Ladies and gentlemen, good morning and welcome to the HELLA Investor Call on the results for the nine months of fiscal year 2025. This call will be hosted by Bernard Schäferbarthold, the CEO, and Philippe Vienney, the CFO of HELLA. At this time, all participants have been placed in the listen-only mode. The floor will be open for questions following the presentation. Let me now turn the floor over to your host, Bernard Schäferbarthold. Please go ahead.
Yeah, good morning to everybody. Very warm welcome to our nine-month result call. I'm here together with Philippe Vienney, our CFO, and Kerstin Dodel, our Head of IR. Starting off the presentation on page four, if we look at our sales development, we are end of September, in line with what we expected. Positively, our electronics business is continuing to grow. We had a growth now in the first nine months of 8.3%. Specifically, our radar business, but as well our business in our product center, energy management, is continuing to grow. On the Lighting side, we are not growing, we are down 8.4%. We mentioned also earlier mid of the year that the end of some larger projects, but also the reduction on volumes on some programs in our order book, is the reason for that.
I will come back to that and actions we have now taken for lighting. On Lifec ycle Solutions, our business is still down in the nine months, but, positively, we have now seen in the third quarter that we are back to growth. We had quite a decent development in that segment in Q3. Overall, sales is quite stable, FX adjusted, so a slight growth of 0.4%. Considering or looking at reported sales, we are at - 1.1%. Considering the strong FX headwind we had. On our operating income margin, we are at 5.8% in the first nine months. Overall, I can state we continue to have a strong cost discipline. We are implementing the structural programs we have initiated in the last two years.
So overall, considering the environment, we are in line with what we planned, also in our budget. Net cash flow has improved. On a year-on-year comparison, it's at EUR 68 million, to the end of the year, 1.2%. We have reduced CapEx, and within that number, if we look at factoring, the increase in factoring is at EUR 23 million in comparison to last year, EUR 30 million less. If we move on to the order intake, we are good on track. The third quarter was again a good quarter in terms of order intake. We had strong momentum, especially in the Lighting business, you know, two areas where we wanted to grow more broadly, in the U.S. and also in Asia, and specifically China, we could win important programs. As well, in Europe, we were quite successful.
We are now attacking the market as well, in the mass market, so in the volume markets, and we were able to win significant program volumes for the European regions in the third quarter. On the electronics side, we continue to be very successful. We are highlighting here some of the programs, but what I can state overall is that within our electronics business, we continue on a strong growth path, and this should also support our growth trajectory in the upcoming years. To finish off, our Lifec ycle was also quite successful in the last month. We are highlighting here some of the programs. BASF, IRI Culture remains important business areas and customer segments for us to continue to grow as well.
Here also to highlight, to get broader in terms of our market reach. We are happy to win also projects outside of Europe and to gain market shares there as well. Overall, we are on track in terms of our order intake achievements after nine months. Going to page six, some highlights. On the Lighting side, we continue to see that we are differentiating with our Lighting technologies. We are present also in different shows and fairs. Here we are highlighting one, and we are advertising and showing our newest technologies also to the different customers. I think, from my perspective, feedbacks are quite good, we are getting. This should support our growth we are envisaging in the upcoming years.
The electronics, one important milestone now we had is the launch of our iPDM, so of our eFuse technology in one large platform. We are engaging ourselves much stronger now into the whole zonal architecture of the car. This technology, which manages the power in the car and which is embedded in the zonal architecture and in the new E/E architecture overall of the car, is a big milestone for us. This is one very important technology we envisage will give a strong growth potential in the upcoming years. This is why we are highlighting it here in a strong way. The other thing I want to mention is on the structural changes. I mentioned we continue to reduce our cost base. In the last month, we announced the.
Structural change in one of our plants in Germany, which now we are going into execution. Other than that, we are now in execution in terms of our new SIMPLIFY program. This is a global program where we are reducing in all white-collar functions in the upcoming three years around 15% on head counts. We are well on track. We already started on that program. The target is to be at least at 20% of reduction to the end of this year and around 50% on the reduction to the end of next year. I can say that we are ahead of the target as of today, and we are trying to accelerate on that as well. You can see that as well in the head count development.
If you only look at the last nine months, we have already reduced close to 5% on head counts as of today in comparison to the start to the year at a quite comparable sales level. We will continue on these adaptions. If we move to page seven, let's say one of the big challenges we are facing actually is the crisis on the shortage on Nexperia. It is clear that if we look at our portfolio of products, we have a lot of Nexperia parts in our products. In general, I can say we are strongly, strongly impacted. We have organized ourselves in a way also with task forces and are managing the situation in the way that we are building up the alternative suppliers.
In the meantime, for sure, we use, we still use Nexperia parts. Our relationship today with Nexperia China is still stable. We also manage to buy broker parts, which in the meantime supports our supply. So far, I can say that the month of October was in line with our plan. There was little impact. The start into the month of November showed a little more impact in terms of the full coverage against the plan. The most difficult weeks now from our side will be the next ones where, in the meantime, before being able really to ramp up the second sources, we are seeing some of the shortages.
We are working intensively also on the application on export licenses and also taking advantage and the support also on the OEM side, which are going for these applications as well. This could help to support also on parts we have in China who could be exported to the U.S. and Europe and help there on the shortages. So far, China for us is not impacted. We have enough parts. This is something difficult to quantify overall. As I said, so far, the impact was very limited. We have now to see how next weeks will be, and specifically if.
With, on the Chinese authorities, the customs and MOFCOM, we are able now to get the necessary applications to do the exports to support Europe and the U.S., as I said. As you can imagine, a lot of intensive work we are doing and managing the situation to keep our delivery promises to the customers. Having said that, we will move on with some more details on the financial results. Philippe will take over.
Yeah. Good morning to all. Looking at the sales, we are publishing sales at EUR 5,868 billion, which is representing a decrease of 1.1% versus prior year. Excluding the exchange rate, this would be at + 0.4% versus last year, and versus a market which is showing a growth of 3.8%.
Here again, I said we have a good momentum in all region on electronics, whereas we are suffering on the Lighting side with lower sales, which are affected by end of production on some programs and mainly in North America and Asia. The Lifecycle is, was reducing, showing reducing sales, but which we are also, where we are also seeing a good momentum in Q3 with some slight recovery. Looking at the sales per region, and versus the market, Europe, where we still have more or less 56% of our sales, we have a growth of 1% versus the market, which is showing a decrease of 1.7%. We are overperforming versus the market for Europe.
For Americas, where we have sales which are above 20% of our sales, we are seeing a decrease of our sales of 1.1%, slightly impacted as well by the FX impact, versus the market which is reducing by 0.5%. Here also we have the impact of Lighting where we have this impact of some end of production series which are not fully compensated by new launches. We have Asia, which is also a bit above 20% of our sales, where we have a decrease on our published sales of 6.4%, also slightly impacted by the FX versus a growth in this region of 7.2%. Here again, we have the same topic on end of production of series project in lighting, but not fully compensated by new sales and new launches with local OEMs in Asia.
We still have, again, growth momentum in China on the electronics with radar and battery management. Now looking at the profitability per segment. Lighting, we are at EUR 2.7 billion of sales, which is representing an organic decrease of 7.3%, excluding the exchange rate. Here, I said again, we have the impact of end of production of some series project in China and North America. We have some increase on the headlamps and rear combination lamp in Europe, in Americas, but which are not enough to compensate the drop that we are seeing in Asia and North America on rundown programs. The operating income for Lighting is at EUR 73 million or 2.7%.
Here we are, impacted by the volume drop, which is clearly impacting the gross margin and the operating margin, which we are partially compensating by lower material cost, also some reduced R&D cost and SG&E cost, but not enough to compensate the volume drop that we are facing, where we still have to reduce and continue to reduce our fixed cost to absorb this and face this volume drop. Electronics, we are publishing sales of EUR 2.5 billion or EUR 2.6 billion, which is representing a + 9.5% excluding FX rates on the organic basis. Here again, we have growth in all regions and growth thanks to the radar business. We have also growth in the car access system in Europe and Asia. We have also some growth thanks to the battery management system as well in Asia.
Good momentum on the sales in electronics. This is leading us to an operating income of EUR 196 million or 7.6% operating margin. Here we have the benefit of the volume, which is helping the gross margin and the operating margin. We have been able to be stable on the R&D spend and also thanks to reduction of external spend and external provider. We have also been able to maintain or even reduce the SG&E percentage in these segments. All in all, leading to the 7.6% operating margin. Life cycle, where we have sales of EUR 739 million, which is representing a decrease of 1.5% excluding FX rate. Here, as we said, we have a low demand, especially coming from the H1 and especially on the commercial business vehicles.
but we see some recovery, slight recovery in Q3. so, especially also on the, on the commercial business. we have some stable, business on the aftermarket. and this is leading us to an operating income of EUR 74 million or 10%. so here we are impacted also slightly by the volume. and we have been able to maintain, or even decrease the R&D expense, and, with SG&E, which are, slightly increasing mainly due to, distribution cost. Profit and loss for HELLA, yes. so we have a gross profit of EUR 1.3 billion, which is 22.8% versus 23.2% last year. so here we have the weight of the, volume decrease in Lighting and Life cycle, which is impacting us and not, fully compensated by the, improvement on the electronic, segment. on the R&D side, we are at 9.4% versus 9.8% last year.
Here we continue to see the benefit of our adjustment and structural adjustment on the R&D side and cut on the external provider, as I mentioned for electronics. On the SG&E, we are at 7.7%. Here we see a decrease on the administration cost, where we have a slight increase on the distribution costs. I think the good trend is the administration cost, which are decreasing and showing some effect of the program which has been launched to reduce this cost. On the earning before tax, we are reaching EUR 208 million versus EUR 409 million last year. Here we have the negative impact of the older restructuring of programs which are booked and are part of the EUR 129 million.
To mention that last year we also had some restructuring costs, but which were more than compensated by the sales of the BHTC business and the net gain that was booked last year. This is leading us to a net income of EUR 108 million versus EUR 310 million last year. On the net cash flow, we are at EUR 68 million, versus - EUR 8 million for the same period last year. Here we are increasing our net cash flow. We have higher cash from operations. We are also having a good momentum on the working capital with some negotiated and good payment terms with suppliers. We are also reducing our tangible CapEx. You can see that we are at - 23% versus what was cashed out last year and spent last year for the same period.
This is benefiting to our cash flow, leading us to have a EUR 68 million cash flow for the first nine months of the year. With that, I think we are finishing the financial details. We can go to the outlook.
Thank you, Philippe. On the outlook, on page 17, if we look at volumes, the actual outlook on S&P is 91.4 million cars. I would expect that specifically in Europe and Americas, we would see some reductions in the fourth quarter due to the shortages on Nexperia parts. China is quite stable in terms of volumes. This is also what we see actually now in the fourth quarter. On page 18, we confirm our outlook in terms of sales in the range of EUR 7.6 billion-EUR 8 billion.
On the operating income, 5.3-6, and the net cash flow of at least EUR 200 million. We are stating that this assumes a sufficient supply situation on especially Nexperia parts. As I said, in terms of today, if I look at the month of October and the start into November, the impact were limited, but I also mentioned that the next weeks will be the crucial ones. Summing it up, on the key takeaways, so far, looking at the three quarters, from our point of view, a robust sales development inline, in terms of profit and net cash flow, what we expected, strong focus on the structural changes we have done, and still a good momentum on the order intake side.
We, outlook, I mentioned, we see us on track for the guidance we have given. If it comes to the top priorities, we continue to work on the structural programs. One important new program we have now initiated is in the Lighting area. We have started a transformation program now, starting into the second half of the year. Mainly, we focus on three big topics. One is on the business growth. We need to come back to growth again. For that, we are broadening our reach and focusing significantly also on the regions where we see strong potential, especially the U.S., but also, beside China, Japan, Korea, India. We already see now, in the third quarter, the first successes and programs.
We could book in quite a sizable numbers. First, let's say proof points are given, but I think this is a very relevant point to come back to growth. On top of that, we have initiated the operational transformation. We see significant potentials in terms of reductions on our footprint or on our costs within the operations, including also the supply side and logistics. We have initiated a structured program on that, which is specifically for Europe and also for our Mexican operations. The third element is the improvement in D&D productivity and efficiency, where as well we initiated a program also with a focus on cost reductions on our technology, where we see also a big potential to reduce on the cost sides as well here too. This should help to.
bring our Lighting business into a much better, profitable situation in the years to come. Having said that, we are happy to take your questions.
Ladies and gentlemen, we will now begin the question and answer session. Please note that questions can only be placed via telephone. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their touch-tone telephone. You will hear a tone to confirm that you have entered the queue. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star and two. Participants are requested to use only handsets while asking a question. In the interest of time, please limit yourself to three questions in the first place. Anyone who has a question may press star and one at this time. One moment for the first question, please.
The first question comes from Christoph Laskawi from Deutsche Bank. Please go ahead.
Good morning. Thank you for taking my questions. The first one, coming back a bit to what you just said on the Lighting performance, obviously Q3 margin around 1% is very low. When you implemented all the measures that you talked about, what do you think is in the midterm a realistic margin potential? Could it be around 5%+ or any thoughts on that would be appreciated? In contrast to that, electronics are actually quite strong in Q3, with 9%+ margin. Was there any specific one-timers in there or just really capitalizing on growth and showing the margin potential of that business? The third question would be on Nexperia.
It sounds like you did not face production shutdowns on your own yet, and you have not caused any so far. Still, you are expecting production cuts to come. Do you already see that in the schedules? Any volatility you can highlight there? And then just on the cost of going to brokers and others, those had been quite high in the semi-shortage. Is this something which could be a meaningful impact on earnings in Q4? Just the sourcing alternatives? Thank you.
Thank you for your questions, Mr. Laskawi. On the Lighting performance, our target is to come back to 6%. This will not be possible on short notice, no? This is a target we have set ourselves. It will take until 2028, 2029. Before we are at this five level, you said, probably 2028.
To come closer to the 6%. We have now seen that, as I said, no? We are struggling a lot because, first of all, we are not growing. Secondly, we have also been impacted now in the second half by a warranty topic, which was quite significant as well. It is partially in the third quarter and will also hit the fourth quarter. This is a topic which lasts now from the years 2022, 2023, where now finally we got to an agreement with, and a settlement with the customers. We are close to, no? This was an impact as well. Overall, on the full, let's say, second half, it will have an impact of around EUR 25 million, which is quite significant for the Lighting business, no? The overall.
Let's say, if I look at Lighting, we are, the business is declining. This is something which will also continue into the next years and will be a headwind also in the next year. Before now we see with the momentum we have on the order intake, we will be able to grow again starting from 2027. What I have to say positively is that in lighting, we are very strong in China. The transformation also we need to do for Europe and specifically also our Mexican operations, we already have done in China and also the adaption to competitiveness. I see us very strong in Asia today. Now we need to do the work we need to do in Europe and North and South America.
We changed also the responsibility. I have taken over in combination of tasks now from the 1st of July, and we are now starting on this transformation program, as I said. On electronics, I'm very pleased about how our business is developing also in terms of performance. What we now see is basically that we see now the payoff of the business now where we see the growth coming with the launches and the new programs which are going into serial production. The growth supports the profit development. What we as well see is that the structural changes we have done in terms of on the cost side help as well, no? With that, we see immediately, no, a very strong profit development.
There was no really specific one-off in the third quarter, no? It was quite a good quarter, no? I would not say now every quarter will be the same. Also, no negative impact, I have to say, no? I have to admit also, no? It is a good development and we are building on that and trying to continuously improve on that. On the next area, I think, I stated, no? So far, with the coverage or with the stocks we had, with the coverage we had, we also bought some quite early on, some broker parts. This helped really to cover the period of time until now. We see now that some shortages on some products, they are already there on the call-off.
Basically, you do not see yet, no? That customers are changing anything, no? For sure, in the systems, no? For sure, we are in very intensive discussions with all of our customers. Today the situation is as follows: the decisions are taken now on a weekly base. What can be produced and how much reduction will we see? I mentioned, no? The next weeks will show reductions, and the magnitude is still not absolutely clear. What is in the next, let's say, three, two, four weeks? It certainly will now also depend on how are we now able, no? really to get exports on Nexperia parts with these exemptions, or with export licenses granted now to the OEMs or to us.
We are already trying out the test shipments and working with MOFCOM and the customs, as I said, no? There is some hope, no? That now it should work. That certainly, no? Will help a lot immediately, no? This is the uncertainty we have. If this is not working, I mentioned it, then the reductions on the volumes in the next weeks will be much higher. On the cost side, on the broker so far, I would say. For sure, no? It goes fast, no? The last broker offers, no? I saw, no? between factor 600, factor 800, also factor 1,000, I already have seen, no? The difference to the semi is that the original price is much lower, no? There we are only talking cents. But sure, no?
If we are talking factor 500, 600, or higher, then you talk immediately some millions. So far, it has not such a big impact. The market today is still there, there are not so many volumes any longer in the broker market. I would not expect that this should have such a hit, which is comparable to the semi today, or to the semi crisis we had some years ago. Again, still we are talking some money, no? It is some millions we are discussing. That is for sure. Not comparable, as I said, to the semi crisis.
Very clear. Thank you very much.
The next question comes from Sanjay Bhagwani from Citi. Please go ahead.
Hi, thank you for taking my question also.
Maybe to begin with, on the Nexperia situation, this morning there seems to be several articles suggesting, like, well. Hello? Yes, you can. Can you hear me right? Okay. Yeah. Yes. Sorry. On the Nexperia situation, this morning seems to be several, like, constructive articles, typically quoting some of these Dutch ministers that things will be okay in the coming weeks and chip supply should resume. Is that providing some comforting messages to you as well? Maybe, let's say if there is a disruption, there can be just one week disruption or something like that. Or, it's probably too early to look at these headlines or something like that.
There are two things for me, no?
One is, Does China now allow that, that Nexperia China, that parts which are still produced at Nexperia China, that we can export these to Europe? There we are still working, I mentioned it, no? We are still working on how, how. Process-wise. The application and the export needs to be executed. This is where I said, no? We are now just running now with custom, the discussions we have with MOFCOM, doing these test shipments, no? To try out how we have now to handle and practically do it. There are some signs now. This I can, I can at least also confirm, no? That, that, I hope that it will be possible soon. Let's put it like that. Still today it has not worked out, but we are getting signals, no?
There is hope that it could be possible. That is one thing, no? I would take that as a positive note, no? Still to be seen, no? If then really it works out. Because just practically I can tell you the custom were not aware that they are allowed to do. On the other hand side, MOFCOM is allowing it. I think we are still, let's say, it's an administrational point. You never know, no? That is one thing. The other thing we are also working on, and this is as well, let's say, a critical path. We are still getting a lot of parts from Nexperia China. They are dependent still on the wafers they get from Europe.
They are apparently not coming along. That is, these wafers, which are needed for the further production. If China does not have any longer wafers from next period Europe, they could not continue on their production. They will run out at a certain point of time if there is no agreement. This is the second path we are working on to get a solution between the two, Nexperia Europe and China, to stabilize the situation so that Nexperia China is able to continue to deliver. This is important because, as I said, we are working on the alternative suppliers. For most of the suppliers, we can find, let's say, good agreements and ramp up quick.
For some of the parts, it will take a little longer. This is why it is important to have stability on next period China as well.
Thank you. That is very helpful. I think on the broker parts, you mentioned that so far this has not been a major impact. In terms of the pricing pass-throughs, I understand in the previous, like, chip crisis, you had to actively go and negotiate the price increases. In this case, is it easy to, like, kind of have some sort of indexation for these components now? Or will this again be subject to negotiation if, if the, let's say, inflation becomes material?
In the actual situation, because we need to be quick, no? We take the decision with the customer, so with our customer, with the OEM together.
The agreement is that, in terms of who takes which part, we agreed that this will be discussed later. It is clear that we will have a comparison as it was in the semi crisis, no? Where we agreed on, I would call it, pain share, no? Who takes which proportion. You can assume that what we have seen, similar in the semi crisis, should, at least from our perspective, also be true now for this one.
Thank you. My final one is on the Q3 margins, just to kind of follow up to Christoph's question, but more at the group level. Q3 group margins have, like, sequentially gone down to, I think it is 5.3% versus H1 was 6%.
Are you able to provide some color in terms of the Q4? Is it sequentially looking better as of now? And in terms of divisions, how the Q4 versus Q3 margins are looking?
Month of October was okay. It was in plan, no? Normally the months October, November are very strong in the industry. We have seen quite a good month in October so far. Even we had this Nexperia situation. The month of November will certainly be impacted now. It's difficult to say on the margin, so if really to say now, what does it now mean, no? For the full quarter because it will depend on volumes at the end. We will lose volumes. The question is how much.
I would not feel so comfortable now to say how it will go. I think in terms of our cost saving, all what we are doing, there we are in plan. At the end, it will depend on sales.
That's good. Thank you very much. Very helpful.
As a reminder, anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one at this time. It looks like there are no further questions at this time. I would like to turn the conference back over to Bernard Schäferbarthold for any closing remarks.
Thank you to all of you who participated. And thank you for showing the interest on HELLA again. I wish you a pleasant remaining day and, after that, a good weekend. Hope to see you and speak to you soon. Bye-bye.