Good day, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the CGG Q3 2023 Financial Results Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there'll be a question and answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star one and one on your telephone. You will then hear an automated message advising your hand is raised. To withdraw your question, please press star one and one again. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to CGG. Please go ahead.
Thank you. Good morning, and good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to this presentation of the CGG third quarter 2023 results. The call today is hosted from Paris, where Mrs. Sophie Zurquiyah, our Chief Executive Officer, and Mr. Jérôme Serve, our Group CFO, will provide an overview of the quarter results, as well as provide comments on our outlook. Just let me remind you that some of the information contains forward-looking statements subject to risk and uncertainty that may change at any time, and therefore, the actual results may differ materially from those that were expected. Following the overview of the quarter, we will be pleased to take your questions. And now, I will turn the call over to Sophie.
Thank you, Christophe, and good morning, and good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for participating in this Q3 2023 conference call. We're on slide five now, and before reviewing the quarter and market perspective, I'd like to start by highlighting the particularly strong ESG rating of CGG. After confirming our high MSCI and Sustainalytics ratings, we received a Silver Sustainability rating from EcoVadis from their evaluation of our reduction of greenhouse gas emissions throughout the value chain. We prioritize ESG and are pleased to see this recognized in our performance. Macro oil and gas trends over the quarter have been fairly stable, with the increasing realization that all sources of energy will be required to optimally manage across the energy transition for decades to come. Our clients are trying to find the right balance between meeting the increased requirements for future production and managing long-term risks.
To address this, we see progressively increasing interest in exploration, yet in lower time to market locations. As an example, in frontier areas that already have discoveries or in basins where infrastructure is already in place. This not only lowers risk, but importantly, shortens cycle times. Good data and high-end imaging are fundamental to reduce exploration risks and maximize oil production. We are in a favorable cycle for CGG, where quality and precision increasingly matter, and our clients, especially NOCs, turn to best-in-class organizations capable of delivering integrated Geoscience. I expect a continued trend of sustained higher levels of E&P CapEx, especially offshore and in the Middle East, both key markets for CGG. Looking at our Q3, we had an excellent quarter, both in terms of operational and financial performance. Geoscience revenue was $78 million, up 13% year-on-year, driven by innovations in high-end imaging.
Earth Data sales were $107 million, up 74% year-on-year, with solid after sales at $52 million, up 21%. Prefunding revenue was $65 million, with a 111% prefunding rate. Sensing & Monitoring sales were $122 million, up 42% year-on-year. Overall, our Q3 revenue reached $307 million, up 42% year-on-year. Segment EBITDA was $109 million, up 41%, including our payment this quarter of $20 million to Shearwater to compensate for the non-utilization of their streamer vessels. Q3 net cash flow was positive at $63 million, and we had $317 million of liquidity at the end of September, including $95 million of undrawn RCF. We'll change to slide seven now.
DDE segment revenue was $185 million in Q3, up 41% year-on-year, with double-digit growth in Geoscience and strong Earth Data sales. Profitability was solid, despite the $20 million impact of non-utilization compensation fees to Shearwater for their streamer vessel. Slide eight. Geoscience external revenue was $78 million in Q3, up 13% year-on-year, with growth coming from all regions. The Geoscience business remains solid, supported by strong demand and by our technology differentiation, particularly valuable for OBN processing. Backlog is up 3% year-on-year, mainly due to delays in the award of large projects for NOCs. We continue to increase quality and extract more efficiencies as our work becomes more and more data-driven and less people-intensive. Slide nine.
In Geoscience, demand for our unique elastic full waveform inversion is very high, driven by North America and expanding worldwide.... To support the ramp up of our activities, we are recruiting top talent from the best schools globally and remain highly attractive because of CGG's culture, advanced technology, and focus on innovation. Our new highly specialized UK HPC Hub is coming online to support running the most compute-intensive algorithms as demand for our advanced technology is picking up in the Eastern Hemisphere. The picture on this slide is a very nice example of CGG's imaging added value for CCUS project. You can see the subsurface in the shallow waters of the Gulf of Mexico. Thanks to our unique high-frequency TLFWI velocity imaging technology, we can show the reservoir pressure differences across the fault and identify high-pressure areas which are not optimal for carbon storage.
The range of our offerings in carbon sequestration is expanding, with more projects targeting the monitoring phase, which is the most sensitive from a regulatory standpoint and offers longer-term business opportunities. Our scope of involvement in mineral and mining covers a broad spectrum from exploration, such as our recent contract for lithium mining in Mongolia, all the way to production, where we provide services to assess mine stability. Overall, our quarterly revenue stream for these low carbon services is showing a positive dynamic as more companies acknowledge the need for high-end Geoscience, as an example, to explore for new mineral deposits buried in the subsurface that are needed for energy transition, or to characterize reservoir, reservoirs for CCUS and better understand their long-term behavior. We'll go to slide 10 now.
The most recent implementation of our full waveform inversion algorithm brings a higher geological fidelity to subsurface images, and this, together with our machine learning and AI techniques, is enabling a much more rapid and accurate interpretation of the data. As such, we are becoming increasingly involved in supporting activities that were historically performed exclusively by our clients and are expanding the scope of our services. Results are particularly striking with OBN data, and this is a key reason our clients are increasingly using OBN technology together with our high-end imaging, even though it is multiple times more costly than streamer acquisition. Processing is more complex, and with our differentiation, clients tend to use our unique and leading technology to extract the most value from their OBN acquisition investments.
The images you see on this slide are five years apart, and the 2023 image is based on the most advanced acquisition and imaging technology. You can see that the details of the salt geometries are refined much more clearly, especially at the reservoir level. Slide 11. In early October, we opened our new UK High P erformance Computing Hub in Southeast England. The initial capacity of the center is 100 petaflops, bringing CGG's global total to just over 500 petaflops. The highly optimized environment, together with the hub's use of 100% renewable energy, reflects CGG's commitment to sustainably meet the massive computing demand required by high-end scientific and AI applications.
I expect the trend of increasing our computing capacity to continue in the future, possibly accelerate, as we not only support our traditional imaging business, but also our new and growing businesses in digital and data transformation, as well as new verticals. We announced this morning another new client, LightOn, a pioneering artificial intelligence AI company, to our emerging HPC business. Our highly optimized and sustainable AI and HPC solutions will help LightOn optimally evaluate and test large language models to support the industrial deployment of AI. Ultimately, our outcome-driven, specialized approach, combined with our proprietary technology, enables companies such as LightOn to accelerate and maximize their return on investment through evaluation, testing, scaling, and commercial production. This unique HPC AI solution brings tremendous value to our internal and external clients. We'll move to slide 12 with Earth Data.
Q3 Earth Data revenue was $107 million, up 74% year-on-year. Prefunding revenue was solid at $52 million, bringing the prefunding rate for the first nine months to 93%, and I am confident that we will finish the year above 90%. Earth Data cash CapEx was $50 million this quarter, down 31% year-on-year, and after sales were $55 million, up significantly, up year-on-year. Overall, we see a strong improvement in prefunding, as we have been more selective on projects this year to focus on shorter-term cash returns. Slide 13. In Norway, we completed the Sleipner 1,200 square kilometer OBN acquisition, and the 2023 NVG East-West is now in the processing phase. We have several reprocessing projects ongoing across the globe to revitalize a library where clients are interested.
This reflects the trend of renewed interest in more frontier areas, where risks and time to market are lower. All these projects have industry prefunding. The APA bid round in Norway was closed on August 23rd, with 25 companies submitting bids. Results will be announced in Q1 2024. In Brazil, the permanent offer bid round was launched in August, and we expect the bid round to be closed in December. Uncertainty remains around the timing of the Gulf of Mexico lease sales, which typically trigger after sales. However, we expect clients might still decide to buy data as part of the year-end budget. Going to slide 14. I'd like to highlight two new projects that started in Q4. The Selat Melaka 2D multi-client seismic program over the Langkas uka Basin offshore Malaysia. This project of 8,000 km will take about 80 days to complete and is well prefunded.
It is our first project in Malaysia, a country where we see increasing activity. Second project, we kicked off a large-scale CCUS screening study in Southeast Asia, covering Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam. Interest around carbon sequestration is growing in Asia, driven by both IOCs and NOCs. Now moving on to slide 15. Our Q3 Sensing & Monitoring segment revenue was high at $122 million, up 42% year-on-year. Land sales at $58 million were driven mainly by deliveries of high number of vibrators. Marine sales at $45 million, more than doubled year-on-year, supported by the sales of OBN to the Middle East. Sales from beyond the core were also up at $13 million, mainly from structural health monitoring projects.
The profitability of SMO was exceptionally low this quarter, but we expect the profitability of the SMO business to be back to normal in Q4. Slide 16 for highlights. Q3 was another quarter of very high deliveries, both in land and marine, driven by stronger activity in North Africa and the Middle East. Given the success of our shallow OBN GPR300, that features the best sensor in the industry, we are launching the full range of products to address deeper water markets. We are also progressing our range of sources to offer broadband and solutions that lower any potential impact on the environment. Our MetaBlue product offers value-added solutions that complement our marine acquisition systems and make our clients more efficient, both in planning and acquiring their surveys.
In BTC, we are proud of our first commercial successes in Saudi Arabia for the identification and monitoring of sinkholes along railways. This is a multi-year contract, which covers an initial phase of analysis and subsequent monitoring. We are also active in the space of wind turbine monitoring. Let me now give the floor to Jérôme for more financial details.
Thank you, Sophie. Good morning. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Let me start with the income statement on slide 18. As previously highlighted, Q3 was a solid quarter, with our segment revenue growing 41% to $307 million, mainly driven by SMO IR equipment deliveries for land and OBN mega crews, as well as a strong prefunding for our oil data business. Segment EBITDA reached $109 million, up 41% versus last year. This translates into 35% margin, including a negative impact of $20 million extra costs linked to the Shearwater agreement, as well as dilutive business mix coming from SMO. Regarding segment operating income, Q3 was at $33 million or 11% margin. After IFRS 15 adjustment, Q3 operating income was $42 million. Net income for the quarter was positive at $8 million.
Moving on to the cash flow statement on slide 19. Q3 2023 segment free cash flow was positive at $85 million, after $31 million positive change in working capital. As mentioned during our Q2 2023 results, the high level of SMO revenues booked in May and June, coupled with an inventory kept under tight control, did translate into a strong cash generation for SMO this quarter. Regarding Q3 year-to-date CapEx, they stand at $190 million, $20 million lower than last year. This is mainly coming from our multi-client CapEx, decreasing from $180 million last year to $142 million year-to-date, but with a prefunding ratio increasing from 38% last year to 93% year-to-date.
This year, we have indeed been more selective in the way we have invested into new multi-client surveys, scrutinizing both the prefunding and cash-on-cash ratio, as well as balancing the potential extra cost paid to Shearwater. Overall, the Q3 2023 net cash flow was positive at $63 million. Looking at our full year guidance, we expect to reach net cash flow breakeven after change in working capital, and this despite the potential unfavorable euro dollar and euro GBP exchange rate. Moving on to slide 20, the group balance sheet and capital structure. The group liquidity amounted to $370 million at end of September, including $95 million of undrawn RCF. Before IFRS 16, group gross debt was $1.197 million, and net debt was $921 million.
Net debt is actually $60 million higher than as of December 2022, mainly from the negative net cash flow over the nine-month period. $24 million of debt interest due as of end of September, as well as circa $20 million of asset financing for [ Bonnet] data center. After IFRS 16, group gross debt was $1,283 million, and net debt was just above $1 billion at the end of September 2023. Segment leverage ratio of net debt to EBITDA was 2.3x at the end of September 2023. Now I hand the floor back to Sophie for conclusion.
Thank you, Jérôme. Now we're on slide 22. This quarter confirms the positive market trends that we saw during the first six months of the year. A favorable cycle is clearly shaping up for our industry, as clients continue to look for ways to optimize production from their producing fields and increasingly prioritize new reserves to meet demand. The cycle, together with our technology differentiation, has already driven the Geoscience business back to pre-COVID levels. In Earth Data, as our clients have started to increasingly prioritize the rebuilding of their portfolio of opportunity, the cycle is still emerging and has not fully materialized. Looking forward, we do see growing interest in exploration, which is positive for Earth Data. SMO, together with Geoscience, will benefit from OBN becoming a reference technology for optimizing the production of mature reservoirs, as well as for lowering the risk of near field exploration opportunity.
The land business in SMO will continue to be driven by the national oil companies, especially in the Middle East, who are taking a longer term view on the cycle. It is expected that timing of the Middle East mega crews will create some quarterly volatility. In this context, our core businesses are doing well and should continue to strengthen in 2024, where we already have improved visibility. Our beyond the core business activities continue to mature, and we are gaining experience and progressively building our commercial business as we participate in more streams of the value chain, and especially around low carbon and digital. Our new contract for HPC applied to GenAI strengthen our credential in this growing sector, and we expect continued success moving forward. Finally, we're very pleased to see our structural health monitoring business continuing to grow with a successful expansion into the Middle East.
In summary, we are on track to meet our 2023 objectives and continue to see a supportive outlook for our business moving forward. Thank you very much for your interest, and we're now ready to take your questions.
Thank you. To ask a question, you will need to press star one and one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, please press star one and one again. We will now go to our first question. Your first question comes from the line of Haris Papadopoulos from Bank of America. Please go ahead.
Hello. Hi, can you hear me?
Yes. Hello.
Hi. Yeah, thanks for taking my questions. I have four actually, please. First one, could you perhaps give us an indication of working capital for the fourth quarter?
Hi, Haris. Sorry, can you repeat your question? I didn't catch it.
Yeah, I was just wondering, could you perhaps give us an indication of working capital for the fourth quarter?
Working cap for the fourth quarter. That's a question for you, Jérôme.
will be slightly negative, around $10 million.
Okay, thanks a lot. And then on the SMO business, I appreciate margins here were exceptionally low this quarter. How should we think about it for the fourth quarter?
Yeah, I did, yeah, the interesting question. Again, that's linked to some of the mix of deliveries we have this quarter. But what we did say is that we expect if you see where we are year to date, we'll probably stay around that number. So we'll, Q4 will be around the sort of average for the year, year to date. So we'll catch up and have the normal back to the normal profitability in Q4.
Sorry, back to my first answer. It's, as you know, the working capital will depends very much on the late sales. So the sales that will be booked November, December, and especially our data after sales, which have a tendency to be booked more in December time. But again, we, I mean, what we just said is, we ambition, as we already mentioned it in Q2, to have a cash flow generation breakeven, including working capital variation. Although the guidance we have made earlier this year was excluding working capital.
Okay, thanks a lot. And then thirdly, I appreciate your liquidity target, I remember, was $150 million. This means that you currently have a large cushion over that. Would you perhaps consider using your 10% special redemption goal?
So-
Is that something-
Yeah, it's been, it's been communicated in the past that we needed under $150 million to operate minimum. Depending on our outlook for 2024, that's something that we indeed may consider paying down, reimbursing out of all debt.
Okay, thanks a lot. And then finally, perhaps again, on the capital allocation front, how should we think about M&A?
The question is about where we are with M&A. Is that correct?
Yes.
We keep cash for M&A. We don't have like a large M&A insight, but we always optimistic, like we had last year. So we like the bolt-on M&A in that range of $20 million, that our technology adds to what we have. Right now, we're actually not working on any, but yes, but we feel like organically this is something we can afford.
Okay, thank you very much. That's all for me.
Thank you. We will now go to your next question. Your next question comes from the line of Mick Pickup from Barclays. Please go ahead.
Good evening, everyone. It's Mick here. Just a couple of questions. Can I just check that in DDE, that increase in cost base, that's all the Shearwater payment that we've seen in the quarter?
Yes. Thank you, Mick, and good evening, and thanks for the question. For the benefit of everyone, that is the reason. We've seen the Geoscience revenue per head continue to increase. We're actually increasing productivity. So actually, what's hiding, if you want, the increases or the good, you know, performance and profitability has been those payments. They've been significant enough that we've been flagging them for the last two quarters.
Yep, perfect. That's, that's nice and clear. Now, and the next one is, can I just talk about on the multi-client business. Obviously, your investments appear to be running a bit lower than I think you were looking for for the year, and you mentioned that it's much higher pre-funding. Just wondering how you balance that going forward with your clients wanting to rebuild their inventory of prospects, and clearly, that would suggest spending more going forward, but you're on the path of trying to spend a bit less at the moment. I'm wondering how this all balances out.
I mean, what we look at, and this is not new, we look, we manage multi-client from the cash-out play, which is basically how much CapEx. You know, basically pre-funding ratio either way, right? So this is the CapEx minus the pre-funding revenue, and we look at how much we're sort of willing to invest, and that number has been over the years, like $15 million. This year, it's going to be less, but, you know, we've been going on all the way to $15 million. So we look at the project, project by project on the merits of, you know, if we see pre-funding or not, and when that pre-funding might be coming.
So this year, I would say if we had had compelling project, we would have invested, provided that we saw the pre-funding. And that's the reason that in particular, there was a couple projects in Norway that we decided to delay until 2024 because we knew, and the client had told us they didn't have the budget this year. So we didn't see a point of putting more cash out and wait until next year to get the pre-funding. So we're trying as much as we can to line up the investment with the pre-funding just to manage the cash, basically. So I don't think you should read much into the level of the levels of CapEx. It just depends a little bit on client interest and quality of the project.
I do expect, and I hope we will invest, for example, in OBN in the Gulf of Mexico, so that might drive some of the CapEx up in 2024.
Okay. And then, and then just finally, obviously, a low margin in Sensing & Monitoring, and you're saying low margin equipment, but 10% is a big step down from what, 20-odd% you did last quarter. So can you just talk me through exactly what's driving it? Because it was you to generate-
It, it, it-
That was a very low margin.
Yeah, it is low, and we were very disappointed. I mean, it's very simple. It's the vibrators. So those are the vibrators, and we've sold a large number of vibrators to Saudi Arabia. And, and that just—they just typically, it's the equipment, and I've seen those vibrators or trucks over the years typically attract a lower margin, kind of lower value add, if you want, and it's just, an unfavorable, mix this quarter. But the GPR products, for example, have the typical SMO, high margins.... So that's why it was just, again, a bit of a volatility. It all happened in that quarter, but next quarter we're confident that, you know, we'll be back.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you. We'll now go to our next question. Your next question comes from the line of Baptiste Lebacq from Oddo. Please go ahead.
Yes. Hi, good afternoon, everybody. Just a very quick question regarding the, let's say, potential merger between Exxon and Pioneer and Chevron and Hess. In this context, can you benefit in 2024 of transfer fees, if the mergers are done? Thank you.
Yeah, thank you, Baptiste, and good evening. So Exxon / Pioneer is purely land, onshore U.S., and if you remember, we sold, we sold our land, onshore, data, business last year, at the end of, last year, so we're not going to benefit any of that. Chevron Hess, there is definitely a potential for, for transfer fees. That will be... I would call them in the mid-range. If you remember, the Oxy one was in a, in a higher range, so we're sort of—it's gonna be significant, but not as significant. And that would happen at the moment of closing. And of course, it always depends on the appetite of the buyer to transfer the data.
So that means we're, we're in the process of identifying which data they don't have, that likely they might want to transfer, but they could still make a decision not to transfer the data. So I don't have the final numbers until those conversations take place. But we should definitely Exxon Pioneer, nothing on that side, and then Chevron Hess, there should be something. Just to remind, you know, everyone on the line, the U.S. land library last year generated around $18 million of after sales, and so when you compare the year-on-year after sales from 2022 to 2023, you have to take into account the footprint change.
Year -to- date, yes?
The year- to- date.
$6 million in Q3.
Thank you. Maybe still one question, if I can, regarding M&A. Let's say two of your competitors or clients, it depends on where you stand, want to merge. What is your view? Can you share with us your view? Is it for you positive, or are you afraid by, I don't know, a bigger, bigger competition, because they are by far bigger now than previously? Thank you.
Yes, sure. So in terms of the client, I think generally speaking, less client is not necessarily good. Now, it depends, you know, who is the buyer and who is the company that bought, and you know, how, what's our position with them. So there's a lot of consideration in that, but in general, we benefit when there's a larger client base. So that general trend of M&A amongst our client base, we will benefit in the short term with transfer fees, but in the long term, I would rather have more clients. Now, the good news is that there are some start-ups, private equity-backed companies that are creating in some of the basins, in the mature basins. And what we're seeing as well, which is also a good thing and a new trend, is NOCs are trying to go more international.
So that kind of opens up an avenue for a new client base, if you want. The second one is on our competitor. Probably you're referring to the TGS, PGS merger. I would say it's relatively neutral in the sense where it creates a big competitor, a larger competitor in the multi-client space. But multi-client is not really about scale, it is more around positions. And so in that sense, whether you're mid-size, like us, or larger size, it doesn't make a huge difference. And then on the processing side, they were both quite small, so the combination remains small, so nothing on that side. And on the acquisition business, it's just, you know, moves from one player to another player, but it's the same business in the end. So that particular consolidation is not. It's fairly mutual for us.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Thank you. Once again, if you would like to ask a question, please press star one and one on your telephone keypad. We will now go to the next question. Your next question comes from the line of Jean-Luc Romain from CIC Market Solutions. Please go ahead.
Good afternoon. You had a very strong first quarter in SMO and a very strong year so far. How should we expect the end of the year compared to the past quarter, as good or even better? And how do you see from today, 2024, you mentioned quite a few possibilities of mega crews. Do you see a higher 2024 already for SMO?
Thank you, Jean-Luc, for the question, and good evening. So in terms of year end, I mean, I think we're gonna be on a trend of a high quarter. Hard to give you the comparison on Q3 or Q1 and Q2, but every quarter has been fairly, you know, fairly high above the $100 million mark, and that's kind of the range that we expect in Q4 as well. So it will be a very good year. But keep in mind that the business of SMO is composed of two revenue streams. If you want a certain recurring revenue stream, which is linked to our install base, a replacement, if you want, and then there's those mega crews that create volatility from a quarterly basis. So to date, we only have one mega crew identified in Saudi Arabia.
I would call it a super mega crew in the sense that it's equivalent to two traditional mega crews. So it's, it's fairly significant. Now, the—if you remember this year, the bid was being delayed, and there's been a lot of delays. So right now it seems like deliveries would be targeted to Q4 last year, next year, meaning that it could easily slip from Q4 to Q, you know, into even 2025, right? Creating some volatility. So that's for the super mega crew in Saudi Arabia. We have in mind as well, some large crews in North Africa that we'll be pursuing. On the node side, it looks like it might be more deeper water requests, but it's not like associated to a specific mega crew, but it's just general increasing demand for OBN.
Are companies doing marine seismic finally starting to replace streamers, which should be quite old by now?
Yes, but we are always looking at the age of our streamer base. So the age of our streamer base is like somewhere around 11 years old. So you think that by now, you know, they would definitely go into replacement cycle. What we're seeing is more... I told you, the replacement cycle is taking a different shape than we anticipated, in the sense that, our clients are replacing portions of their streamer set. So they're doing a mix and match between old streamers and newer streamers. They're trying to refurbish as well. Now, eventually, all these streamers will have to be replaced, and we're definitely seeing requests for quotation, but not really a significant increase in orders. We're still at that recurring level, not at that sort of full replacement level yet.
Eventually, I mean, I would expect that at least that replacement level sets at a higher level.
Thank you.
Thank you. We have one further question, and the question comes from the line of Guillaume Delaby from Société Générale. Please go ahead.
Bonsoir, Sophie. Bonsoir, Jérôme. One question for Jérôme. Basically, I would like to come back on the working capital dynamics to be sure to really understand the different moving parts. So basically, change in working capital after nine months is -$23.5 million. If I understood correctly, and we all know that forecasting change in working capital is highly a difficult exercise, but I understand that it might be $10 million more, so let's say -$33 million at the end of the year. Your guidance at the beginning of the year was neutral free cash flow, excluding change in working capital, and now you are saying neutral free cash flow, including.
Just to be really sure, is it, I would say, given the fact that you are more or less implicitly forecasting -$33 million, so is it, I would say, some kind of increase in guidance? Just to be sure.
Yeah, let's put it that way. Because the guidance was excluding working capital and here with we ambition to be breakeven or inclusive, so yes.
So, okay. No, no, I just wanted to be sure, because, you know. Thank you. I turn it over.
Yeah, Guillaume, just to add, you know, when we—as you know, it's difficult to plan for working cap, and that's why when we guided for the year, we wanted to exclude the working cap. But now we are fairly advanced in the year and have a good visibility on it, and so we are more confident. But we always, I told you last quarter, that our aim was always to have it all inclusive, and that's the number we look at, is the net cash flow, including everything. And by the way, including at year-end, around $16 million of payments to Shearwater between the $21 million of IDC, and exceptional, which has gone below, and then the $40-some million that will be included in the EBITDA.
We stop here. Merci, Sophie. Have a nice evening.
Of course, Guillaume. Bye.
Thank you. We have another question, and the question comes from the line of Daniel Thomson from BNP Paribas. Please go ahead.
Hi, good evening. Just one question on late sales. Obviously we had improvement this quarter, but of course we had $20 million, sort of, which was delayed from 2Q to 3Q coming this quarter. So, you know, underlying sales are probably not as robust as you want it to be.... I think you mentioned last quarter that you saw improvements in order intake trends related to this in the year-to-date figures. So can you just talk about order intake trends in the third quarter, how it's progressed and how it's looking, you know, over the first nine months? Thanks.
Yes, thank you, Daniel. So I'll comment first on Earth Data. So as you saw, in terms of order intake, and you see it through the pre-funding, I mean, the pre-funding has been very sustained this year, and that's the reason of also is we've invested less in CapEx. But in terms of after sales, I did mention that last quarter, we were looking at kind of thinking it's around that 10%-ish improvement year-on-year, but outside, keep in mind that exceptional transfer fee that we had last year and our footprint change in the U.S. So corrected for that, we're sort of trending a 10% up year to date, and we look at it on a rolling basis, and that's pretty much where we at. So it is improving, but not as much.
If you take as a reference 15%, 15%-17% exploration CapEx offshore improvement in 2023 over 2022, the Earth Data is sort of a little down, is down from that macro trend, if you want. And that's when, where in the conclusion, I said, well, for Geoscience, it's truly sort of materializing, where for Earth Data, we're somewhat lagging. And I think the, the difficulty of Earth Data is clients are struggling with the projecting themselves beyond, say, 2035, 2040, and they're really looking for projects that they think can become material and have an impact on production in the shortest term possible. But at the same time, we're seeing when would demand for our data that is not in the core basins, and we saw with we're launching the project in Malaysia, for example.
So we're doing and we're growing, basically, where the pre-funding is. So in general, correcting for those exceptional, it's trending up, but not as high as the macro number in Earth Data. But then in Geoscience, we're definitely trending along those lines of the sort of the macro trends. And as I was being difficult to project because it has that volatility of specific deals that could be positioned a quarter or another, or even from a year to another year. I think I mentioned as well somewhere that, perhaps from the backlog of Geoscience and the reason why it was that 3% year-on-year, is because there are two large contracts for NOCs that are pending signature and that we haven't put in our backlog. So they're fairly significant.
If we had them in there, we would see the kind of the significant increase in backlog year-over-year. So we're not concerned that, you know, the Geoscience is definitely on that uptrend.
Okay. Thanks, Sophie.
Sure.
Thank you. There are currently no further questions. I will hand back to CGG for closing remarks.
All right. Well, thank you very much. Thank you for the lots of questions and really good questions, and thanks for your time and your interest, and we'll be in touch in the next few days or weeks. Thank you again. Good evening.
Thank you, indeed. Good evening.
Thank you. This concludes today's conference call. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.