Good morning, this is the conference operator. Welcome, and thank you for joining the Publicis Groupe Half Year 2023 Results Presentation and Webcast. As a reminder, all participants are in listen-only mode. After the presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions by pressing star one at any time. Should anyone need assistance during the conference call, let me signal an operator by pressing star and zero on their telephone. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Arthur Sadoun, Chairman and CEO. Please go ahead, sir.
Thank you, Alicia. Bonjour, welcome to Publicis Groupe first half 2023 result call. I am Arthur Sadoun, I'm here in Paris with our CFO, Michel-Alain Proch. As usual, we will take your questions together after the presentation. Alessandra Girolami is also here and will be available to take all of your questions offline after this session. I will start this call with our H1 highlights. Michele will provide more details on our member. I will share with you what makes our model not only resilient to business cycle today, but also future-proof, particularly in AI. Before we start, please take the time to read the disclaimer, which is an important legal matter. Okay, let's dive into our presentation. There are 3 key highlights to take out from our H1 results. Our Q2 organic growth came above expectations at +7.1%.
Our operating margin is at a record high at 17.3%. We are now in position to upgrade our full year guidance on all KPIs, demonstrating again our resilience to business cycles. Let's get into the details of this performance. First, we continue to outperform the market on organic growth, thanks to Epsilon, Publicis Sapient, and the impact of our new business track record on Publicis Media. At +7.1% organic growth, Q2 came ahead of expectations after double-digit growth in 2022. On the macroeconomic context, that is still challenging, the strengths of our uniquely balanced revenue mix continue to perform. The growth of our data and tech activities, representing 1/3 of our revenue, came in strong. Epsilon posted +6.8% organic growth, following a high comparable base of +14% in Q2 last year.
Publicis Sapient was a very solid +5.5% for the quarter, despite very high comparable at +19% last year, clients slowing down their decision-making process in digital business transformation, as we anticipated in Q1. Creative saw a low single-digit organic growth for the quarter, with some expected localized cut on smaller projects in classic advertising, compensated by continued solid momentum in production. Media activities, which represent another third of our revenue, accelerated even further with double-digit organic growth, thanks to our new business track record in 2022. The strength of our differentiated offer was again visible across our regions. The U.S. posted a +5% organic growth on top of +10% last year, despite ongoing macroeconomic tensions. It included a very solid Publicis Sapient, continuous trends at Epsilon, an acceleration in media to double digits.
Creative was stable, as anticipated this quarter. In Europe, the performance has remained particularly strong at +15% organic in Q2, on top of double digit last year. The UK, with +17% organic growth, was led by Publicis Sapient and media again this quarter, while France accelerated to 5% and Germany stayed strong at +10%. Asia PAC improved to +3% organic growth in Q2. China delivered the very solid dynamic we anticipated, with an acceleration to +7% this quarter, on top of a positive performance last year. Second highlight, we continue to deliver the best financial KPIs in our industry for H1, thanks to our platform organization. Our operating margin came in at 17.3%, in line with our record level of 2022.
Our country model, shared services, and our global delivery centers allow us to deliver this performance, all while continuing to invest in our talent, maintain record high bonus pool, and absorb wage inflation. When it comes to free cash flow, it is worth mentioning that we absorbed the impact of the U.S. R&D tax payment related to 2022, and deliver EUR 725 million in H1 above 2022 record level. In line with our capital allocation, we invested in bolt-on acquisition to complement our capabilities in the last 12 months. We acquired Retargetly and Yieldify to further expand Epsilon data reach, Practia to strengthen Publicis Sapient global delivery center footprint in LATAM, and Corra for its Adobe expertise in the U.S.
We did this while completing our share repurchase program to cover LTIs and continuing to deleverage as anticipated, reaching an average net debt of circa EUR 500 million in H1. Thanks to our strong operational performance, combined with our improved interest income, headline EPS was up double-digit again at +11% to EUR 3.21, on top of +29% growth in H1 last year. Third highlights, thanks to our ability to win market share and the resilience of our model to business cycle, we are upgrading our guidance on all KPIs for the year. On organic growth, we now expect to deliver circa 5% for 2023, above our 3-year CAGR at +4%. There are two reasons why we are raising our full year 2023 expectations. First, of course, a better H1 than anticipated.
Despite persistent macroeconomic uncertainties that could lead to localized cuts in classic advertising and more delays in mid-sized business transformation projects, we are confident to deliver an unchanged expectation for H2 organic growth at a rock solid 3%. We are also confident to upgrade our guidance for financial ratios, thanks to the proven efficiencies of our platform organization. We are now anticipating to deliver an operating margin rate close to 18% and a free cash flow at least EUR 1.6 billion. Our upgrade in organic growth and operating margin also means an upgrade in EPS, despite the recent moves in the euro to dollar rate. This is it for our three highlights. I will now leave the floor to Michel-Alain.
I will come back to share with you what drive our confidence in having a model today that is ready for tomorrow.
Thank you, Arthur. Good morning to all of you, and glad to be with you today. I will begin with the evolution of the net revenue for the second quarter and first half of 2023. The group posted a net revenue of EUR 6.318 billion in H1, representing an organic growth of 7.1%, and this despite a high comparable base of 10.4% organic growth in H1 last year. Reported net revenue growth was 7.6% in the half year. Looking at the second quarter, net revenue was EUR 3.239 billion, up 5.4% on a reported basis.
This includes EUR 213 million contribution derived from a 7.1% organic growth, a net negative impact of Forex for EUR 73 million, half of it coming from the USD and the other half across all other currencies. Finally, a contribution of acquisition net of disposal of EUR 26 million. This includes the revenue of the acquisition we closed in 2022, such as Profitero, Yieldify, Retargetly, as well as our most recent acquisition of Practia and Corra for about EUR 29 million altogether. It was partly offset by some disposal, representing EUR 3 million. Let's move on to the next slide, which is giving you the dynamics of our Q2 organic and reported growth by region. North America posted a solid 4.9% organic growth after 10.3% last year.
As I mentioned, the impact of the Forex was obviously negative, bringing the region reported growth to 2.2%. Europe again recorded double-digit growth this quarter at 15.2% organically. This came on top of a very strong comparable of 10.1% in the prior year. Excluding Outdoor Media activities and the drugstore, Europe growth came in at 11.6%. Asia Pac posted a 2.6% organic growth, with China accelerating to 7%. Middle East and Africa and Latin America continue to perform well, with 6.5% and 5.9% organic growth, respectively, on double-digit growth last year. Let's begin with more detail on North America. The region posted 4.9% this quarter, with the U.S. at 5% and Canada at 2.2%.
In the U.S., the group's largest country, all activities continue to perform well. Media accelerated to double-digit growth on top of double-digit last year, fueled by strong underlying trends and new business won in the last 18 months, notably in the healthcare, food and beverage, and retail sectors. As anticipated, creative activities were stable due to localized cuts in classic advertising. Production remained solid, particularly in automotive and retail. Publicis Sapient grew 5.1% organically, as the demand for digital business transformation remained solid, in particular, in leisure and travel and in retail. This come in a context of slower decision-making process and after a high comparable basis of 17% last year. Epsilon grew 6.9% organically. All division posted a very solid performance in the quarter, and particularly digital media.
It is worth noting that both Publicis Sapient and Epsilon grew strongly compared to 2019 levels, at 38% and 31%, respectively, highlighting the structural demand for those capabilities. Let's turn to the performance in Europe on the next slide. As I mentioned earlier, Europe recorded 15% organic growth this quarter, or 11.6%, excluding outdoor media activities and the drugstore. In the U.K., organic growth came in at 17%. This performance continued to include a double-digit Publicis Sapient, like in the previous quarters, with significant contribution from financial services and retail clients. Also notable was a double-digit growth in media, supported by global clients and a solid creative. France, which represent 5% of our net revenue, posted a 5% growth, excluding outdoor media activities and the drugstore. This implied an acceleration this quarter compared to Q1.
The country saw double-digit growth in media, notably in the non-food consumer product sector, as well as at Publicis Sapient. Germany, which represents 3% of our net revenue, posted a 9.5% organic growth, with double-digit in media and a very solid Publicis Sapient, particularly in the manufacturing sector. Creative posted a positive growth over the quarter. Lastly, our operation in Central Eastern Europe accelerated to 17.1%, led by both creative and media, mostly thanks to global clients. The group posted double-digit growth in Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic, and resume its activities in Ukraine. On next slide, I will detail our performance in the rest of the world. In Asia PAC, which represent 9% of group net revenue in Q2, we posted 2.6%, above Q1 performance.
Importantly, China accelerated from 3.7% in Q1 to 7% in Q2, driven by new business wins in media, which grew double-digit. Thailand sequentially improved while remaining in negative territory due to the phasing of a large project in DBT. Singapore, Vietnam, and Japan posted double-digit growth. Australia and New Zealand were broadly flat. In Middle East and Africa, we posted 6.5% organic growth. It was largely driven by media activities. Publicis Sapient was stable due to some project delays coming from slower decision process. Latin America posted a 5.9% organic growth, largely driven by media. Mexico, Colombia, and Argentina were the main contributors. Reported growth was 15.1%, taking into account the recent acquisition of Practia in Argentina. For your reference, you'll find on the next slide the H1 regional performance by regional performance.
As you can see, Q1 and Q2 growth by region were actually quite similar. North America grew 5.3%, Europe, 13.8%, APAC, 1.7%, Middle East and Africa, 11.2%, and Latin America, 6.7%. On the next slide, you'll find the group performance by client industry for the first half. This is based on an analysis of our main clients, representing 91% of our net revenue, and it excludes Outdoor Media activities and the drugstore. In H1, all of our client industries, but TMT, posted positive growth. Automotive continued to perform well at 6% after 5% last year, fueled by growth at existing clients. Financial posted 2% in H1, despite a very high comparable basis of 14% in H1, 2022.
TMT is coming back to positive territory in Q2 2023, thanks to new business gains, improving from negative growth in Q1 2023. Food and beverage posted 20% growth in H1, thanks to the ramp-up of large existing contracts and new business in media. As anticipated, non-food consumer products posted 2% in H1 2023, with positive contribution in both quarters after a high 9% comparison base. Healthcare, retail, public sector, and leisure continued to perform very well at double-digit, like they did in Q1 2023. Moving now to our consolidated income statement. For the first half 2023, EBITDA was EUR 1,335 million, up by 3.7% versus last year.
Operating margin was at EUR 1,093 million, a margin rate of 17.3%, in line with the record level of last year. I will provide more details in the next slides. Headline group net income was EUR 813 million in H1. It's an increase of 11.8% versus last year. Headline net financial expenses strongly improve to EUR 6 million, reflecting a higher remuneration on cash position, while income taxes increased to EUR 272 million due to a higher profit before tax. Amortization of intangible were mostly stable, while real estate restructuring charges reached EUR 83 million, with a continuation of the group real estate footprint optimization. Capital gain and losses were not significant this semester, contrary to last year, when we accounted the disposal loss for the exit of our Russian operation.
Taking all this into account, the group net income was EUR 623 million in H1 2023, which is up 16% versus 2022. Let's now turn to the following slide, which present our simplified PNL down to the operating margin. As I already mentioned, our operating margin rate was stable compared to last year, at a record high 17.3%, with EUR 1.093 billion. I'll detail the different component on the next slide. Let's begin with the effects and perimeter effects, which were negligible. We kept personnel costs stable in percentage of revenue, thanks to a dynamic management of group resources, absorbing 2022 wage inflation.
In particular, this semester, as the Group grew by 7%, we managed to contain net hirings at circa 1,300, while strongly decreasing our freelancer cost. As per the plan I shared with you last February. This is reflected in the bridge by the 140 basis point shift between fixed personnel costs and freelancer. When it come to restructuring costs, the increase of 20 basis point reflects the localized adjustment that we have made on the Group organization to adapt it to the current environment. Let's turn to the operating leverage of the Group. Other operating expenses, including depreciation, contributed to a net improvement of 20 basis point. First, we have posted an increase of 40 basis point of other operating expenses, as anticipated, reflecting the increase in travel and client-facing meetings.
Second, depreciation improved by 60 basis point, driven by the continued benefit from our actions to reduce our real estate footprint over the last few years, as well as an increasing use of SaaS software that are directly expense. As a result of all this, our operating margin rate in H1 2023 amounted to 7.3% in line with H1 2022 level. Let's move to our headline net financial expenses on the next slide, which are improving by EUR 68 million. Beginning with the interest on net financial debt, which is a positive of EUR 42 million, improving by EUR 69 million compared to last year. This was largely due to higher remuneration on cash balances. This improvement was actually stronger than what I anticipated in February, reflecting the continued rise in central bank rates on both sides of the Atlantic in H1.
Interest on lease liabilities improved by EUR 6 million to reach EUR 39 million, reflecting the reduction of our real estate footprint. The other lines being non-significant, this result in EUR 6 million headline net financial expenses versus EUR 74 million last year. Income tax. Reported income taxes stood at EUR 205 million. The increase reflects the rise in profit before tax, as well as higher effective tax rate compared to H1 2022. To calculate the headline income taxes of EUR 272 million, we are adding the non-cash element of our PNL, i.e., the tax effect on amortization of intangibles, on impairment and real estate consolidation, as well as other non-cash items.
Effective tax rate was 24.8%, up by 140 basis points compared to H1 2022, reflecting the higher share of the U.S. in the profit before tax, which is carrying a 26.6% tax rate. Next slide, the headline earnings per share, fully diluted, is actually growing by 11% year-over-year and reach EUR 3.21. This is an increase of 62% versus 2019. This strong growth reflects not only the improvement in our operating margin, but also the reduction of net financial charges that I just described. Those two elements that made our H1 EPS growth will actually do the same on the full year.
Our guidance upgrade on organic growth and operating margin, combined with lower than anticipated financial charges, are two major positive for the full year headline EPS. They absorb the impact of the evolution of the dollar, which we consider at 1.12 for the remaining part of the year. As a consequence, we anticipate a full year headline EPS growth to be between mid and high single digit, which is an upgrade of 3%-4% compared to the current consensus of EUR 6.57. Finally, it's worth mentioning that the average number of shares on a diluted basis is stable versus December 2022, exactly as we committed. This materialized our decision to prevent shareholders from dilution by first suppressing the scrip dividend, as announced in February 2021. Since that, buying shares on the market to complement the managers' long-term incentive plans.
Moving to next slide, free cash flow. Our free cash flow before change in working capital reached EUR 725 million, up EUR 17 million compared to H1, 2022. Despite the EUR 110 million TCJA transitional tax payment related to 2022 and paid in January 2023. This improvement is mainly driven by the increase of EBITDA for EUR 48 million, reflecting the strong activity in the first half, as well as the higher interest received on cash balances, particularly in USD, for a total of EUR 80 million that I mentioned already. This is partly mitigated by a EUR 25 million increase in tax paid on top of the EUR 110 million TCJA tax related to 2022. Lease and CapEx were both reduced by EUR 15 million in total.
Lease, thanks to action on real estate footprint, CapEx, reflecting our increased usage of SaaS platforms, which are directly expense, as I have just described, as well as some phasing effect between H1 and H2. Excluding the 2022 related tax paid in 2023, free cash flow before change in working capital is EUR 835 million, a 18% improvement compared to H1, 2022. Next slide, use of cash. In H1, 2023, change in working capital represented an outflow of EUR 1,053 million, higher than last year. This materialized a particularly high commercial activity of the group this semester, notably in production. Acquisition, including earn-out of net and net of disposal, amounted to EUR 170 million.
This included three acquisition made for Publicis Sapient, namely Practia, in April 2023, to extend its Global Delivery Center in Latin America. Publicis Sapient AI Labs, for which we took full ownership in May 2023 to complement Publicis Sapient AI capabilities, and Corra in June 2023, to develop its expertise in Adobe Commerce in the U.S. It also included an acquisition for Epsilon, Yieldify, to improve on-site personalization and customer journey offering for the mid-market. On share buyback, we have a EUR 193 million outflow following the completion of the repurchase of shares to cover LTI plans. Finally, other non-cash items represented a negative of EUR 162 million, largely coming from the change in earn-out and buy-out, fair value of cross-currency swaps, and the currency translation adjustment on the balance sheet, mostly due to the USD to EUR exchange rate.
Moving to the following slide for the net financial debt. The group closing net debt reached EUR 226 million at the end of June, 2023. It's an increase of about EUR 860 million compared to the end of December, due to the cyclical nature of working capital. The average net debt on the last 12 months is EUR 498 million. When we include the average lease, this represent a leverage of 1.1x EBITDA, an improvement both versus the 1.2x at the end of December and the 1.3x a year ago. Taking into account our performance in the first half, we now aim at circa EUR 400 million of average net debt for the year, should the USD to EUR remain at the current level of 1.12.
This concludes my financial presentation. I now give the floor back to you, Arthur.
Thank you, Michel. six years ago, we set the objective to shift from a communication to a transformation partner for our clients. six years later, the shift is now completed. Today, we are outperforming our industry, thanks to our ability to win market share and the resilience of our model to business cycles. That's not all. Not only are we performing very well, but thanks to our transformation journey, we are also uniquely positioned to lead the future of our industry, which will be shaped by data, technology, and AI. AI is the flavor of the day, and thanks to ChatGPT great launch, everyone has discovered this potential. We can expect new changes by the day in the tech world. Just take yesterday and Meta launch of Llama 2, which will be available on Azure, free of charge, including for commercial purposes.
In our industry, there has not been one day in the last months without a new partnership announced. Of course, we are doing ours with big platforms like Microsoft with OpenAI, Adobe with Firefly, or Google with Vertex AI or core AI. We are also doing a partnership with focus startups like Jasper, Writer, Bria, or AssemblyAI. What truly sets us apart from our competition is that in our case, AI is already at the core of our business model, and we have been pioneers in many areas. Thanks to our investments in Sapient, Epsilon, and Marcel, we actually have three unmatched competitive advantages to make sure that our clients, but also our people, can truly leverage AI to grow. First, by combining AI with Epsilon identities, we can refresh our data every five minutes to deliver real-time personalization.
We can also link media investment to business outcome, which is, you know, the holy grail in marketing. It allow us to lead in Connected TV and Retail Media, where AI plays a critical role to find real reach and incremental sales for marketers. The 250 million Epsilon profile, boosted by AI and empowered by our scale in media, are the reason behind our major wins in the last years, including Disney, Stellantis, Walmart, ABI, Mondelez, LVMH, and very recently, Pfizer. Massive competitive advantage. Publicis Sapient's historical extensive experience in the areas of machine learning, Natural Language Processing, and every kind of AI, allow us to build solutions for our clients across industries and capabilities. From developing AI, and particularly Generative AI visions, to building out use cases and launching offering for all industry verticals.
For example, at Publicis, Sapient technology and engineering, combined with AI, drastically accelerate and improve our own processes, particularly in the creative space. This is true, first and foremost, for the end-to-end creative development. Thanks to our technologies, our partnership, and our own safe environment, PublicisGPT, we generate faster and at-scale content that is directly relevant to our client customer and in line with our brand values. This is also true to optimize production, automatize processes such as translation, compliance, and asset reuse. Let's take a couple of minutes to show you how AI can make an idea that come from one of our most brilliant creative in Paris, Marco, just even better. I hope you have liked our small commercial break. Let me come back to our last competitive advantage.
By powering our industry-first platform, Marcel, with AI in 2017, we have a lot to connect, empower, and manage our people in a unique way. Today, we are still the only holding company using AI to identify the most relevant talent across the group, provide quality, personalized training to all, and enhance career mobility through smart talent findings, thanks to Marcel, 100 million data points. I mean, we are just at the beginning to see the potential of AI. Thanks to our investment over the last years, we are clearly leading the industry in terms of capabilities. We now need to bring those capabilities into the hands of everyone at Publicis, which is our priority in the coming months. Voilà. As you have seen, H1 has been strong on all fronts.
Once again, we are outperforming the market on organic growth, delivering record financial ratios and upgrading our guidance on all KPIs. We are making the demonstration that we are both resilient to business cycles and future-proof. Actually, taking a step back and looking at our run, we have had since the pandemic, our performance this first half confirmed that despite persistent microeconomic uncertainties, we are today a much stronger company. Since 2019, our net revenue is up 45% on a reported basis in H1. Our organic growth is up +19%, with the U.S. at +22%. Our operating margin is up by 68%. Our free cash flow is up by 70%, and our headline EPS is up by 62%.
I would like to end this presentation by thanking our clients for their trust along this transformation journey, and of course, our people for their continued effort. I thank you very much for listening, and now with Michel-Alain, we are ready to take all of your questions.
This is the conference operator. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star one on their touchtone telephone. To remove yourself from the question queue, please press star two. Please pick up the receiver when asking questions. Anyone who has a question may press star one at this time. The first question is from Lina Ghayor from BNP Paribas. Please go ahead.
Hi, good morning, Arthur, Michel-Alain, and the team. It's Lina. I hope you can hear me well. Well, congratulations on the results. I do have a couple of questions. The first one is on Sapient. Some of your peers in digital transformation have had a cautious message around their pipeline and business momentum. For you, Sapient still has healthy growth on strong comp. Could you share a bit your sentiment around the medium-term outlook and the need for digital transformation in a toughening macro environment? The second question is on your guidance. Your 5% organic growth guidance implies around 3% organic in H2 versus 7% in H1.
Should we understand that there is a bit of caution in the guidance, or else, could you help us understand what are the macro assumption that you have factored in to reach 5% for the full year? Lastly, you have mentioned a couple of times production, which is nicely offsetting some of the cuts in traditional creative. Could you remind us how much this presents as % of group net revenues, and what are the drivers of the top line for that division? Thank you.
A lot of question here. What I propose is I'm gonna start coming back on the guidance, because this time we did at the beginning of the presentation, so if some missed it, I'm gonna recap a bit everything and of course, answer your question, Lina. I will let Michel-Alain go through the production SaaS question, which is a very important one, and I will end up with your question on Sapient, okay. I'm going to take a bit of time as you are asking, of course, a critical question. And I'll start with the guidance for 2023. As we said, we are upgrading on all KPI for the year. Again, I'm insisting on that despite persistent macroeconomic challenges, huh.
This is where, hopefully, you see the strengths of our model, and we will see how our peers are doing in the near future. When it comes to organic growth, coming back to your question, we now plan to deliver circa 5% in 2023. It's important to note that it is an acceleration versus our three year CAGRs, huh. We are insisting on the three year CAGR, basically, the result went since 2019 because you all know that there have been so many ups and down during this period. By the way, ups and down, half year versus half year, as you can see in 2023, that it's important to remind that the dynamic is actually accelerating versus our three year CAGRs, that was at 4%, now we are at 5%.
To come back precisely to your question. The reason why we are able to upgrade this guidance is first, of course, because we have better than expected H1 at 7.1, clearly. It's important to note also that this is based on the fact that we have a rock-solid growth for H2, that we anticipated a circa 3%, taking into account two important factors. On the one hand, potential additional cuts, so let's come back on your point, in classical advertising, but also more delays in transformation project due to those persistent microeconomic uncertainties, and I come back to that later when we talk about Sapient. On the other hand, we should not forget that Q4 is always an adjustment quarter and even more in what is still a very volatile year.
I think it is very important to note, again, coming back to 2019, that the growth we are anticipating in H2 imply that actually H2 compared to 2019, is going to grow at a similar pace as H1 at circa 19%. Again, when you look at 2019, we have the same growth in H1, then in H2 with 19%. We expect, again, with this performance, to continue to lead the market. I think we can make a focus on production and creative, and then I will come back on the focus in Sapient.
Sure. Hi, Lina. Just a couple of data point about production. Production is roughly representing 20% of creative today. You remember, creative is one third of our business, and it's growing double digit for several quarters in a row. You're right, in Q2, we had a very solid momentum in production, and it helped us compensated the localized cut that in classic advertising that Arthur was mentioning, that we actually anticipated. For H2, we anticipate this solid momentum in production to continue, mostly fueled by our new business, and Pfizer is a good example, and leveraging the group technological production platform, which is called PX. Arthur.
Lastly, on Sapient, and I'm going to take a minute on that because this is where, again, you see the strengths of our model. I mean, if I've got to take a step back before getting into Sapient, as I said in my second part, the future of our industry lies in data, tech and AI. We are incredibly positioned for that, thanks to the acquisition we have been making and the vision Maurice Lévy had roughly a decade ago. This means that not only we are outperforming today, but we are, of course, confident for the future. Coming back on Sapient. First, with 5.5% organic growth in Q2, Publicis Sapient is clearly delivering a very solid performance, considering, as I said, a very high base of 19% organic growth in Q2.
I guess you realize what it means. It is actually, that's very interesting, if you look at the market, a performance that is at the high end of its system integrator peers guidance. It means a lot for us, because we are fighting against those guys with Publicis Sapient. Publicis Sapient is again accretive to the group in H1, with +8.3% organic growth, it will also be accretive for the full year versus our new guidance. I don't know if you remember, as we discussed in Q1, like all the system integrators, we are currently experiencing some delays in implementation of some digital business projects, okay. This is due, honestly, we can understand that, to our client consciousness in the context, again, of persistent microeconomic uncertainties. I want to be clear on something, yeah.
Those delays are not a source of concern at all and are actually already baked in our guidance. Concretely, they do not change anything to the structural demand for DBT project, that not only remain very strong, but honestly, are even stronger when you look at the rise of AI. I don't want to do too much on AI, because as I say, it is a flavor of the day. You know, when Maurice Lévy made the acquisition of Sapient, some were doubting, and then with time, I think we have been able to demonstrate that they were growing and being very accretive to the group. If you look at the four-year stack, Sapient is growing at 30% when the group is working, is growing at 20%. Between us, this is not the most important thing for me.
The most important thing for me is if you want to lead in data technology and AI, having Sapient at the core of our business, not a partnership, not a couple of people that you hire, not a small company that you take. I mean, a big player in technology, system integrator with engineer that can help our client transform and help ourself transform, make a very, very big difference. If you add to that, which is something that we try to insist today, the strength of our very well-balanced revenue mix, we are actually able to deliver and actually over-delivering whatever the circumstances.
Thank you.
Long answer, but hopefully we have touched many points with those three. Thank you very much.
The next question is from Lisa Yang, from Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead.
Good morning. Thanks for taking my questions, and congratulations on the results, really impressive. I have a couple of follow-up questions on the guide and on your outperformance. Firstly, I mean, clearly you're significantly outperforming your peers, and I was wondering if you could help us quantify the benefit of the new business in the second quarter and what you expect for the full year. I think previously you said, usually it's 1%-2%, but clearly it looks like it could be higher this year. Can I also clarify whether your guidance reflects any benefit from the size of win, and when you would expect to start to see the benefit from that contract?
The second question is also related to new business, just wondering what sort of conversations you're having with clients. Do you see an opportunity for more potentially client reviews and more opportunity as opposed to risk in the rest of the year? Thirdly, on Sapient, you mentioned you're factoring in the slower decision processes into H2. Just wonder, I just want to clarify in your guidance for the full year, you don't expect any sort of major projects resuming. If they do, for instance, resume as we get, I don't know, maybe better, if you get a soft landing in the U.S., for instance, that would be basically an upside to your current guidance. Thank you.
Thank you very much. I'll start with Sapient, as we were talking about that a minute ago. I mean, again, all the industry is experiencing what we are at the moment, which is, let's be clear, slowdown in the execution of project. Clients are not cutting. We are actually winning very well, this is why, with our performance in Q2, we are actually in the higher part of the bracket of our system integrator peers. We feel very confident about what we can build and what we have built so far. What I can tell you at this stage is that we have anticipated that this slowdown in the decision process will continue in H2, this is why we are saying that our 3% is rock solid. On new business, I'm continuing with your question number two.
I mean, we had an exceptionally busy H1 in new business. We see, of course, some opportunity in H2, but not as much and not as big as what we have seen in H1. To be clear about that, it's not a bad thing for us because we have won a lot, so it's good to be able to integrate and ramp up this business very well. You have seen the growth we had in media. That was pretty impressive. Second, it's good for us because we don't have that many defensive, only offensive opportunity, but again, not at the level of what we have seen in H1. I won't make any comment on Pfizer, as we don't comment any particular new business.
What I can tell you, to finish on that, is that we don't quantify exactly the impact on new business because it's ongoing, you know. We have been. We were number one of the ranking four year out of the five. We continue to have a very good track record, and it's part of our goals overall. When you look at the number we are delivering on media, I mean, the big unexpected number here is Publicis Media, thanks to our new business track record in Q2, to be clear. The rest was expected. This has been a very good surprise, It showed that the model we have been convincing some client to take is actually ramping faster than we are expecting.
I would like just to take this opportunity to talk precisely about why we win. I mean, for those that have been following us for a while, we decided to make those two big acquisition, Epsilon and Sapient, because we knew, and at the time, Maurice Lévy knew, that technology and data would be at the core of our industry. I think what we have been doing particularly well in the last year is to make sure that those two operations are really at the core of our group. What makes me very happy today is our ability to win in media and sometime in creative, although creative is more what we're gonna do with AI, but winning in media, thanks to Epsilon, thanks to the technology of Sapient.
This is what makes our model unique when we pitch, and this is the reason why our track record is what it is. This is why, by the way, although we are the number one in new business, we are continuing to improve our margin, and new business is not dilutive but accretive to our margin also. We are building a model, again, based on data, based on technology, based on AI, that is already at the core of what we propose, and hopefully, I haven't been too fast into what I presented, that is truly differentiating and justify a special value in the eyes of our clients.
Very clear. Thank you.
The next question is from Julien Roch from Barclays. Please go ahead.
Three questions. At the full year, you gave us a Q1 organic guidance. At the Q2, you gave us, sorry. At the full year, you gave us a Q1 organic guidance. At the Q1, you gave us a Q2 guidance, so far, you've not given a Q3 guidance. I know you said about in the second half, can we get an actual Q3 guidance? If not, why not? First question. The second one, for Michelin, EUR 1.6 billion of free cash guidance, pre-new US tax and pre-working capital. Can we get a full year 2023 guidance for US tax? Is it EUR 110? Working capital, so we can get referred cash flow. With so much cash generation, can we get a fuller number for interest?
Two numbers there. Finally, would it be possible to get the exact net sales of Sapient in the first half or full year 2022? Globant is worth $8 billion, and according to Nadja, Sapient is bigger and much better, but I think the market won't give you fair value for Sapient if we only have organic. Getting net sale would help, suggestion there. Thank you.
I have Michel-Alain, that is asking more detail on question three on the net side, but it looks like Alessandra got it. While they are translating, I'm gonna take the first question very quickly on the Q3 and Q4. Honestly, in our assumption, we do not expect any major differences between Q3 and Q4, so they should be both roughly at the same level. Map, I'll let you take the two other questions.
Yeah, sure. I think I begin with the last one. I think you were asking the size of Sapient in million of euro. It's roughly EUR 2 billion for 2023. Related, Julien, to the question on the free cash, the connection is not great. I'm not sure I got it. You were referring to the above EUR 1.6 billion. What is it that you wanted to know about that?
I'd like to know, to go from free cash flow, which the guidance is pre the new U.S. tax and pre-working capital. Can we get those two numbers to get to reported free cash flow? Also, with so much cash generation, what should be the interest for the full year?
Now I understand. Let's clarify two points here. The first one is the one that seeks above EUR 1.6 billion of guidance, including the tax payment that we've made in the US in January 2023, related to 2022, which maybe you remember, is representing EUR 110 million. It's including this number. The second thing is that this free cash flow guidance is taking into consideration the exchange rate of the USD to euro, which has just changed in the last, you know, in the last weeks at 1.12.
I think in term of interest charge, maybe a couple of remarks here. The first one is you see that we, and as I've said in the presentation, we have received in H1, a far better remuneration on cash than what I expected at the beginning of the year. It's coming straight from the fact that the interest rates are better than expected because of the increase in the central bank rates on both sides of the Atlantic. For us, it's mostly the Fed, which is important. It's true that in February, when we gave you the indication on financial expenses, economists were not anticipated such a rise in interest rate.
Clearly, this has benefited us more than we anticipated. When we anticipated, maybe you remember, Julien, EUR 95 million for the year, this implied EUR 45 million for H1, which actually came at EUR 6 million, the improvement fully coming from the interest rate. When it comes to H2, remember that the interest rate began to increase almost exactly a year ago. This mean that H2 this year should be in the bracket of EUR 30 million-EUR 40 million, versus EUR 52 million last year. It mean that for 2023, in total, headline financial expenses should be about EUR 40 million, which mean improving by EUR 50 million versus our previous estimate.
Merci, Michel-Alain.
Merci beaucoup, Julien.
The next question is from Matthew Walker, from Credit Suisse. Please go ahead.
Thanks a lot. Thanks for the results. Hope you can hear me. The first question really is on the Omnicom call, they said that they expected AI to be to increase both organic growth and to also increase margin over time. I guess the first question is, do you agree with that? The second question is, on the 3% for the second half, which is like an exit rate into 2024, is that an appropriate growth level for 2024? Do you think it will be higher because all of the contracts from Sapient will start to flow again, you know, when clients become more confident?
Thank you, Matthew. Hopefully, you will understand that for 2024, we will have to wait a bit before getting into that. Let me take your question on the Omnicom. We don't comment on competition, if the question is: Is AI will increase our organic growth and help us on margin? I have two answer for you. Yes, it will for the competition, and yes, it is for Publicis to be very clear, and I'm gonna give you a very precise example of that. We don't win what we win today in term of media if we don't put AI and Epsilon together. You need to understand something, is that AI is nothing without data.
Everyone can claim, again, partnership, managing AI, doing fancy images with a gorilla flying a plane, this is not what our client want at the moment. Our clients are living in a turbulent time. They need to increase their growth while reducing their costs, they need to make sure that they can efficiently spend their marketing budgets. The reason why we grow, thanks to AI, and this is only one example that I'm giving you here, is definitely our ability to have, since a while now, AI at the core of Epsilon, for example, which means that we are refreshing our data every five minutes to deliver real-time personalization at scale. We are the only one.
We are the only one that can link any media investment to business outcome on everything we do, and we are leading in Retail Media and Connected TV, thanks to AI. When you look at our growth in media, you understand that AI is already at the core of our model, delivering growth. On margin, it's a very interesting topic. I guess everyone in the future, and we are already today, and I didn't want to spend time on that because I took it as an assumption that was obvious, is AI is already at the core of most of our operating system in everything we do, and our ability to actually outsource to AI a number of simple tasks, so I didn't want to come to that on the presentation.
I want to take another example that is, by the way, related to what Michel talked about personal costs. Okay. We have been able to cap our personal cap at the same level independently of inflation, and by the way, hire less people than our growth, because we are able today, thanks to AI on Marcel, to truly optimize our workforce and make sure that we find the right people for the right job with the right ambition, training them well, paying them well, and giving them opportunity to grow. Again, we'd be on the client side and our ability to generate revenue thanks to AI. We are already there, and we're gonna accelerate. When it comes to our own operating model, I can give you thousands of examples where AI is already helping us to get where we are.
I mean, again, if you look at our margin, okay, for H1, despite delivering the best growth, we're going to have a margin that roughly is 150 basis points better than the second one, and roughly 400 or 500 basis points than the lagger, while delivering the best margin. AI is helping for that.
Okay, thank you. That's very clear. Thanks a lot.
The next question is from Christophe Cherblanc from Societe Generale . Please go ahead.
Yes, good morning. Thanks for taking my question. First one was on the platform organization. You have added Practia this year, last year. You feel today the setup is complete? Should we expect a fewer acquisition at Practia or at Tremend? Related to the same subject, what is the share of the cost base today, which we could see as offshore? That's the first question. The second question, I think Michel-Alain mentioned that you added 1,300 net hiring. I wanted to make it clear it was organic, just was curious about what you were planning to do in Q3 and Q4. The last one was on property. Is there more to come in H2 in term of property cost?
Given the plan you have put in place, what are the savings that you have locked for 2024 versus 2023? Thank you.
Thank you very much, Christophe. I will let Michel take the offshore, net hire, and property question. I will go quickly on our M&A strategy. I mean, hopefully, you have seen that we have been pretty consistent in our acquisition strategy, and we will continue to do so. We are looking for a company, only bolt-on acquisition, that can help strengthen our data stack and everything that has to do with first-party data around the world, we have made a couple of acquisition, and we will continue. We are also looking for more capacities and capabilities for Sapient. Will it be directly for them or in link with some platform as the deal we just did for another integrator? What is important to note here is that we are only looking for two things. We are looking for talent and technology.
We are looking for talent and technology that can complement the two platform that we have created with Epsilon on one side and Publicis Sapient on the other. We strictly go on that. If we find more opportunities, we will accelerate on opportunities. If it doesn't fit with what we do, we will actually slow down. For the moment, we are counting of being on the same pace. Maybe, Michel-Alain, I'll let you take the three others.
Yeah, sure. I'm sorry. Beginning with the net hiring of 1,300, yes, you're right, this is organic. We net hire about 700 people in the Q1, and then we net hired about 600 people in the Q2. We got from our acquisition, so mostly Practia and Corra, 1,700 non-organic. If you look at the first semester in total, it is 3,000 people, more in the group, 1,300 organic and 1,700 non-organic coming from Practia and Corra, but you know, mostly Practia, which is representing 1,200 out of the 1,700. On the property part, yes, you're right, Christophe, we are very active in this area.
I cannot comment yet on the amount of saving we will materialize in 2024, but what I can tell you is that obviously it is playing a key role in our P&L this year, both in H1 and in H2. You see that through the decrease of depreciation, because in depreciation, you've got the depreciation of assets, okay. You've got the depreciation of right-of-use. Right-of-use is directly linked to the number of lease we have, and we are reducing this lease consistently semester after semester. It boiled down in H1 into a decrease of depreciation of 60 bits, as you have seen.
On the offshore part, it's a key element of our strategy. As you can see, we have now a Global Delivery Center for Sapient, which is complete and which is what we call in the industry, follow-the-sun, meaning with Latin America, Romania, and India. Overall, for the group, all of our Global Delivery Centers are representing about 25% of our account. We are monitoring this on a monthly basis on our mix by onshore, offshore for all the practice, and we are fully on track for our objective in 2023.
Just on the hiring plan for Q3, Q4, have you stabilized accounts at the level of H1?
We'll have a net hirings will be which will be, we think, a bit below than H1, in line with our activity that Arthur commented as a rock-solid 3% in the second semester. Just have in mind, Christophe, if I may, a last comment. We just won a gigantic contract, which is Pfizer, and obviously we'll be ramping these resources right now and during summer. Obviously it will be in our numbers for H2.
Okay. Thank you.
The next question is from Richard Eary from UBS. Please go ahead.
Morning, everyone. Just two set of questions from myself. Firstly, just on guidance, going back to the H2 guidance of 3%, can you just maybe give us a bit more color within that in terms of what you're expecting around media, creative, Epsilon, and Sapient? I would imagine that, and correct me if I'm wrong, if media is still continuing to double digit benefiting from the Pfizer and existing new business wins, does that mean that Sapient and Epsilon is effectively close to flat growth expectations in the second half? If you can just clarify that would be great. Then the second question, just on margins, and maybe Michel-Alain, as we look out into 2024, I presume that the benefits of load appreciation from property, and the change in terms of expensing software will continue.
Should we see more benefits around margin improvements from those two elements as we go into 2024? I presume that will also get aided by new business wins, as you said, is already high margins. Any comments on margins as we go forward, would that be helpful?
Thank you very much. I will take the first question and leave you the second, or we can do the other way around, I think it'd be better on the second one. Now, look, when we look at H2, if you look roughly by expertise and capabilities, we believe that data and tech, that is roughly one third of our revenue, as you know, to continue to be accretive, even after a strong H1 and with a huge comparable. We also expect media to be accretive. Again, thanks to our new business tailwind. We do see some softness on creative as we anticipated.
Again, nothing new there, but with a strong momentum of production, which is good for the future, as Michel-Alain was telling you, because client will need more production content in the future, and that makes us very optimistic for the quarter to come. This is roughly how it goes, but maybe Michel-Alain on margin?
It's obviously too early to comment on 2024. What I can say that obviously the dynamics that you are underlying as the right one, and they should contribute to our margin for next year. What I can comment on is that the way we see margin for this year is, as you know, close to 18%. The major assumption behind this is that we will have personal costs, which should be broadly stable on the full year in a percentage of net revenue. This include an envelope of bonus and incentive, which is equivalent to 2022. It's already baked in our guidance.
As far as non-personal cost is concerned, which I think was more your question, we'll have indeed, on the year, lower depreciation with the real estate optimization plan and with an increased use of SaaS platform, which are directly expense. At the same time, as I told you at the beginning of the year, it will be compensated by a bit more G&A, which is linked to the return to the office, more travels, more client-facing meetings. Overall, I expect the two to compensate one, the other on non-personal costs and will be all together close to 18 for the year.
Thank you very much. Other question? Yeah.
The next question is from Conor O'Shea, from Kepler Cheuvreux. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Yes, thank you. Thank you for taking my questions. Morning, everybody, and congratulations on the results. Just three quick questions for me. Just first question, just on the media side, double-digit, it seems like in almost all territories, even ahead of building some of the bigger wins you've had recently. With, you know, digital advertising media being still pretty weak, for the platforms and so on, which has got 70% market share, can you give us an indication of are there other factors involved, that are driving such a strong recovery of a business that was weaker going into the pandemic and has come out extremely strong?
The second question, just on the CPG business, particularly in the U.S., among the clients as a group, some of your peers have suggested that the underlying trend is a bit weaker there. Have you seen anything there excluding the effect of any new wins on an underlying basis in terms of activity and so on? Then just the third question, maybe for Michel-Alain, just an indication of the pipeline on M&A for the second half of the year. Is it looking stronger than the first half, or is there anything you can say on that at this stage? Thank you.
I'll take the two first one, and I'll let Michel on the pipeline, although we are not disclosing a lot on this topic. On media, there is two reasons why we are outperforming the market strongly, yeah. You are right, Conor, we can see some weakness, for example, in the upfront, which, by the way, is linked to what we are saying about client delaying their decision in investment. They are doing this with digital business transformation because it's a lot of money, so they are not stopping, they are just delaying. They are also doing that with upfront because, by definition, they have to commit for the future where they want to keep some flexibility. We are seeing, of course, a lot of movement. Honestly, this is something we like, huh.
Because our model, and it's impossible to do it on the phone, but is based on the fact that the future of marketing will lie on identities, which is what we deliver with Epsilon, and there will be a shift from cookies to identities that is benefiting us at the moment. Our client will start to balance better what they spend in paid media, renting audiences, and this is what we are talking at the moment, and how they build their own digital ecosystem, and they are able to navigate from one to another, thanks to identity. The more complex it gets, the more interesting it is for us to make sure that we can again, help our clients to really transform.
It come back to the point I was making about the shift we have operated over the year to move from being a communication partner that could be impacted by some slowdown in media, to a transformation partner that is truly agnostic between paid and owned, with identity at the core. It was a bit specific, but if by any chance there is a prospect on this call, it will be interesting about that. More importantly, coming back to your question, the two reason why we are winning as we do in media, despite what we are seeing at the moment, is first, new business.
Again, our ability at the moment to win market share is extremely important because in media, scale matter, and our ability to lead the market, particularly in the U.S., makes a big difference, and we are winning market share, thanks to the ability to bring with media Epsilon and Sapient. The second is new media. I mean, hopefully, I was clear in my presentation, but one of the big benefits to bring Epsilon data through AI to be refreshed every five minutes, is that we are able to lead in a direct TV, personalized TV, but also in Retail Media, which are two areas where not only we see growth and great growth, but true transformation and good reason for the client to choose us. Which leads me, by the way, to your question on CPG.
I'm starting to be very excited by the marketing model of CPG, because for too long, too many CPG company have been investing a disproportionate part of their investment in what we call the walled garden, where their media was managed by other, and their data were kept in the walled garden. Retail media allow now CPG to create a direct relationship with their customer, with a very simple platform that not only allows them to track them during their journey on site, on walmart.com or Carrefour.fr or whatever, but also offsite when those people moves to other platform on the web. This means that we can put the right message at the right time with the right place.
The second thing that Retail Media does for CPG that is breakthrough, is that it allow us to link media investment to business outcome. You remember this sentence saying, "I know that 50% of my budget is working, but I don't know which?" This is over with CPG when you use Retail Media. We are seeing a huge potential in a category that honestly, apart for some, that I won't name, that were very advanced, has still a lot to do. We feel good about the potential of our offer to actually rise with CPG in the future. Sorry, it was a bit technical, but you got me there.
No, no, absolutely. Very helpful.
Okay, on the on the pipe for M&A, obviously, I cannot comment in detail, but what I can tell you is that we have the pipe to reach our EUR 500 million-EUR 600 million of bolt-on acquisition for this year. Obviously, you know, the timing of M&A are, is depending on availability and targets and negotiation. As Arthur underlined all this, while respecting a very strict group financial discipline. What I can say that we will carry on to focus on this bolt-on acquisition to improve our skill and capabilities in data, in DBT, in commerce, and AI. That's what is for the year.
We still have two question, I guess, yeah? Okay, two more. Who's next?
The next question is from Adrien de Saint Hilaire, from Bank of America. Please go ahead.
Yeah, many thanks for taking the question, and good morning, everyone. I've got a couple of questions, please. Arthur, you mentioned the localized cuts. I'm just wondering if you have seen a deterioration around these cuts throughout the quarter and into the early part of Q3, or if it's the same trend than in Q1? Maybe some housekeeping questions for Michel-Alain. I think implicitly, the margin guidance for H2 is for margin to be about 18. 7%, let's say.
I think in 2019, they were above 19%. Just conceptually wondering why, like, should the H2 2023 margin be below H2 2019? Secondly, if you could just reconfirm how much you intend to spend on CapEx, because it was down in H1, but I think you've talked about EUR 250 for the year. Also for M&A, normally the envelope is EUR 400-600. I'm just wondering how you're tracking against this for the year. Thank you so much.
No, thanks to you. I would like two and three to Michel-Alain. I will take one. No, we don't see more localized cut than at the beginning of the year. The thing you need to understand, and hopefully we've been clear on that, is that we always said that the 5% was implying that the macroeconomic situation will improve. We don't see any improvement at the moment. We don't see worse, but we don't see any improvement. Despite this, and thanks to the resilience of our model and honestly, the fact that we are winning market share, we are still capable of going to 5% and being in position to tell you that any eventuality of a slowdown in DBT or some cuts that are coming in H2 is baked into that.
We don't see any big difference at the moment, but we are prepared. This is why we said that our three is rock solid. You want to take two and three?
Yes, sure. On the margin. I begin with last year. Last year, we reported, as you remember, 18% margin on the year, and it was 17.3% in H1 and 18.6% in H2. If you take into account the new dollar rate that I just mentioned, at 1.12, for the rest of the year, it means that actually it will represent a 20 basis points impact on H2. 10 basis points impact on the year, but 20 basis points impact on H2. The 18.6% of last year, taking into consideration this new dollar exchange rate, it's 18.4%.
If you look at what we have in front of us, it's an equivalent margin in H2 than than last year to get to 18%, if you take obviously 17.9 as close to 18%. On your second question about about CapEx, we spent EUR 75 million in H1. Last year, we spent EUR 82 million, so it's a, it's a notch below. Traditionally, CapEx is always lower in the first semester. For the full year, we are anticipating a CapEx between EUR 230 million-EUR 250 million. I think you had a last question of on M&A, but I think I just answer it.
We spent EUR 170 million on M&A, mostly on Practia and Cora in the first semester. We confirm the envelope of EUR 500 million-EUR 600 million, but obviously, we will see how the second semester is happening.
Thank you very much. I think we have a last question.
The final question is from Tom Singlehurst from Citi. Please go ahead.
Yes, thank you. Just two quick ones to finish, Tom here from Citi. First for Arthur, then for Michel-Alain. On Arthur, question is, do you have enough scale in retail media? I mean, obviously, Profitero and CitrusAd doing really well, there's the partnership with Carrefour, but do you need to double down on that space to really capitalize on the opportunity? Then question for Michel-Alain. Higher interest rate environment, clearly very good for net interest income. Just wondering whether it's having any impact on discussions around terms of trade and whether a knock-on impact on the anticipated working capital business for the full year or into next year. Thank you.
I'm going to let Michel-Alain take the second one, and then I'll end up with the first one.
We can reverse if you want.
No, I can take this one then first. I'll start with Retail Media then, because it's a great question.
Sure, yeah.
It's, as I said, this is a strategic topic for many, many of our clients, particularly in CPG. I think we have a massive competitive advantage here. Why? Is because compared to any other competition, we are the only one that has the full stack of capabilities you need to lead in Retail Media, and we've got it at scale. Let me spend a second on this. Yes, you need a Retail Media platform, and with Citrus, we are the best, if not one of the best, not to seems too competitive on the market. This is not enough, and this is actually resuming very well our acquisition strategy.
The reason why we bought Citrus is that we knew that by combining Citrus with Epsilon Identity, we were building a model that was unique because we were able to track customer not only on the retailer website, but also when it goes out of the website. We are uniquely positioned here to actually do end-to-end Retail Media. If you add to that, the scale we have with Publicis Media, and our ability to get the best deal for our clients when they get out of the platform, not only we have the scale, but we have a unique product. This is why we are winning what we are winning at the moment. Michel-Alain, I'll let you take the second one, and then I will conclude.
Yeah, sure. On the working capital, there is no link, I mean, between the rise in the interest rate and the evolution of working capital by itself. Really, we had this semester, as usual, with the cyclical nature of working capital, an outflow of EUR 1 billion in this first semester. It's really reflecting the very high commercial activity that we had this semester. Particularly, we won several production deals. That's where the link is. It's not linked to the interest rate. Back to you, Arthur.
Thank you very much. Maybe just one word in conclusion to make sure that we leave you sharp at the hour. Hopefully, you're gonna take simply two things out of the time we have spent together this morning. The first is, I think we have made the demonstration that our model is truly resilient and can resist to the business cycle. There is two reason for that: a revenue mix that is incredibly well-balanced, and our ability to win market share through the performance of Publicis Media. We are outperforming again, the market on growth, and we are continuing to deliver, by far, the best financial ratios.
By the way, it's interesting to see six years later, that we are today making the demonstration that you can keep the best margin of the industry by far, while by the way, rewarding our people properly and best in the industry, and outperforming on growth. As long as we have operated this shift from a communication partner to a transformation partner, and we have put the right capabilities at the center that our client are needing. This allow us to upgrade our guidance, despite the fact that we still have some persistent microeconomies uncertainties on all of our KPIs. The second thing I hope you will take, although it's difficult to do on a call, but by chance, our members are starting to convince you that this is the case. We believe that we are ready today for tomorrow. Today for tomorrow.
When you look at the investment we have made, when you look at the transformation we've been through, that honestly has not been easy, and some investors on the call have been suffering with us during this period. Today, we are really leading the industry in what really matters, and it matters at scale, which is data, technology, and AI. Well, I'm gonna thank you. I hope you can take a couple of days off and enjoy a bit of the winter. I know that Alessandra is here in summer, winter, summer. It depends where you sit. Alessandra is here for you for any additional questions. Thank you very much.
Merci beaucoup.