Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the Heidelberger Druckmaschinen AG conference call for the publication of the annual results of the fiscal year 2024/2025. At this time, all participants have been placed on a listen-only mode. The floor will be open for your questions following the presentation. Let me now turn the floor over to Dr. David Schmedding, Chief Technology & Sales Officer.
Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to Heidelberg's conference call on our fiscal year results 2024/2025. I will be guiding you through today's presentation, as Mr. Otto is unfortunately unable to attend due to personal reasons. Let me start by outlining the agenda. First, I will provide a brief overview of our key achievements over the past fiscal year, share insights from our participation in the China Print trade fair held one month ago, and present our outlook for the upcoming fiscal year. Next, I will review the performance of our business segments and highlight regional developments. Finally, Volker Herdin, our Head of Finance, will take you through the financial results in greater detail. Let's begin by taking a closer look at our incoming orders, where we delivered a strong performance last fiscal year.
The key driver of this success was our global footprint, which enabled us to capitalize on growth dynamics across key markets, even in the face of a challenging economic environment. The numbers speak for themselves. Orders were up by a solid 6.4% year-over-year, increasing from EUR 2.28 billion to EUR 2.43 billion in fiscal year 2024/2025, with a book-to-bill ratio well above 1. This clearly outpaces and stands in sharp contrast to the broader German engineering sector, which saw a 7.2% decline over the same period. Looking at the quarterly trend, Q4 shows a positive momentum too. Orders came in at EUR 611 million and were up both quarter and quarter and year-over-year. Our backlog is up 11% year-over-year, giving us a solid foundation as we enter fiscal year 2025/2026. This slide clearly shows the strong operational improvements we achieved over the course of the last fiscal year.
Following a difficult first quarter, with sales falling below prior negative EBITDA margin and free cash flow, mainly due to market hesitation ahead of Drupa, we saw a clear turnaround starting in Q2. With a new management team that took over in Q2, we placed a strong focus on reducing the cost base and efficiency, working through the high order backlog. We successfully managed to steadily increase production output, improve efficiency, and reduce expenses across the company. As a result, we achieved consistent quarter-on-quarter growth in both sales and profitability. In Quarter 3, the EBITDA margin was twice as high as in the previous year, with sales roughly on par with prior year levels. In Quarter 4, we reached an impressive EBITDA margin of 10%. This clearly contributed to turning free cash flow positive, but it was also driven by disciplined working capital management and strong cash collection.
Today, we are proud to say that we achieved our targets, despite a challenging environment and in contrast to the broader mechanical engineering sector. Thanks to our focused efforts, sales remained broadly in line with the previous year, coming in only slightly lower at around -4.6%. Nevertheless, we resiliently managed to maintain our profitability level. Next to this, we were also able to compensate for significant margin pressure resulting from higher collectively bargained wages, which proposed a substantial headwind of EUR 25 million. Free cash flow also continued to show a positive trend. At EUR 51 million, we again delivered a clearly positive figure in the double-digit million range, this time without any one-off effect as seen in previous years. Considering the challenging start to the fiscal year and the demanding environment throughout, these tangible results clearly demonstrate a new level of resilience.
Let me take a moment to highlight our successful participation at China Print 2025, held in Beijing from May 15 to 19. Heidelberg had a very strong presence at the event, making an excellent start to the new fiscal year. We exceeded expectations by selling nearly 350 printing units, driven largely by robust demand in the packaging segment. This will result in high utilization at our local production facility. A major highlight was the first sale of our Jetfire 50 digital press in China, following its debut at the show. Overall, we secured a slightly triple-digit number of hard and soft orders, providing solid momentum for fiscal year 2025/2026 and confirming our strategic focus on packaging and digital solutions. This brings me to our outlook for fiscal year 2025/2026. We are projecting moderate sales growth, with net sales expected to increase from EUR 2.28 billion to EUR 2.35 billion.
This is particularly notable given that the VDMA forecasts a decline in sector-wide sales. On the profitability side, we expect our adjusted EBITDA margin to improve from 7.1% to up to 8%. This would represent our highest profitability level since 2008. Key drivers behind this outlook include the positive momentum from China Print, the impact of our ongoing strategic initiatives, and personal cost measures that are already delivering quick payback. Together, these factors position us well for a strong and profitable year ahead. Now, I will take you through a deep dive into our segments and regional performance. Let's start with a breakdown of our segment performance for fiscal year 2024/2025. Packaging solutions achieved a new all-time high, with orders up by 7% to EUR 1.27 billion, continuing to serve as a key growth driver for Heidelberg.
Net sales declined slightly from EUR 1.24 billion to EUR 1.18 billion, with the adjusted EBITDA margin coming in at around 9%, showing a slight improvement compared to the previous year. In the print segment, we also saw solid growth in order intake, which rose by 6.3% to EUR 1.15 billion. This increase was primarily driven by strong demand for new equipment. However, net sales amounted to EUR 1.1 billion, reflecting a year-over-year decline of 4.1%, largely due to the rate and fee attitude in the market ahead of Drupa. In terms of profitability, the adjusted EBITDA margin declined over the course of the year, mainly as a result of the lower sales volume. In the technology segment, net sales showed a moderate development and have not yet reflected the improved positioning of Empatite. However, the adjusted EBITDA margin showed a significant year-over-year improvement, highlighting operational progress in this area.
Let's move on to the next chart to look at the regional breakdown of orders received. Heidelberg continues to benefit from its global footprint, which supports stable demand across regions despite differing market dynamics. In EMEA, orders received increased by 10.3%, driven by strong investment activities in Italy and robust demand in Eastern Europe. However, net sales declined by 6.4% year-over-year, mainly due to a weak first quarter. Growth in Eastern Europe was not sufficient to offset declines in other parts of the region. In Asia-Pacific, orders received remained stable at EUR 643 million, largely due to a predictable dip in Q4 ahead of China Print in May. Net sales in the region increased by 7.4%, driven by strong performance in the packaging business. In the Americas region, orders received rose by 5.4%, supported by strong growth in Mexico, where orders surged by 23%.
However, net sales declined significantly by nearly 40%, primarily due to a weak start to the fiscal year and ongoing investment reluctance. I will hand it over to Volker, who will walk us through the financial details of the past fiscal year.
Thank you, David, and good afternoon from my side. First of all, let's turn to our EBITDA bridge, which illustrates the year-over-year changes in our operating profitability, which stood at EUR 172 million in fiscal year 2023/2024. Given our catch-up efforts, the decline in sales volumes had only a minor impact of EUR 7 million year-over-year, as our cost margin benefited significantly from higher capacity utilization compared to the previous year. Also, product margins remained broadly stable despite somewhat higher tariff wages, energy prices, and material costs, as positive pricing effects helped to partially offset these increases. Next to this, and thanks to our focused cost control measures, we achieved a notable EUR 17 million improvement in other operating costs, such as reducing external services and increasing efficiency across all functions.
This is also attributable to agreements reached with the Works Council and trade unions to reduce personnel costs, of which initial positive effects were already seen during the past fiscal year. In total, adjusted EBITDA reached EUR 162 million, representing a margin of 7.1%. As previously mentioned, we built a provision of EUR 25 million for future transformation measures, which was excluded from the reported EBITDA. Let's continue with the cash flow section, starting with our operating cash flow. Operating cash flow strongly improved to EUR 113 million, up from EUR 90 million in the prior year. This was enabled by a stable adjusted EBITDA margin of 7.1%, which laid the foundation for this positive development. While tax and interest cash outs remained at the prior year's level, the improvement in operating cash flow was mainly driven by favorable working capital performance.
In particular, higher customer prepayments and the effective use of working capital financing tools reduced working capital by EUR 17 million, representing EUR 29 million more improvement than in the prior year. Overall, Heidelberg has been very successful in reducing its working capital over the past quarter. Relative to net sales, working capital now stands at only 17.6% compared to almost 30% five years ago. Other operating cash outs, such as pensions, which amounted to EUR 36 million, remained at prior year levels and included EUR 21 million related to restructuring initiatives. Let's conclude the cash flow section by taking a closer look at our free cash flow development.
While the change in operating cash flow was already shown on the previous slide, it's worth noting that investment increased to EUR 88 million in the reporting period, EUR 23 million higher than the previous year, primarily due to cash outflows for new demo machines. Investment totaled EUR 26 million, including proceeds from the sale of older demo machines, resulting in a figure slightly below last year's levels. In total, the net investments were EUR 62 million. After 12 months, free cash flow stood at a resilient EUR 51 million compared to EUR 56 million in the previous year. Let's go have a look to our current balance sheet for fiscal year 2024/2025. Our equity ratio increased slightly to 25.1%, primarily supported by a higher pension discount rate that reduced the present value of pensions obligations to EUR 650 million, supported by the EUR 36 million payout.
Additionally, net income of EUR 5 million, including the restructuring provision of EUR 25 million, contributed modestly to equity. Our net financial position improved to positive EUR 91 million based on the free cash flow development. Next to this, our financial headroom remains strong. We have extended our revolving credit-based facility to EUR 370 million with a new maturity in 2028, providing us with the flexibility to pursue future investments and growth initiatives with confidence. Overall, this balance sheet reflects a sound financial foundation and positions us well for the strategic steps ahead. Thanks for listening. Now I'm giving back, handing back to David to round out the presentation.
To wrap up, this slide summarizes the key takeaways from our presentation. First, we have demonstrated that Heidelberg remains resilient despite a challenging market environment. Second, our operational improvements throughout the fiscal year have translated into solid financial results and positive free cash flows. We have implemented the right strategic initiatives to further enhance our profitability and navigate macroeconomic challenges. Third, this progress will become evident next year. With an expected margin increase of up to 8%, we anticipate achieving our best profitability level since 2008. Thanks for listening. Now we are ready for your questions.
Ladies and gentlemen, if you would like to ask a question, please press nine and star on your telephone keypad. In case you wish to withdraw your question, please press three and star. Please press nine and star to register for a question. One moment for the first question, please. First up is Stefan Augustin from Warburg Research. Over to you.
Thank you very much. Hello. The first question is actually on the Q4 development and Q1 development a little bit. Even though you had a very strong Q4 with respect to sales, it has been a little bit lower than you had initially anticipated because we were looking for, let's say, something rather to the level of EUR 2.4 million sales. What is very good is that we kept the margin up, but I was wondering if there simply is some spillover of sales from Q4 into Q1, or what has been the reason that finally, let's say, the sales level you reached in last year was a bit below what you had expected before because the orders were at hand. That would be my first question.
Dr. Silverholz, good afternoon, Mr. Augustin. The first quarter of the last fiscal year was indeed very challenging. Yes, we had to manage these challenges very cautiously. We managed to increase both sales and profitability quarter by quarter, ending the year on a strong note. Overall, and this is also a fact we saw in quarter four, record sales volume with a high capacity utilization nearing its maximum. There was almost nothing more we could do in the last quarter out of the factory. In addition, revenue recognition for certain deals had to be re-scheduled into Q1 of the new fiscal year. At the end, yes, the shift this year we see from last fiscal year into this fiscal year is due to revenue recognition topics. Last fiscal year before Drupa was really challenging.
We produced the capacity to the needs, and this was the reason for the low momentum. Starting with Q2, we steadily increased the sales and profitability over the year, and it ended up close to EUR 2.3 billion.
Would it be correct to expect a, let's say, especially strong Q1 this year as we have revenue recognition from the past? We have a good order intake from China Print right now, and we had a sizable backlog when we moved into the start of this year. Could you give us, let's say, a bold range where you would foresee sales level in Q1 possibly and order level?
Yes, of course. For the time being, as of today, we expect significantly higher sales in our first quarter. We estimate approximately 20% above prior year in Q1. This is now the estimation. At the beginning of the year and before China Print, yes, there was also somehow a momentum in the market adapting the capacity, but nevertheless now, and this is a good message also to you, yes, level will be significantly higher in the first quarter.
Orders in Q1 should also be then above EUR 600 million?
Let's see. There will be a—I would not say that for the quarter still running. At the end, we are still having some time. Overall, we have a stable order development. China Print made a solid contribution to this. With a good order momentum, order intake will be clearly below the strong prior year. This is also definitely true because last year with Drupa, we had an order intake of more than EUR 700 million last year. At the end, it will be on a good level.
Thank you. A question respectively to the Jetfire. You had a very high number of, let's say, soft orders and LOI back at Drupa. Where are we with the hard orders right now? Do you have a number of what has been ordered so far since the machine then finally is available to the customers?
Yes, of course. First of all, we are on track with our plans, agreed with our partner here. In terms of numbers, and for the time being, we have ordered 13 presses here from Canon under this cooperation. This is exactly at the same level we anticipated, so perfectly on track. The first machines are already delivered to customers in Switzerland, in Germany, and last week to the first Chinese customer. A good message here is we are on track. The first machines are up and running, and our story seems to be working.
All right. Thank you. The final question from my side would be a little bit on cash flow expectations for this year. Obviously, we have a little bit higher earnings input. At least that's the expectation from the guidance. Can we also expect a higher free cash flow? Could we be able to keep the working capital stable roughly, or shall we prepare for a working capital step-up?
Volker, the answer to this question.
Yes. Thank you. Yeah. Hi. This is Volker. Thanks for this question. Since we have a new board, the new board, they restated the strategy for the future. We have in the midterms EUR 300 million net sales growing to expect. This is what our strategy basically turns out to be. This is our plan. For this additional growth, especially in digital narrow web, wide web, and very large formats, which have been announced this week, we have to invest bigger amounts of money in order to gain this additional sales. We cannot expect to have the same cash flow levels like we have this year. We have clearly less to expect. We have to say from this side, growth needs to be invested. We invest the generated cash we did not last year and three years ago.
We utilize this in order to raise our EBITDA level and EBIT level in the future. At the same time, our sales. That gives us further cash out in the upcoming years on the middle level, not this year and most likely not next year.
All right. Thank you very much.
The next question comes from Sven Sauer from Kepler Cheuvreux.
Yes, hello. Thank you for taking my question. I have just one on the quarterly development on the EBITDA margin this fiscal year. Just wondering if we are going to be returning to normal seasonality. I understand last year Q4 was the strongest quarter on the margin side due to Drupa and the efficiency measures. If I look at the past years, normally Q2 and Q3, I think, were the strongest quarters on the margin side. I was just wondering if you could give some color on the expectations for this fiscal year.
At the end, our ambition is to achieve an EBITDA margin of up to 8% in total. This year, just looking into the first quarter, EBITDA should improve accordingly. As I mentioned before with the sales, we're expecting higher sales in the first quarter compared to previous year. EBITDA margin will also be better in some runoff costs we had last year in the first quarter. We know the impact will have no impact this year. We expect a higher margin in the first quarter.
Maybe I add something. I think we have to anticipate from the seasonal ones a similar picture like last year. However, a bit more leveled out.
Okay. Thank you. That was helpful.
Next up is Peter Rothenaicher from Baader Bank.
Good afternoon, gentlemen. Firstly, a question on restructuring. You had booked in the third quarter the restructuring expenses for your Wiesloch-Waldorf site. In the fourth quarter, you had a positive impact. Obviously, the sales provisions were not fully needed. On the other hand, you have not booked any provisions for restructuring the other site. Can you give us here some insight? What was the reason for the positive effect in the fourth quarter and what do you expect here regarding restructuring for the current year?
Yeah. Yeah, we can. I mean, the whole restructuring is basically focusing on reducing complexity, basically having our negotiations successfully finished with our worker council, and basically avoiding any increases in salary and wages. This is one part of that. The second part of that is to, let's say, restructure the amount of our employees better to the total outcome of our total performance of the company. That means we have a plan in order to reduce employees by approximately 450 people. In the fourth quarter, we started with all that, but we had to put restructuring obligations in our P&L, which amounts to EUR 25 million, which basically has to be paid out as soon as the employees are leaving the company in the year 2006 and 2007. That is when the cash goes out for that.
Additionally, we restart basically, or we put a new program in place because we are not long, we are not finished at this point of time because the complexity is still too much and too high. Since I am here since April 1, since I have with the board a clear commitment that we focus furthermore on that and getting additional restructuring level. Then helping and supporting a growing EBITDA margin with it. Was that the answer to your question or did I miss it?
Not completely. On the one hand, what was the reason for the reduction of restructuring charges in the fourth quarter by EUR 3 million? What are your expectations regarding additional restructuring expenses for the current fiscal year?
Hi, Peter, this is Max speaking. There was a change in assumptions for the provision that has been built. There is basically a higher share of early retirement program participants. This is the reason for the EUR 4 million reduction in the provision. I guess this was the question you were pointing out too.
Yeah. For the current year?
For the current year, we expect EUR 10 million.
EUR 10 million. Okay. Another question regarding your technology solution segment. Last year, what was still extremely low level regarding revenues, you now have given some positive aspects with the SAP project. Can you give us here some more insight? What do you expect for this segment in the current year? Can we expect here a further significant loss reduction?
Yes, of course. At the end, we are working a lot in the technology segment. We have a clear focus on our strategy here to bring new companies to us. We are already having a lot of orders here in the segment. Our ambition for this year is the sales of EUR 60 million in the technology segment. At the end, our clear strategy is also that the segment pays itself. At the end, there is no, let's say, investment from the company needed. This is our target to turn it into a positive number at the end of the day. We have at the end a lot of ideas on one hand side, but also a clear strategy, which industries we are approaching, where to do that, what kind of capabilities we are using. We are not just talking about our foundry in Amstetten.
We are also talking about our electronics assembly here. We have competencies and we see an increasing demand for this. The topic you are just mentioning, the SAP, is just the first big, let's say, order here in this direction. At the end, it is part of our transformation story in the e-mobility business, coming from a pure assembly of e-charging points for Volvo to a full system integrator, managing the whole infrastructure. SAP was one of the biggest users of vehicle fleet operators in Germany. It is the first step into that direction, but it clearly underlines our ways that we are just more than just the manufacturer of single devices. Strategy is there. We have hired certain experts from outside here in the segment to underline also that it is a clear way moving forward.
Thank you. Then one technical question regarding tax expenses. Last year, you have definitely high tax payments. I know this has to do that you're earning good money in China and therefore have to pay taxes there and cannot use too much of your tax loss carry forward. Now, with cost reductions in Germany, I think the profitability of your German enterprises should improve massively. This should, in my point of view, have a positive impact on tax payments as well. What is your view on this? What can we expect for taxes for the current year?
Yeah. Last business year, we still had a negative number in our German company. So we increased the loss forward amount. Now we are in the middle of a restructuring project and bringing even more value add into our China facilities in order to increase the profitability overall. However, it has countered the efforts to increase the profitability in Germany. However, in general, we are now starting a bigger project, basically facing all angles and trying to get the German companies at least back to a normal number, let's say it this way. How far we come with that, we have to see. It's our strong target to minimize the losses in Germany. This is a permanent effort to increase the overall performance of the company. We cannot avoid, in order to basically utilize our low-cost locations for more value add.
Does this mean that your tax rate will remain also extremely high in the current fiscal year?
On the current planning, yes, until we have a breakthrough. Because our transfer price system is stable. To touch the transfer price system is, as you may know, a critical topic. We need to gain these advantages. We need to focus on it from a different angle. That is what we are trying to do. It is too early to, let's say, inform about the sites at this time, at this point of time.
My last question is on free cash flow again. You explained that CapEx spending will be definitely higher. Therefore, some negative impact on free cash flow. On the other hand, there might be also some first payouts for restructuring. Can you give us an indication? Will free cash flow be positive in the current year, or might it be possible that we see negative free cash flow?
I can say it this way. We have to, our expenses and CapEx investments will support this business case. We need to get a raise in our top line to a level we need to achieve. It's too early to say because there's a lot of things we didn't have in our plan, which basically was a secret project we now announced. The cash out we need for that, it's not, let's say, at this level. I cannot pinpoint down to an exact level. However, it will be less, definitely much less than last year. It's too early to say, really.
Yeah. Thank you.
At the moment, there seem to be no further questions. If you have any additional questions, please press nine and the star key now. Nine and star. Any additional questions, please? There are no further questions.
Yeah. Thank you all for your participation. Wish you a good day. Thank you very much for listening.
Thank you.