Good morning, everybody, and welcome to the presentation of the 2024 results. I am here today with Félicie Burelle. Bonjour, Félicie. And Stéphanie Laval, bonjour, bonjour, Stéphanie. And we will comment, for sure, on the business highlights of the first semester 2024. We will talk as well about the financials, and we will finish with the outlook and with the traditional Q&A session with all of you. But first of all, let me talk about the executive summary. That means the main topics of our first semester 2024. Basically, I want, first of all, to thank the OPmobility team because we are very satisfied with the solid result in the first semester 2024 in a market which does remain uncertain and volatile, but we continue to develop the company, we continue to transform the company, and we continue to outperform the market.
The main topics I wanted to highlight in the executive summary, first of all, solid earnings growth in the first semester 2024 compared to H1 2023, but also to H2 2023. That means all of financial KPIs are improving compared to last year, first semester and second semester. We are also outperforming the market by almost four points. The market is flattish, is slightly declining by 0.3%, but we have been able to grow in this flattish market. We have been able to grow thanks to the strong order book of the last years. The U.S. is becoming the biggest country in terms of group revenue for the first semester of 2024.
It is the result of our strategy to become less dependent on Europe and to invest more in the US and in Asia because we are convinced that it is in those countries that we will be able to grow more in the coming years. Therefore, the USA is becoming the biggest country of OPmobility in the first semester of 2024. And we do continue to have a very robust commercial momentum. You may remember that we had a record order intake last year. We are also in a very good pace on 2024 because we have an order intake in 2024 which is above the turnover. And that is the fact in all the business groups.
But I want to highlight especially what we are booking in hydrogen, and we will come back to that with Félicie later on, but also in the lighting business, confirming again our capacity to continue to grow in the middle and long term. If we talk about outperformance, we had in the Q1 an outperformance of 3.5 points. In the Q2 , 4 points. That means we are confirming the strong outperformance of 3.8 points. Our home market, Europe, is declining by about 4%. But again, thanks to the very strong order intake of the last years of OPmobility, we are posting a very solid outperformance in the first semester of 2024. If we have a look by region, because the situation by region, as you know, is pretty diversified, Europe is still declining in terms of number of vehicles produced by about 4%.
We are able to stabilize our turnover compared to last year. That means that we are posting 4-point outperformance in Europe. Europe accounts now for 50% of our revenues. That is 2 points less than last year in the first semester. North America is the fast-growing market for OPmobility. 10-point outperformance, 11-point of growth in North America. North America does represent now 30% of our revenues. That is 3 points more than last year at the same period. That is clearly the region where we will see the biggest growth of OPmobility in the coming years. As I was mentioning before, that the US is now the biggest market for us in terms of sales. China, we are underperforming the market in China. When we talk about China, we need to give you a bit more details about our situation in China by business group.
ICE Power and Modules are declining in sales, which is due to the electrification and to the customer mix. While YFPO, our joint venture for exterior system, which is the number one on the Chinese market for exterior system with more than 20% of market share, is able to stabilize the sales but to underperform the market. The good news is that we have been able to have a solid order intake in the first semester in China for YFPO, especially with newcomers, 50% of this order intake being with pure Chinese OEMs and a decent portion of that with customers like BYD, NIO, and also Huawei. BYD was not addressable for us in the past because they are producing their exterior parts, but now moving to plastic tailgate, which is offering us a lot of opportunities. The rest of Asia is outperforming the market, 12 points.
It is mainly driven by India and by Korea. That is clearly for us also a region where we are going to grow. You may remember that we are adding capacity in India for the business groups, E-Power and Exterior, and India will be clearly also a growth engine for the group in the coming years. I hand over now to Félicie to talk about some business highlights, starting with Exterior.
Thank you, Laurent. So, as you know, now we are reporting by activity segment. So I'm going to give you an update on all three segments, the first one being the exterior system one, so composed of exterior, activity, and lighting. So this segment has posted a good performance in H1 in terms of sales versus last year, plus 1.5%, but with obviously two very different trends among these segments. The first one, exterior, which has had a solid, very strong activity in H1. As a matter of fact, for just the first semester, exterior has recorded 27 launches, which is to compare to last year of 10 launches. So very solid activity, a bit all around the world, but you have here a few examples. As you know, Spain is an important country for us, and the ramp-up of many of the commercial vehicles there has supported this growth.
But also in Mexico, with the launch of the Honda Prologue with front and rear bumper. But that's not exhaustive. Obviously, you also have the Škoda Kodiaq in Poland or the C3 in Slovakia. And we talk a lot about our strong activity in North America. Here again, exterior was supported by the ramp-up of the Cadillac LYRIQ in the U.S. Coming to the lighting activity, as we told you in the past, we are suffering in 2024 of a decrease in sales that unfortunately is due to the lower order intake during the acquisition process, as people were not focusing so much on taking those accounts, those new orders. So obviously, the team is now focusing on absorbing these lower sales, but at the same time, also for the second year in a row, having a strong commercial push.
Last year, we said we had an order intake of EUR 1.6 billion. Again, this year, we will secure an order intake that is higher of our sales, so really focusing on growing the business over time. You have here again an example of some awards that demonstrate that we have gained back the trust of our customers. You have one new EV player in Mexico for headlamps and body shell, and also Stellantis with Peugeot 2008 that again has put a new order with us for headlamps and body shell in Morocco. Coming to the module segment, as we told you last time we met, we were experiencing some operating concerns in the activity, and we put a plan in place back at the end of the second semester of last year to really focus on improving the operations.
That was also helped by a better geographical and customer mix. We talked a lot about our new plant in Austin for an EV player. Obviously, this ramp-up has been flawless and also is continuing on posting a good performance and supporting this growth and the better geographical mix. We also have had some other successful launches around the world. You have here an example of the Škoda Scala and the Mercedes-Benz platform in China, so really securing the strong increase in sales overall of the module activity. Obviously, modules is contributing a lot to the sales performance of the group, but it was really important for us, for all of the team, and thanks for all the job that they have done in being more selective in our order intake to really focus in developing a contributive impact in terms of profitability over time.
Coming to the powertrain segment, so again, the powertrain segment, as you know, we are covering the full spectrum of the powertrain mix with the ICE Power activity, fuel tank and SCR system, E-Power with 48-volt battery pack, and also H2 Power, our hydrogen activity. Different business model, different maturity. We are really happy to tell you that we are moving forward with our last-man-standing strategy. The ICE Power activity keeps on gaining momentum and securing the increase in market share, which is very important for us in implementing the strategy overall. Again, successful launches throughout the world. You have here some highlights of those launches. And we were really also happy to secure the first award of SCR depollution system in South America for Toyota. H2 Power, last time we met here, I mentioned a new order for storage system for a German OEM SUV in North America.
We have kept the momentum again on this strong order intake, but also addressing this time new mobility. Laurent will come afterwards giving more details on the railway mobility updates that we have had over the last months. We keep on putting in place this capacity. You have here two of the plants that will launch fully in 2025, but that will start pre-series at the end of this year, so one in South Korea and one in La Rochelle. I will now let Laurent give you more update on the H2 activity.
Thank you, Félicie. If we talk about H2, you know that for us, H2 is for sure a strong strategic decision we have been taking some years ago. We are convinced that H2 is going to play a major role in the decarbonation of the mobility, starting with the EV mobility. And for us, it's also an opportunity to develop the H2 portfolio to open OPmobility to all kinds of mobilities, meaning not only the passenger car market, but also to be part of the EV mobility segment, which is promising for us. And therefore, the railway segment is very important for us. You may remember that some years ago, we have been working with Alstom to start to support them to develop hydrogen trains. We are continuing our way with Alstom.
In the first semester, we have been very successful also in the railway segment, first of all, by signing a partnership with the Chinese giant CRRC. CRRC is the biggest train producer in the world. It's based in China. We are working now with CRRC, with our joint venture, Pureride. That is the joint venture we have with the Shenergy Group in Shanghai to develop hydrogen for EV mobility in China. Now one of our customers, one of our partners, because it's not only about having a customer, but a partner, is CRRC. The first contract we have been working on with CRRC is not for the train. That is for a tramway, a new kind of mobility, because this tramway will be fully autonomous without rail. It will be used, first of all, in Malaysia and will be developing probably in other countries.
Therefore, a very strong momentum as well in Asia and China for the railway segment. And more recently, last week, we announced that in Europe, we have now Stadler as a strong partner of us. Stadler is a Swiss company, one of the major train producers in Europe. And for Stadler, we are going not only to provide the storage system, but the complete powertrain of hydrogen, meaning the fuel cell stack with our joint venture, EKPO, the fuel cell system and the storage system, again, to support Stadler in the decarbonation of the mobility of the EV mobility in Europe. Therefore, hydrogen, again, strong momentum and the opportunity for us to diversify our customer portfolio and our segment we're addressing. Now, regarding sustainability, you know that it is a very important topic for us. That is really at the core of everything we do.
We have a program, which is ACT4ALL, which is based on three pillars, starting with caring for people, but also responsible entrepreneurship, and also sustainable business. I will talk about carbon neutrality, which you can see on this slide in a couple of seconds. I wanted also to highlight the successes we had in the first semester when we talk about caring for people. First of all, regarding accident rate, we have been able to decrease by 40% our accident rate compared to last year, being now at 0.6 in FR2, and we were at 1.1 last year in the same period. We have more than 80% of our sites being at zero accident. Again, it is a strong push for the company.
We are also involving the new acquisition, which are for sure part of the game and which are improving very strongly compared to last year. Also, a very important topic for us is our engagement for young people, for apprentices and trainees. We have close to 1,300 young people in our headcount at OPmobility. That is what we were targeting. The good point is that 40% of these young people are women. That is also a very good opportunity for us, first of all, to prepare the future, to engage the young generation, but also to become more diversified in terms of gender diversity in our headcount. The result of that is that we have been able to improve by 1 point our ratio of women in our headcount at OPmobility.
That is still far away from what we want to achieve, but that is, again, a strong improvement compared to last year. If we talk about Carbon neutrality, you know that we have a very strong commitment in terms of Carbon neutrality, not only for 2050 to be carbon neutral, but to be already in 2025 carbon neutral for the Scope 1 and Scope 2. We are on track. We are doing what we said we will do, first of all, by reducing our energy consumption, which does mean by increasing our efficiency. And compared to 2019, where we did commit to this Carbon neutrality roadmap, we have been able to improve the efficiency of our production by 20%. If we compare the numbers of the first semester 2024 compared to 2019, that means that is the quantity of energy we are needing to produce a certain quantity of part, basically.
That is the efficiency, which is good for the planet and good as well for the financial performance of the company. We are developing on-site PPA and VPPA for sure to be as green as possible already by next year. At the end of the year, we'll have more than 30 sites being equipped either with a solar panel or wind turbine. We are working with partners in Europe, in Asia, but also in North America for PPA and virtual PPA. And we believe we'll be able to cover more than 60% of our needs by 2026. For the rest, for sure, we are working on green electricity certificates in order, again, to be carbon neutral in 2025 in our Scope 1 and 2. And we can confirm this commitment also today. We believe it's a factor of performance for the company. It's going to be recognized by the customer.
We can differentiate with that. That is our responsibility, our duty as well, to be a role model in the carbon neutrality roadmap. I hand over now to Stéphanie, and Stéphanie will talk about our good financial results in the first semester.
Thank you, Laurent, and good morning, everyone. Let's start with an overview of our key financial metrics. You can see all the charts there that we can compare our H1 performance in revenue, operating margin, free cash flow, and net result that is above H1 2022, H1 2023, and even H2 2023. If we just come back on the revenue side, we have a revenue of EUR 5.9 billion on an economic revenue, which is plus 2.1% compared to last year. It's even plus 37% if we compare the revenue to H1 2022. Moving on, operating margin. Operating margin for the group in H1 is EUR 234 million, which is plus 12% compared to H1 last year. On the net result side, we stand at EUR 100 million, which is a good performance, so stable compared to last year, which is a good performance in a context where interest rates are up.
Free cash flow, we stand at EUR 157 million in H1 2023, which is +15% compared to H1 2023 if we exclude the asset disposals, which remain a very good and solid performance for the group. Now, if we just go on the revenue side, the revenue, the consolidated revenue is up +2.3%. If we exclude some FX effects of EUR 52 million, which are more related to the Chinese renminbi and the Argentine pesos, the revenue is up +3.3% on a like-for-like basis. If we look per segments now, coming on the exterior systems, the rise is +1.2% on a like-for-like basis, with two different evolutions regarding the two business groups, exterior on one side and lighting on the other side.
We posted a solid performance in exteriors in H1 2023, driven by many launches, as explained before by Félicie, and also the ramp-up of volumes for some vehicles that were launched in North America end of last year. In the lighting business group, we posted a drop in the revenue, but fully in line with what was expected by the group. It is linked with the order book that was previously booked by the previous owner. What makes us confident is that the actual and current order book is fully in line to have a growth of the revenue in lighting starting 2026. Moving to modules. Modules posted the highest growth of the semester, with +8.4% on a like-for-like basis. It is mainly driven by two things. The first one is, of course, the ramp-up in the volumes in the Austin plants.
Second, modules also benefited from volumes in the two new plants in Europe, in Czech Republic and Slovakia. Moving to powertrain, powertrain posted a growth of +1.7% on a like-for-like basis. It includes two things. On one side, E-Power, which has an activity that remains solid, so making us very confident for the future. And on the other side, H2 Power, that is still on track with our strategic plan. Now we are talking about the operating margin, which is really good performance for the group in H1 2024. The operating margin stands at EUR 234 million, which is +12% compared to last year. I remind you that the revenue at the same period is only +3.3%. So it gives you the good performance of the operating margin for the group in H1 2024. We increased our operating margin rate by 0.3 points.
We were coming from 4%, and we stand at 4.3% now, which is also increasing. The historical business group, exteriors, modules, and ICE Power contribute to the increase of this operating margin. H2 Power and E-Power activities, they just follow the strategic plan, which is fully on track with what we were expected. Moving to the net result, the group posted a stable net result at EUR 100 million, so stable compared to last year. The plus EUR 24 million that we had on the operating margin side fully covers the rise in the financial results, which is plus EUR 14 million, but also the rise in the non-recurring items of plus EUR 11 million. The non-recurring items include mainly FX impact plus reorganization costs, mainly linked to lighting and ICE Power. What has to be noticed is that the financial results represent 1.2% of the total revenue.
Income tax in H1 2024 represents 0.8% of our total revenue, which is stable compared to last year. Moving to the free cash flow, the group generated solid free cash flow for H1 2024 at EUR 157 million. Excluding the asset disposal of last year, it is a plus EUR 20 million of free cash flow generated in H1 2024 compared to H1 2023. It represents almost 3% of our total revenue. On the CapEx side, the group monitored well its CapEx, adapting to the situation of the market, and it represents 4.8% of total revenue, which is fully in line with our capital allocation framework of less than 5% of total revenue. The working cap is at EUR 42 million, which is perfectly in line with last year at EUR 46 million. Last but not least, regarding our debt, the group continued to reduce its net debt.
The net debt stands at EUR 1.5 billion at the end of June 2024. It is EUR 49 million down compared to end of 2023. At the same time, the leverage ratio is at 1.6 times EBITDA compared to 1.7 times EBITDA end of 2023 and compared to 1.9 times EBITDA end of 2022. The group is fully on track to reduce its net debt. The level of liquidity remains solid at EUR 2.3 billion, which is comparable to the level at the end of 2023. The group in H1 2024 has proceeded to a reimbursement of a bond in June, has also issued a new bond in March 2024, and also has been assigned a BBB+ rating by S&P with stable outlook. We remain confident with the solid and sound financial situation. I'll now turn to Laurent to conclude the presentation.
Thank you very much, Stéphanie. It's now time to conclude. First of all, to talk about the outlook for the full year. You can see here the latest estimate of S&P compared to last year. You may have noticed that S&P did decline its forecast for the full year by almost 1 million vehicles being produced in 2024. It was done by last week. The new expectation, the new forecast for S&P is about 86, 85.8 million exactly cars being produced worldwide this year, which would mean -2.5% compared to last year.
Based on the very solid numbers we have been able to post for the first semester, and Stéphanie was just commenting, we confirm, even if the context remains very volatile and even if the market is declining this year, we can confirm today that we will continue to outperform the automotive production in 2024 and that we have the target to improve all of our financial aggregates compared to 2023. That is what we have been able to do in the first semester, meaning the operating margin, the net result group share, the free cash flow, and also to reduce the debt.
Based on these very solid results of the first semester 2024, based also on the confidence, on the trust we have in our team to continue to deliver, the board has decided to pay an interim dividend of EUR 0.24 per share, which means a payout ratio similar to last year of 34.5%. As a conclusion, without repeating what we said, I want to highlight again that we are very proud of the job being done by the OPmobility team. We are improving all of our financial KPIs compared to last year, again in a market which is very challenging, very volatile. We are always able to adapt to show that we are extremely agile and that we have a team being very engaged. We are outperforming the market.
We are much better balanced in terms of geographies compared to where we were some years ago, U.S. being now the biggest market and the growth being pushed by North America. We can confirm commercial successes in all of our business groups, but also the new ones or in the ones bringing growth for the middle and long term, like lighting and hydrogen. And therefore, we are very satisfied to be able to confirm our 2024 targets and commitment. Many thanks for your attention, and now I hand over to you for the traditional Q&A session.
Sure, thank you. If you would like to ask a question, please signal by pressing star one on your telephone keypad. We will take the first question from line Thomas Besson from Kepler Cheuvreux. The line is open now. Please go ahead.
Thank you very much for taking my questions and congratulations on these numbers. I have three questions, please. First, last year, your second half was weaker in terms of profitability despite higher volumes. Is it something we should expect again this year, or was it just an anomaly last year? Maybe I'll let you answer, and I'll ask the other questions later.
You want to ask your three questions, Thomas, or you are afraid that I forget? No, I was ready to notice the questions, therefore.
One by one, I think it's easier, Laurent. Thanks.
Yeah, yeah. Okay. It's easier for us as well. Many thanks. No, last year, our sales were lower in H2 compared to H1. You know that traditionally, the market in Europe and the market in North America is lower in terms of volumes in H2 compared to H1 just because of the summer vacation. And as 80% of our sales are in Europe or North America, traditionally as well, the S2 is slightly lower than the S1. And that is what we could expect this year. We don't have precise numbers right now because everything remains volatile, but 80% of our sales have been done in markets which are traditionally having lower production in second semester than in the first semester. That is also the expectation of S&P this year, meaning that S2 and in North America, sorry, and in Europe should be a bit lower than S1.
Therefore, we are convinced that we are pretty confident to be able to post a growth compared to last year in S2, but the sales could be slightly lower than in S1.
Understood. Thank you very much. Second topic, please. I'm slightly surprised by the development of your margins looking at your new divisions. So I wanted to ask a little bit more granularity on that, if that's possible. I mean, exterior managed to see a substantial improvement, which I think is probably driven mostly by your bumper and exterior business. But I'd like to understand whether there has been an improvement in lighting losses in H1 despite what we understand was a drop in revenues, or whether that exterior systems improvement was just driven by bumper and tailgates.
Yeah, you have noticed, Thomas, that our exterior segment is improving its margin. As Stéphanie mentioned, that is driven by the traditional business, bumpers and tailgates business, which is growing, a business which is always improving its operational performance. Therefore, that is driven by the traditional business, the margin improvement. Lighting is working on compensating the drop in sales. We announced that we will have a drop in sales by about 25% this year in lighting due to the weak order book before the acquisition. That is the case. We had about 25% less sales in S1 compared to last year in lighting. And lighting was able to compensate this loss in sales by working on operational performance, but also on structure cost. But the margin improvement from exterior is coming from the traditional business.
Yes. Can you similarly comment, please, on the level of losses in hydrogen and E-Power? I mean, you said it's in line with your business plan, but can you help us understand on the bridge the impact of these losses? Are they higher, similar, or lower than last year?
I mean, first of all, we don't consider H2 and E-Power as being losses. These are investments to prepare the growth of the future of the company. But for sure, the results are negative for the time being because we are investing with, for sure, still a weak top line. The level of investment, the level of operating margin is slightly lower than last year for H2 and for E-Power because we are building factories, because we are starting to deliver products, but still with a weak turnover. Therefore, C-Power is improving its margin. The investments are a bit higher for H2 and E-Power in terms of negative operating margin. And that gives the mix you can see on the report by segment.
Clear. Last question. I know China is not a major part of your business compared with other companies when we look at the consolidated part of your business, but could you still give us some indications on the evolution of the share of your business with Chinese automakers, both in terms of revenues within consolidated OPmobility and in terms of orders? And you mentioned specifically BYD opening up, notably on tailgates, and you said it's an opportunity. Did it already translate into orders, or it's something you're chasing in the second half or in 2025? Thank you.
Yeah, thank you. If you allow me, Thomas, I will talk especially about the exterior business in China, not about C-Power, not about hydrogen for the time being, because that is our biggest part of the business. In total, we have 40 factories in China. Therefore, it's a very important market, but we do not consolidate the exterior business because we are owning 49.95% of the shares of the joint venture, and the joint venture is having more than 20% of the Chinese market. Traditionally, this joint venture is very strong with other customers being married with a SAIC, like SAIC Volkswagen, SAIC GM, with other SAIC brands, but also with the German premium OEMs. These customers are losing market share in China since some years with the electrification.
Our target, for sure, is to keep those customers because we believe that some of them will be able to recover slightly in the coming years with new models, but also to work for the winners in China. You have been mentioning the purely new Chinese BEV automakers like BYDs, which are not very strong in our portfolio today. In the first semester of 2024, the Chinese OEMs, they do represent more than 40%, 45%, I think, of our turnover for YFPO. And in order intake, it's about 50%. That means the momentum is here. And when we talk about BYD, you know that BYD is producing internally its bumper. Therefore, it's not addressable for us. It's not that the competitor did get the market share. It's just not addressable for us.
But BYD has decided to work with us for plastic tailgate, and we have been able to book some orders with them, which is promising for the coming years. No impact on the sales this year, but impact on the sales in the coming years. Not only BYD, also Huawei. Huawei is engaged in the mobility as well, and it's now a customer of us, not in production, but in the order book. Therefore, we are going to maintain our strong position with our traditional OEMs, and we are able right now to develop the winners in China for the coming years.
Great. Thank you very much.
Thank you. As a reminder, if you would like to ask a question, please signal by pressing star one on your telephone keypad. We will take the next question from line Akshat Kacker from JPMorgan. The line is open now. Please go ahead.
Thank you. Good morning, team. Congratulations on a very strong start to the year. The first question is on recovery from OEMs. I know over the last few semesters, we have stopped talking about inflation recoveries, but I wanted to get back to the discussion around volume shortfalls. We all know that we warned in the second half or in October last year around a few volume shortfalls specifically related to BEV programs in Europe. Could you just tell us if the first half result has been helped by a few recoveries from OEMs based on those volume shortfalls, or if you expect recoveries in 2024 as a full year? That's the first question. The second question is kind of a follow-up on lighting. Could you just give us an update on your targets for 2024 and 2025, please?
We all know that the backdrop for Europe and battery-electric vehicles in the near term has worsened. So do you stand by your targets in terms of a similar negative operating profit in 2024 and getting close to break-even in 2025 on lighting, please? And the last question is on hydrogen. You mentioned you are gradually ramping up volumes. Could you just give us rough revenue expectations for the second half of this year or what your target is for 2025, please? Thank you.
Okay. I mean, first of all, thank you, Akshat, for the congratulations. Regarding the BEV segment, if we have a look on what we know with our customers, and you know that we are engaged with most of the customers for the BEV, and if we have a look on the traditional OEMs, that means the ones which are now developing BEV on top of ICE, not the newcomers, in average, we do see that the volumes are 45% below their expectation, 45% below their expectation, which was already the case last year. And we are convinced it will remain the case this year and probably next year as well.
Therefore, for us, it means to be more agile, to be more flexible, to be more cautious when we are investing, when we are cutting for the new programs we are cutting right now, or for the new ones we are launching. And for sure, to try to find a way with our customers, commercial way, I would like to say, to compensate the over-investment we may have or the structure we have in our factories, which is not being fully used. That is what we are doing. We have some commercial successes we had in the first semester, but for sure, it's not finished.
Again, we do see that in, I would say, in two different steps to try to fix the current ones where the volume are not here, mainly with commercial negotiation, and to anticipate for the coming years and to be more cautious on volumes and to be more agile in the way we are investing. But these are the ongoing discussions with our customers, and I don't want to disclose too many information on that. We have been partially successful in S1, and we will continue to entertain the discussion with them in S2 as well to find a fair way to share the pain. Regarding the lighting, we announced last year that lighting will suffer in 2024, 2025 from weak sales based again on the weak order book before the acquisition. That is the case in 2024 with a 25% less sales compared to last year.
We still target for 2024 to have a similar negative operating margin compared to last year, even if we have a drop in sales, which means for the team in lighting to continue to work on operational excellence, but also to work on downsizing the structure cost, either in the factories or in the SG&A, and that is what they are doing. 2025 won't see any increase in terms of sales. It will be still pretty low in terms of sales in 2025. Target for us will be to be as close as possible from the break-even. Then we will start to see growth in 2026, and the growth will be confirmed in 2027, again, due to the fact that we have been able to book EUR 1.6 billion of orders last year and that we have still a very dynamic commercial momentum with our customer right now.
Regarding H2, we are starting the production. We are producing today in Belgium for storage system. We are starting the production pretty soon in Korea for Hyundai as well in storage system. We will start in France at the end of the year. Stellantis is launching its product with SOP in December. That means we will post our sales in December. They have some delays, but we are ready, basically. And we're also producing in the U.S. I think this year, H2 will be around EUR 40-50 million of sales, and it will be higher next year, but it will depend on our customer again and on the ramp-up. But that is, I would say, on track. We do see for H2 that there are some delays in start of production from our customers, like we are experiencing in electrification as well.
Therefore, we are investing also with some delays as well. That means we are adapting our investment pace, I would like to say, to the development of the H2 business with our customers. But again, we have more than EUR 4 billion order intake in H2 in all the continents with many very solid customers, mainly in heavy mobility. We are convinced that H2 will be one of the best solutions to decarbonize the heavy mobility.
Very clear. Thank you, Laurent.
Thank you, Akshat.
Thank you. As a reminder, if you would like to ask a question, please signal by pressing star one on your telephone keypad. We will take the next question from line Michael Foundoukidis from ODDO BHF. The line is open now. Please go ahead.
Yes. Hi, Michael Foundoukidis from ODDO BHF. Just one follow-up on the.
We cannot hear you. Sorry.
Is it better now?
Can you try again? Otherwise, we can answer, but I'm not sure it will be the right question.
Yes. Do you hear me now?
Yes.
Okay. Hi. So first, congrats for these results for H1. And then just to follow up on the lighting business. I mean, on the EBIT margin, I mean, you said as a percentage, but just wanted to clarify on an absolute basis. I mean, how should we compare the losses of 2023 versus 2024? Should it be lower as a result of the lower sales or not necessarily? Absolute basis. I mean, millions of euros I'm talking about. That's the first question.
I mean, as I said, Michael, first of all, thank you for the congratulations. We are having 25% lower sales this year in lighting compared to last year, and we are targeting similar losses in absolute value compared to last year.
Okay. So just clarify. So you are talking about absolute. And then maybe coming back to your orders on the lighting business, I mean, are we still targeting? I mean, should we still target above mid-single-digit margins? I mean, not necessarily starting 2026, but I would say for these new orders or given the tougher environment, I mean, we have seen ELA results this morning. I mean, margins on lighting are much below that. So I mean, how should we see that over the mid to long term, let's say?
I mean, first of all, when we talk about lighting for us, lighting has not only as purpose to have lighting in our portfolio, but it's also lighting to be able to offer to our customers what nobody can offer, meaning the integration of lighting in exterior parts. That is what making us unique. We will give you a bit more information in the coming months on that, but we do see more and more momentum with our customers about what we call the integrated offer. That means what you can see on the screen, basically, the capacity to have a better integration from lighting in exterior parts, which is clearly the trend of most of the OEMs and where we can differentiate because if you talk about HELA, you were mentioning HELA, they don't have the possibility to do that like our main competitors.
Therefore, for us, lighting has to be really considered not only as a lighting business, but as lighting combined with our leadership position in exterior business. That is a topic which is very important to mention because that is also the way we are developing lighting in terms of strategy. That means the investment we are doing right now in terms of R&D are focused on making sure that we will be able to develop this unique offer. That means the integrated offer in front or in rear, meaning to integrate, again, the lighting within the bumper business because that is the way we can differentiate. Normally, when you can differentiate, you can aim for better margin.
If we do analyze the order book of the lighting business right now, that means the EUR 1.6 billion Félicie was mentioning before from last year, plus the various, I would say, solid first half of the year, we are confident to achieve in lighting middle-term similar margin than what we have in the exterior business. That means by definition, lighting should be at similar level. It won't be in 2026 because in 2026, we will see the growth of the lighting business, and we should post positive numbers in 2026. But I'm convinced that middle-term lighting will have a similar margin than the exterior business based on the order book we have and based on the improvements the team is doing.
Okay. Very clear. Thank you very much.
Thank you. We will take the next question from line Thomas Besson from Kepler Cheuvreux. The line is open now. Please go ahead.
Thank you very much. I just have a follow-up on hydrogen. You said revenues this year should be EUR 40-50 million, right? And rising in 2025. So we should be relatively far from the initial objective in terms of revenues for 2025, which, if I remember correctly, was EUR 300 million. Or do you think we are going to have a chance to get close to that? Or did I miss a revision of that target? That's the first topic. And second, I think one big order is responsible for a large proportion of the EUR 4 billion orders you've mentioned for hydrogen. Is this fully secure? Because I think it's something which is linked with North America, North America pickup trucks, and the political landscape in the U.S. might be changing for the worst in your case if effectively the polls are right.
What degree of confidence should we have on 2025, 2027, 2030 revenues in hydrogen with these two things in mind?
I mean, first of all, regarding 2025, I think we said last year that the EUR 300 million we were targeting for 2025 will be delayed just because of customer delay, not due to the order book of OPmobility because the order book is very solid, but we are experiencing some delays in start of production in France, in Korea, and so on. And therefore, the sales will be probably at EUR 150 million in 2025, but not EUR 300 million, which doesn't mean that our long-term expectations are changing. It's just a delay in the development of the pace of hydrogen. I would say we react to that. We invest a bit less. We put capacity in place later than expected.
Therefore, I think it's a normal phase of a transition in the market with new technology, and we know that it depends on many items like the BEV by definition, infrastructure, technology readiness, and so on and so on. Therefore, I would say no drama for us, just acknowledging us and adapting to that and investing in a more staged manner than what we were expecting for 2024, 2025, 2026. You refer to a big order in the U.S. If you know the result of the election of the U.S. in November, Thomas, please give me a call. We don't know it. We just know that the market is pretty volatile in Europe, in the U.S., in many regions of the world, and that the transition to hydrogen to be also depending on local policies.
Nevertheless, we also know that in the U.S., there is a big portion of the mobility, heavy mobility, which has no choice than going to hydrogen if they want to become decarbonized. They are investing. They are going in this direction. Our customer is confirming the start of production, is putting also in place some investment. Therefore, we are pretty, I would say we are pretty quiet with that. At the end of the day, if there are more combustion engines in the U.S., we will benefit from that as well, as we have more than 50% of the market for fuel tank system.
Understood. Yeah. My question was more probably linked with the level of incentives we should expect for hydrogen in the years to come and the need to have an infrastructure for these products to also eventually be successful in?
Yeah, yes, but if you take some states like Texas, Texas is investing a hell of money in hydrogen right now because they can produce hydrogen. I mean, they have solar energy, pretty cheap. They can use the surface they have to produce hydrogen to a very interesting price, more interesting than in Europe. Therefore, we are less concerned about the U.S. when we talk about hydrogen than what we could be concerned about Europe. Because again, in the U.S., with the surface they have, with the solar energy they can use, but also the wind energy they can use, by definition, they can produce a lot of hydrogen to very competitive prices. And that is what Texas is doing right now, for example. Therefore, no concern with that.
Understood. Perfect. And sorry, my bad. I had forgotten about the change in the wording for the 2025 target. Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you. It appears no further question at this time. I'll hand it back over to your host for closing remarks.
Good. Many thanks to all of you for the question and answer, for your attention. Many thanks again to the OPmobility team for this very first-half 2024 result. We keep in touch, and we come back after the summer vacation to continue our journey of transformation. Many thanks.