk].
Thank you, sir. As we have no further questions at this time, ladies and gentlemen, this will conclude today's conference. Thank you very much for your attendance. You may now disconnect. Have a good day and goodbye.