Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Cherry SE's Full Year 2025 Earnings Call. Thank you for taking the time to join us today. You have just seen the launch video of CHERRY XTRFY first TMR-p owered keyboard. This product exemplifies our strategic focus, combining cutting-edge magnetic technology with premium build quality and next-level performance. The keyboard is designed for gamers who want maximum speed, precision, and customization. As customary, today's call is being recorded. During the presentation, participants will be in listen-only mode until we open the floor for Q&A. Joining me today are Rogier Volmer, Chief Executive Officer, Jurjen Jongma, Chief Financial Officer, Dr. Udo Streller, Chief Operating Officer. Today, Udo has dialed in from China. Let me briefly outline today's agenda.
Rogier will begin with introductory remarks, this being his first earnings call as CEO of Cherry, and will frame the strategic direction of the company and highlight key milestones achieved in 2025. Jurjen will walk you through our Q4 and full year 2025 financial performance, followed by a segment review and a detailed discussion of a comparable P&L, also on a segmental basis. He will also explain the structural and operational drivers behind the significant reduction in working capital. Udo will subsequently provide an operational update, including progress on our restructuring program and advancements in sustainability initiatives, particularly regarding our carbon footprint. We will conclude with Rogier outlining our strategic outlook, including insights into our innovation pipeline and our way forward. After the presentation, we will open the Q&A session. With that, let me hand it over to Rogier.
Thank you, Nicole. Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to Cherry's Q4 and Full Year 2025 Earnings Call. Today, we will walk you through our final 2025 results and the actions we have taken to reshape our business across the key segments. We will also outline the actions already implemented and those that are still ahead of us to ensure a sustainable change, of course. While this call is primarily about the financial performance, it's also an opportunity to introduce myself and to share my initial observations. My mandate from the supervisory board is to create stability, support the team, and ensure Cherry is managed with professional discipline during this important phase of the company. Most of my career I spent in peripherals and accessories. I worked nine years at Philips, 10 years at Logitech, and four years at Trust.
Most recently, I held a management position at Haier Europe, where I have been responsible for driving a turnaround in two of the core European regions. What attracted me to Cherry is the combination of a global recognized brand, strong engineering capability, and a company that is at an important turning point. We have leading technology and highly committed employees. Over the past weeks, I have visited our teams worldwide, and without exception, I've experienced strong engagement and pride in the company. The focus now is to strengthen stability, set clear priorities, and build a sustainable future together with the team. To deliver sustainable performance, we first had to stabilize the foundation. 2025 was fundamentally a year of structural refocusing and operational cleanup. By reaching several critical milestones, we created the necessary room to shift from stabilization towards more disciplined execution.
A key step was strengthening the leadership team to ensure clear accountability across all segments. Alexander Hecker took the responsibility for Global Sales of Peripherals. Philip Groth has been leading the Digital Health business and solutions since March 2025. In September, Jurjen Jongma joined as CFO, bringing the management board to its full strength. Another more important milestone was the sale of our Active Key hygiene business to Pontis. This transaction generated a fixed purchase price of EUR 10.3 million and a book gain of EUR 5.7 million. More importantly, it allows us to focus our resources on our core competencies. In Digital Health, we achieved TI-Messenger provider approval from gematik in August, followed by the TIM.Pro approval in December. These approvals are important building blocks for our positioning secure digital communication.
Finally, we made strong progress in our operational fundamentals, particularly in reducing the inventory, a key focus of the strategy. The group inventories now stand at EUR 28.8 million, down EUR 29.5 million compared to previous year. At the same time, we reduced complexity by cutting number of SKUs by more than 40% since January 2025. These steps support our stabilization and have been delivering the first results that are needed for the next phase. Over to Jurjen, who will guide us through the financials.
Yeah, thanks a lot Rogier, thank you all for the interest in our Q4 2025 webcast. Let me start with an overview of the key KPIs and the main drivers behind it. At EUR 94.3 million, our full year revenue was down 15% in 2025, primarily driven by weaker demand in the Component segment, but also due to the basis effect of the deconsolidation of Active Key, which we sold in May 2025. On a like-for-like basis, revenues actually grew by 4.7%. As a consequence of this, adjusted EBITDA in 2025 was significantly down as well. In the fourth quarter of 2025, revenue amounted close to EUR 24 million, down 10% versus the same quarter of the previous year.
Adjusted EBITDA of the same period improved on a year-on-year basis, driven by strong underlying demand for eHealth terminals, as well as narrowed losses in peripherals and much better capital and cost discipline. Obviously, we are far from satisfied with these numbers, as we had promised to reach even break even after two comprehensive and consecutive restructuring programs. If we then move on to the next slides, I start with addressing overall performance in terms of revenue and adjusted EBITDA. Note that Q1 is depicted in dark gray, Q2 in light gray, Q3 in red, and finally Q4 in black. We ended 2025 with EUR 94.3 million of revenue, like I just said, against our guidance of north of EUR 100 million.
This is predominantly related to lower than expected sales of our card reader terminals in the Digital Health segment on the back of the government decision to postpone mandatory adoption of those credit terminals. We see, however, that we are recuperating from that, and we are positive about the initial developments in Q1 2026 in our Digital Health segment. In addition, our Peripheral segment suffered from the inability to fulfill all of the orders towards the year end of 2025 due to shipments arriving late in Europe. These orders will shift to 2026. In terms of adjusted EBITDA, I'm encouraged by our lower operational cost levels, which is one of the key drivers to narrow the losses in both Q3 and in Q4. I will dive a little deeper in adjusted items later on in the presentation.
We then move to the next slide, let me elaborate on the results per segment for the full year and for Q4 2025. As it is our custom in this slide, the Component segment is shown in light gray, Gaming and Office Peripheral segment in red, Digital Health and Solutions in dark gray, the Central segment in black. Looking at Components in light gray, we can be brief. Annual revenue to third parties is now less than half of what it was in 2023, with a significant loss. As far as components are concerned, we obviously continue to use our switches in our own keyboards, going forward, we only entertain profitable sales with third parties. As can be seen on the slide, the business showed a considerable loss in 2025 of more than EUR 5 million.
Our Peripherals business, even though pressured by supplies arriving late in Europe, showed low single-digit growth in the fourth quarter, bringing annual revenues to a level of EUR 67.2 million. As it had been the case throughout 2024 and 2025, the EBITDA contribution of our Peripherals business continues to be negative, driven by adverse margin effects. We see, however, that the loss in Q4 was half of the loss recorded in 2024, signaling the first signs of margin recovery. In Digital Health, the sales decline versus 2024 is entirely driven by our Active Key business, which was divested in June of 2025. Excluding this on a like-for-like basis, the Digital Health business shows very healthy growth levels of 17%.
Although the adjusted EBITDA numbers in 2025 contain part of the proceeds from the Active Key divestment, the digital health segment performs on a very strong and healthy EBITDA level. As I said, I will elaborate on adjustments in more granular detail as I believe that the 2025 adjustments results contain too many non-recurring item, which blurs a transparent view on underlying operational performance. As I commented during our Q3 call, it's obvious that our Central segment is too heavy a burden on the total organization with an adjusted EBITDA level of minus EUR 50 million in 2025. Our cost reduction efforts are beginning to bear fruit, and I will provide a little bit more color on cost and cost effectiveness further on in the presentation.
Let me now spend some time on a topic that is very close to my heart and that we really must address in order to get a better, more transparent view on true operational performance. Unfortunately, in 2025, our adjustments did not fully reflect the non-recurring nature that, in my view, adjustments should reflect. Let me illustrate this with the next slide. In brief, although our methodology of arriving at adjusted EBITDA was consistent, it include a clear distinction between recurring items that reflects normal continuing operations and non-recurring items that should be adjusted out. Upon my start in September 2025, we looked closer at this methodology and came up with a stricter definition of items to be adjusted out, obviously which were not.
Although the adjusted EBITDA for the group as a whole remains largely unaffected, we did find that the adjusted results for the Peripheral segment were pictured too low, and the adjusted results for the DH and S segment were pictured too high. While this transparency certainly is something that we wish to provide for our investors and our shareholders, it is also important for ourselves in a sense that we must focus on true underlying operational performance. In the slide that is currently screened, you will see what we actually adjusted our 2024, 2025 results were as they are now published. You can also see what we should have adjusted for, and had we followed a more robust distinction between recurring results and operational performance.
If we then do this and apply these effects on our actual segmental performance, we arrive at a segmental view that makes more sense, allows us to look at real progress over time, and more importantly, let us take the right decisions going forward. You will see this depicted in the next slide. We can now start and take a closer look at segmental performance and can draw a number of important conclusions, specifically related to peripherals and DH and S. For peripherals, we see the gross margin appreciated by some 500 basis points to almost 38%. While this is still too low, it represents an important improvement versus prior years. In Digital Health, margins remain strong and results are largely in line with 2024, albeit that we continue to invest to ensure that we capture the growth opportunities in this market.
In 2026, we will adopt this methodology of adjusting EBITDA, and we will restate the 2025 results for it so that the 2026, 2025 comparison is on a like-for-like basis. Before we now move to the balance sheet, I would like to highlight what has been done on the cost side since 2023. As you can see, on a comparable basis, we've taken out approximately EUR 60 million of cost over these two last years across all cost categories. Given where we are in terms of profitability, this is still not enough. Therefore, we're planning to take out at least another EUR 10 million in 2026. Now that I've taken you through the main elements in our 2025 P&L, let me move to working capital.
Since March 2023, the group has consistently managed inventories down from EUR 75 million in 2023 to EUR 29 million by the end of December 2025. As it is very apparent in our results, a part of this inventory decrease is related to write-offs, and these have no cash effect. Importantly, however, almost 80% of the inventory reduction actually represents the sell-off of inventories. As the quality of our gross margin clearly suggests, this has often happened at a strongly discounted price, but it obviously did generate liquidity for the group. If we now take a little closer look at the cash conversion cycle, you will see that this has improved by 90 days since 2023, which is the key driver behind our resilience from a liquidity and cash point of view. With that, let me pass on to Udo.
Good afternoon also from my side. Greetings from China. Exceptional, means I'm not in the same group like my colleagues, being in China here. Warm welcome also here to all of you in the today's conference. In the next few minutes, I will present you a detailed CEO strategy update. We'll provide also an example for our ESG measures, one just as an example, and also the world restructuring benefits that we have reaped so far. With the slide you see now, this explains how we translate strategy into sustainable value creation. The core of our operating model is what we call the heart of Cherry. It's our culture and our ESG foundation. For us, ESG is not a reporting exercise. It is embedded in the operational decision-making, risk management, and capital allocation.
It reduced volatility and strengthens long-term resilience. Around this core and its first driver, we focus on four additional strategic value drivers. In alphabetical order, means all are equally important. It's the product and the innovation and the technology, ensuring differentiating customer value and protecting pricing power through innovation. It's a performance at the footprint, continuously optimizing our global manufacturing footprint to secure scalability, cost efficiency, and margin stability. At the quality, preventive and best in class, reducing failure costs, and safeguarding our brand and customer trust. Last but not least, the supply chain being resilient and customer-centric, mitigating disruption risk while protecting service levels and working capital performance. Execution discipline is critical for all of these elements. Here we operate with a clear annual strategy review cycle and a structured half-year roadmap deployment. This creates transparency, accountability, and measurable progress.
From the CEO perspective, this ensures three things. First, the operational leverage, the risk mitigation, and the disciplined capital efficiency. In short, it's a scalable, resilient operating platform designed to deliver sustainable returns. Within the field just as an example of ESG, we compiled in 2024, now for the first time since the IPO, a detailed material reality analysis. Based on a progressively compiled long list of potential material relevant topics, a total of seven ESRS topics, including corresponding subtopics, were systematically assessed in terms of their impact and their financial materiality, critically examined and classified in the materiality metrics. Strategic packages of measures were derived accordingly. Here as example, it's just one example, provided for the topic, so-called topic E.1, the climate change. It's our CCF corporate carbon footprint analysis we have done.
If we're looking to, and we have looked in detail and in total all of our emissions, for 2024, we had this, slightly more than 36,000 CO2 equivalent were caused by our business activities in the year 2024. Less than 2% out of these are really direct emissions, what is so-called Scope 1 emissions from our factories itself. An extremely tiny fraction are upstream's emissions related to energy consumption, Scope 2. I will come to this why that's so low. The far majority, roughly 98%, are due to other upstream emissions, the so-called Scope 3. The corporate carbon footprint serves to identify the large sources of the emissions within the company and along the upstream and downstream value chain. With the support of our CCF, we focus on four value-relevant outcomes.
First, what we had achieved is increasing transparency across Scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions, strengthen risk management and strategic steering. Secondly, ensuring regulatory compliance and future-proof reporting, reducing exposure to transition risk. Thirdly, improving energy efficiency and cost discipline, protecting margins. As fourth point, enhancing access to capital and customer contracts by demonstrating measurable ESG progress. In short, the CCF is not just a sustainability tool, it's really a risk mitigation and a value protection instrument supporting long-term shareholder returns. For the point of the general optimization and footprint optimization restructuring Oliver already mentioned, we have gone through several quarters over a period of time, which resulted in a production shift to China, as well as a reclassification of the Auerbach site. For this, I would like to give you a quick overview on the main benefits that resulted from these measures.
First, we have reduced our in-house manufacturing sites to two, one in Zhuhai and one in Vienna. Zhuhai for the peripherals, Vienna is for the terminals, completed by two established subcomponent partners for peripherals in Slovakia and China. Secondly, we have streamlined the number of warehouses, our global warehouses, from seven to three. One then each in Europe, Asia, and one in US. In the European, Auerbach warehouse, all European business, including the Peripheral webshop and the digital health products are being handled. Auerbach remains the development site for the hardware technology, and that means also including switch development and for some piloting for the metal parts. It is becoming complemented by our development hubs in Sweden and in China. By this, we are really globally set it up. Our software and firmware development center is based in Vienna. With this, back to you, Rogier.
Thank you, Udo. Now moving to our outlook and the road ahead. Our priorities are clear: transparency, operational discipline, and realistic sustainable goals. We're not here to make any bold promises. We're here to show how we steadily strengthen Cherry's foundation to create long-term value. Our business stands on two pillars. One, the continued transformation of our Digital Health business into a platform-driven model. Two, the structural realignment of peripherals and components to reflect market realities and focus on our core competencies. Our long-term ambition remains clear: to evolve Cherry into a provider of secure, quality, and high-performance input solutions built on our hardware footprint. In digital health and solutions, demand for our terminals remains solid. Our installed hardware base is the foundation that enables us to bundle software solutions.
With the rollout of TI- Messenger, we are progressing from a hardware-focused model toward a more platform-based model with recurring revenues. Over time, this shift will improve revenue visibility and margin quality. We expect our proof of patients present SaaS business, the based offerings to become increasingly relevant over the coming years. Our hardware creates entry points. Software adds recurring value. In peripherals, stabilization is visible, the foundation is stronger, and we still have improvements to make. We are positioning Cherry as a focused input device specialist with our proprietary technology. With this, our ambition is to strengthen our position in the core segments, in the core markets over the coming years. From a regional perspective, in EMEA, we see that the transition is progressing and operational stabilization becomes more visible.
In APAC, and predominantly China, we see that a disciplined action, execution and a clear focus is driving solid performance with room for further profitable growth. In the Americas, the reset continues. We are prioritizing structural profitability over short-term volume. This turnaround requires discipline rather than quick fixes. Overall, the foundation is stronger, transparency is improving, and our focus is firmly on sustainable profitability. Now a bit more details on the specific businesses. First, let me start with Digital Health. Our e-health business is built on a strong foundation. Looking at the numbers, we expect up to 200,000 additional unit deliveries through 2028. A key highlight of our operational improvement is the 45% decrease in return rates in 2025, which provides a direct increase of our margin. The strategic logic behind this business is simple but powerful.
Our established hardware footprint enables bundling with new software offers. This is the foundation for our licensing model, which creates compounding recurring revenues. By moving away from purely transactional hardware sales, we ensure that each new bundle adds incremental, predictable revenue that accumulates month-over-month. This shift not only increases our visibility, but also ensures that the platform-driven transformation we talk about is backed by a scalable and highly profitable financial structure. Furthermore, the 120,000 new TI users who were previously postponed represent a unique opportunity. Unlike existing customers, they will need both hardware and software right from the start. This perfectly fits into the new business model. The German telematics infrastructure remains a regulated and highly attractive market with long-term visibility. Several regulatory milestones will drive demand, including the mandatory connection of 90,000 therapeutic and medical aid providers.
The PoPP is an important component of the telematics infrastructure in Germany, enabling digital verification that a patient is receiving medical care. It is scheduled to be rolled out at the end of 2026. Next to this, we are actively evaluating all opportunities here and identifying exactly where our expertise in secure hardware and certification plus software can create a differentiated value. We will focus on secure connectivity solutions with this new architecture. At the same time, the integration of AI into TI- Messenger opens opportunities for additional value-added services. On Peripherals and Components. As mentioned earlier, 2025 was fundamentally about stabilizing and strengthening the foundation of this business. We will focus on three core areas. First, working capital and inventory discipline. We significantly reduced our inventory from peak levels, actively sold down slow-moving SKUs, and we restored price discipline across our core portfolio.
At the same time, we implemented a more demand-driven replenishment model, and this was essential to improve transparency and control. The second part is our portfolio and commercial focus. We initiated SKU simplification, and we have sharpened the differentiation between B2B and B2C. Our emphasis is clearly shifting toward our core higher-priority segments, where we see sustainable demand and margin potential. The objective here is to focus and to do more with less and clear positioning of the products. Thirdly, the structural simplification. We optimized our distribution model, clarified regional ownership, streamlined logistics, and improved visibility across the value chain. This reduced and will further reduce complexity and strengthen accountability. Importantly, although the reset is not yet fully completed, the business today is structurally stronger than it was a year ago. Working capital intensity is improving, as shown by Udo.
Transparency is higher, operational discipline is increasing, and this provides us with foundation towards a more disciplined execution. On products. With the portfolio stay streamlined and inventory largely normalized, our focus now shifts to innovation with fewer and bigger products. Our 2026 pipeline is balanced across Office, Gaming, and Security Peripherals, all built on our foundation of in-house technology and hardware expertise. In office, we are expanding our cordless and premium portfolio while strengthening our presence in the B2B environments. A key highlight is the MX 8.2 TMR, as you could have seen in the intro video. Here we bring our high-end mechanical technology into a modern wireless office design. This segment is about stable demand, margin consistency, and quality differentiation. Gaming. In Gaming, we will continue to leverage our CHERRY XTRFY brand.
With launches like the K5 TMR and other MX-based platforms, we fully control the core technology inside the keyboard. This gives us a clear differentiation in performance and durability in the premium segment. The security in specialized markets, where our certified hardware solutions underline our role as trusted partner in regulated environments where compliance and secure connectivity are critical. Products such as the SmartBoard 1150 and the Smart Terminal highlight our capabilities in reliability, security, and long product lifecycles. Across regions, including China, we use our global platforms and products with locally adapted editions, like you can see here with Pokémon, that increases brand visibility and support our China for China business. The pipeline shows innovation with fewer and more targeted products, aligned with our cordless growth, midst to premium positioning and secure connectivity.
As I mentioned earlier, we see an opportunity in retail and wireless products. Our portfolio has historically been strong in B2B and quarter products. However, the market clearly shows that structural growth lies in retail and wireless products. According to the GfK data, for Germany, retail growth accelerated to 14% in Q4 2025. More importantly, the retail value share of the total market increased from 65%-74% over the past periods. This confirms a structural shift towards the retail channel. The market mix is moving, and we are aligning our portfolio and go to market strategy accordingly. The wireless category has reached a critical point. Approximately 80% of the German market is now cordless. Given our historically stronger position in the quarter products, this is a clear opportunity for us.
By strengthening our cordless portfolio and expanding our retail business, we are addressing the segments with the strongest opportunity. Our strategy is therefore to build on our technological strength and expand into segments where market growth and potential are structurally higher. Let me briefly update you now on the ongoing strategic review. As announced in last November, an M&A process was initiated for the divestment of one of the segments, Peripherals or Digital Health and Solutions. The objective of this process is to further strengthen the company's financial position while ensuring that the remaining division is optimally positioned and financed for its future growth. As previously communicated, we continue to work towards concluding the strategic review within the first half of 2026. The process is progressing in a structured and disciplined manner in line with our internal planning. Engagement with interesting parties is ongoing.
These discussions are being conducted under customary confidentiality arrangements. As such, we are limited in the level of detail we can provide at this stage. What we can say is that we are seeing interest from both strategic and financial investors. This reflects the underlying value and positioning of the business. Our clear priority throughout this process is to act in the best interest of the company and its shareholders. We remain focused on executing the process professionally and with discipline. We will provide further updates as appropriate and when there's a greater certainty. In the meantime, we ask for your understanding that we cannot provide any further information on the details of the M&A process. This is a structured process in which, in accordance with market practice, detailed information is only disclosed to those involved in the process.
Lastly, let me close with a brief perspective on our priorities going forward. After a year focused on stabilization, we are now moving into execution phase. We will continue to reduce inventory and complete the remaining cleanup. This improves our capital efficiency, increases transparency, and will strengthen our operational foundation. At the same time, we are sharpening operational control across the organization. This means clearer targets, better performance tracking, and stronger cost discipline. We will simplify processes and further clarify regional responsibilities. Decision-making is moving closer to the market, which strengthens ownership and improve the execution. At the same time, we are focusing our portfolio on core priorities, directing resources to areas with clear strategic relevance and sustainable margin potential. Our goal is to improve margin quality and optimize our product mix through disciplined commercial execution and structural improvements.
Regarding Guidance, we will provide a credible outlook in the second quarter based on better visibility and realistic assumptions. Regaining trust through reliable and consistent performance remains our key priority. Overall, our focus is clear: strengthen operational performance, restore sustainable profitability, and position Cherry for long-term success. I hand off to Nicole.
Ladies and gentlemen, we will now open the floor for questions. In order to raise your questions, click on the Raise Your Hand button. Participants dialing in by phone can press star nine to signal a question, followed by star six to unmute your phone. Dear participants, we're now looking forward to the discussion. The first question comes from Bastian Brach, Montega
Thank you. Some questions for me. The first one is on the card reader, which obviously strong growth last year. You said software revenues could outpace hardware revenues there as early as 2029. Could you give us some guidance when we can expect material software revenue? Is it already, like, in H2 this year, or is it more like 2027 and late 2027? This would be my first question, and the other two for Jurjen. The EUR 10 million cost savings you mentioned in some of the slides. Could you, like, detail in which department? Is it mainly in G&A, or is it a marketing reduction or more on the operating side? My last question would be on the gross margin adjustments you also mentioned in the Peripheral segment.
Could you explain that further? I didn't really get it in the short amount of time. Thank you.
Okay. I think all these questions are for me. Thank you, Bastian, for these questions. I think, you know, by and large, your first question is on the distinction between hardware sales and software sales in the Digital Health area. In 2026, we expect the vast majority of our revenue to be hardware-based still. You know, obviously, we also see that at a certain point in time, you know, all the healthcare providers will have a card reader, and then this business becomes more of a replacement business. We have forecasted some software revenues in the course of 2026, but like I said, the vast majority will still be on hardware. We see that gradually picking up in the years thereafter.
When it comes to cost savings, you would actually see this across the board. I mean, it would be difficult for me to highlight a particular department or a particular cost category. What I can say is that by and large, these savings, you know, are, let's say, the outcome of all of the restructuring that has been done in the past. You basically, you will see in 2026 a cleaner run rate of operational costs, and obviously, that is across the board. But the big impact, you know, obviously comes from, you know, by and large, closing down our production facilities in Auerbach.
Okay.
On gross margin, perhaps you can reiterate the question. The slide on, let's say the adjustments and the changes were unclear or?
Yeah
the question?
Yeah. On the Peripherals segment, you restated the gross margin. Could you explain why you did that and why it's now higher? Is it the, yeah, inventory sell-down to your partner in the U.S.?
No. First and foremost, you know, we're not in 25 adjusting the numbers, but I was interested, and so should you, in, let's say, a true operational outlook of performance. If I do that, and then in Peripherals, by and large, clean for extraordinary items that largely impact margin, like selling off of inventories and obviously the Argand transaction, fits in that profile, you know, then a comparable operational margin performance in the Peripherals segment would be around this 38% as opposed to the adjusted number that you see. On the slide, you see that in the adjusted picture, as we will also publish it in our segment reporting, you see a gross margin of EUR 20 million.
You know, if I adjust for those, let's say, recurring items, you end up at EUR 25.5 million If you will, a bigger adjustment, bringing the operational performance in the Peripheral segment to close to 38%.
Okay. Okay. Got it. The published numbers are, like, the adjusted.
Correct
... role.
So, so you will-
Okay
... the numbers that we published are in the adjusted column indeed. Yes.
Okay. Thank you. Got it.
Okay. Yeah.
Thank you for your questions, Bastian. The next question comes from Oliver Frey, Bankhaus Metzler. Oliver, please go ahead.
Hey, everybody. Thank you for taking my questions. I would start maybe with the Q4 shipment delays and Peripherals. Could you quantify these and how much are you expecting to get in Q1?
No, it's difficult for me to quantify it. Like I said, you know, we gave guidance of, you know, just short of EUR 100 million. If you take that, it would be approximately EUR 6 million. That is too big a number, because the miss against EUR 100 million was also to a certain extent healthcare related, where we expected to ship more. We expect a, let's say modest quarter on the Peripherals side for Q1. It's difficult to exactly quantify the, let's say delayed shipment number. Oliver.
Got it. Thank you. Maybe on the restructuring side, how much expenses are you planning in to get to those EUR 10 million in savings you are targeting?
Yeah. Like I just mentioned to Bastian as also thanks for the question. The EUR 10 million of cost savings that we're planning in 2026 are a result of restructuring that has already happened. I'm not planning to spend additional restructuring on it. That is already included in all of the actions that we did so far.
Perfect. Maybe, like, as a small last question on the inventory side. I think in earlier of 2025, you mentioned a targeted run rate of around EUR 50 million. Did this change?
I don't think that this EUR 50 million is coming from me because the EUR 50 million was already achieved somewhere, half 2025, if I'm not mistaken. I think when I joined, we were somewhere in the high 30s. I've never seen this EUR 50 million level. If you look at the number of days in terms of inventories, that you can also see in the cash conversion cycle, in the picture. Yeah, then, you know, we're at 114 days, you know, towards the end of 2025. That's a third, approximately. You know, so that is like four months. I still think honestly, that four months is on the long side. We see some further opportunities.
EUR 50 million is a number, Oliver, that I don't recognize.
I can shortly comment. I think 50 was as mentioned as a reasonable target for end of 2024. We reported then in the Quarter 1 2025 call. This is where the figure. Also for this year it was a realistic figure.
Okay. No, that's fine. Thank you very much.
As mentioned, EUR 50 million for now would be by far too high.
Thank you.
Thank you for your questions, Oliver. We have another question coming in from Philipp Frey, formerly Warburg, today Excelsis Capital. Please unmute. Philipp, from what I can see, you're still on mute.
Can you hear me now?
Yes.
Yeah, sorry. Difficult question. No, thank you very much for the elaborate presentation. I am a bit struggling honestly with the impact of the Argand deal and your gross margin adjustment, restatement, however we want to term that. Because I was under the impression that the Argand deal is also impacting your sales and that this negatively in that way. First of all, how should we look at the Q4 underlying growth in Peripherals? What's the best way to get your real underlying growth? Shall we probably just look at Europe where you didn't sell any inventory, how you performed there, or what's your suggestion?
Yeah. Philipp, I thought about this long and hard because, you know, you can argue not only for the Argand sales, but for all of our inventory clean of sales, that you should not only adjust margin for it, but, you know, since you are selling at a discounted price, your sales level is also subdued, right? That is exactly-
Right
... your point. You know, although I would describe myself as creative, I really don't dare to go as far to adjust sales to a higher level. I have to, you know, if any margins or if any adjustments, they would impact margins and not sales. It is clear also if you look at the inventory picture and that, you know, the 80% of the inventory reduction that comes from sales. Some of that is really truly normal, at normal prices and normal distribution. A lot of our sales in the past two years are accelerated inventory sales at discounted prices. Very, very valid question. Super difficult to answer, but maybe Rogier you can say something to it.
It's, I don't know the exact answer to it.
Yeah. I feared something like that.
I've nothing to add. Yeah.
No.
I can give it a go, take it, take it as an action, but.
Yeah
It's very difficult.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Related to that, well, if you stated now in Peripheral something like 38% gross margin, and I think we understand that there is still quite a lot of exceptionals in that. If you look at fresh merchandise that you are sourcing right now, what kind of gross margin do you consider feasible if you are, well, in an, say, normal mode and not selling under duress?
For me, that would be looking at industry standards and see, you know, what margins do we usually see in, let's say, the computer peripherals markets. We look at what we call gross profit ones, so sales minus cost of sales of around 48%, maybe 50% even. We're still 10%, 12% off of that.
Mm-hmm.
I think, personally, and Rogier said that.
Yeah
... we will come with the more narrow guidance, in the course of the second quarter. You know, for us to now budget and plan at this 48%, 50%, would be naive.
Yeah
... and overly optimistic. That should definitely be our entitlement level.
Yeah.
To add to that for this year, as I already mentioned in my part as well, we still have some writing off to do.
Mm-hmm
... inventory that we need to get rid of. That will, for sure, impact the gross margin in 2026.
Right.
As Jurjen said, the industry standard lies between 48 and 50, to what we believe. You know, is it realistic to think that we already be there excluding the write-offs? That might be a bit of a challenge, but we should be above, for sure, should be above a run rate of 38% that we, that Jurjen showed in the, in the margin slide.
Yeah
I think there's room for improvement still. We will have some impact in 2026 based on previous inventory.
Right. How clogged do you see your customers' inventory position? How staffed is the channel?
The exact numbers, I don't have. What I do know is that the inventory at our direct partners has reduced significantly versus last year as well. Also there, we still have slightly too much inventory. As Jurjen said, I think 190, 114 days that we currently have, I think is also still on the high side. That also accounts for our customers. Also there we see a margin... or sorry, a stock reduction for both the core distribution partners that we have in Europe.
Right.
In parallel, we are working with them to further reduce that to normal levels.
Right. Probably one last and question, a bit. Well, imagine you were successful in selling, one of your divisions and getting a nice cash in. What kind of projects are you seeing that would enable you to undertake? What kind of uplift in terms of profitability or capital returns could that unleash basically?
That is, that is difficult to answer because, let me try a little bit. Our Digital Health business today is hampered by our inability to fully invest in all of the opportunities that are there. Our Peripherals business today is hampered by, you know, our constant urge for cash, which means that, you know, we are sometimes compelled to make deals that help us from a liquidity point of view, but do not help us from a margin point of view. You know, either way, you know, for a sale of the Peripheral segment would mean that, you know, we would have ample of monies available to invest in the Digital Health business.
The other way around, you know, a sale of the Digital Health business would allow us to truly invest in, let's say, sustainable margin improvement and, you know, focus on sustainable healthy underlying profitability rather than, you know, having to struggle for cash.
Yeah. Right. That leaves me just to wish you best of luck in your sales process and to really bring this turnaround fully to fruition and, well, looking forward what division you sell.
Okay. Thank you, Philipp. Thank you.
Thank you, Philipp. Best of luck to you too. We are running out of time, we're coming to the very last question of somebody I have only an abbreviation of, CHUVE. Please state your name and company, and unmute.
You can hear me?
Yes.
Yes. That's Ramon Huber from LIMMAT CAPITAL .
Ramon Huber.
I have three small ones. On the slide 22, you have the red color 26, what you said you're selling units already in the... Is that for the first two months you sold so many? How much is coming from last year? Is there some special effects in, or is it going in this speed further up the year?
No, in all honesty, I think that picture, we have some, of course, Jurjen already mentioned, a part of the miss in the outlook of 2025 was related to the Terminal business. We see a part of the Terminal business indeed that has been postponed to 2026 or to Q1. What you see here is the relative portion versus the expected first half. We expect Q1 will be okay and good with some spill off from 2025. I do, however, think that this picture is also a little bit, it's part of the animation, which is maybe slightly misrepresenting.
I'm just not completely understanding. It means the gray one you have, which is nearly as high as last year full year sales, or, no, second half year? You would expect the first half year to be the same as the second half last year?
No. This is what Rogier tried to say. I see the picture is not a true reflection of the levels so far. The red part is a bit of a misrepresentation of the actual situation. We haven't sold, year to date, you know, half of our levels in 2026. Just to make it very explicitly clear.
Okay.
Yeah
Why you show this picture? Sorry.
Yeah. It's, well, it's a very sharp spot. That is what we shouldn't have done. I mean, it's not a fair representation of the actual situation.
Okay. Okay, you don't want to tell how much you sold compared to last year then?
Yeah. We are. No, I mean, but we're two months in.
That's what-
It's also We are looking at very good and healthy growth in our terminal sales in Digital Health, like we also did in Q4 and the total of 2025. We're absolutely in our Digital Health segment, off to a good start. This is too optimistically represented.
Okay. The decision is made that you sell one of the units as you were writing, or is it still possible that you're going to go sell the whole company?
All right. That is still very well possible. I mean, like Rogier outlined, we're speaking with many interested parties. I do have to say, you know, which is also the reason why we're discussing, you know, sales, or divestment of separate units, is that the synergy, the obvious synergy between the two units is relatively low. Therefore, you know, it is possible to sell the company as a whole. Unlikely, especially, when it would be a strategic buyer.
On the debt side, you have a lot of debts. How relaxed are the banks? How much time do you have for the sale?
The banks are not necessarily very relaxed, but they are also not necessarily very distressed. I mean, we announced last year in the May-June timeframe, also before I was there, the fact that our financing was extended until the end of 2027. That is still there. Obviously, the banks are expecting, you know, for us to repay our obligations, you know, once we conclude a sale. We're also keeping the bank abreast of progress. Other than that, our relationship with the bank is very good, I have to say.
Okay. liquidity is not really an issue for the next 12 months then?
No, I've just outlined to Philipp, as the previous question, that, you know, more often than not, we are pursuing deals that help us from a liquidity and from a cash point of view. Yes, liquidity obviously is a concern. I mean, we're struggling with that on a daily basis.
Okay. Banks are not chasing you that you should redeem it quickly or whatever?
No.
Okay. Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Good luck.
Thank you.
Thank you for your question. This concludes today's webcast. Thank you very much for being with us today. I hand it back to Rogier for his closing comments.
Yeah. Thank you all for participating. Thank you all for also the interesting, high-quality questions. This concludes indeed the hour with Q4 and preliminary 2025, and we are looking forward to seeing, hearing you in the next quarterly update call, which most likely will be in May.
Yeah.
Thank you for your participation, and we wish you a great afternoon. Thank you.