Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. I warmly welcome you from the Carl Benz Arena in Stuttgart to our Annual Results Conference 2021 of Mercedes-Benz Group. My name is Steffen Hoffmann, and I'm heading Investor Relations and Treasury. Due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, we have to do without the usual physical conferences with analysts, investors, and media representatives here in Stuttgart.
Good morning also from my side. A warm welcome to our video stream from the annual results conference 2021. My name is Tobias Just, and I'm the Head of Corporate Communications at Mercedes-Benz. I think we are all well aware that other news dominate the headlines this morning on the geopolitical landscape.
However, we are presenting our business results today, and for the second time, we're doing that jointly to you, ladies and gentlemen, the press, as well as the analysts and investors. For the very first time, we are doing that as Mercedes-Benz Group AG. We want to provide you with the key figures of the past financial year for outlook, for the current year, and the strategic plans at Mercedes-Benz. After the presentation, I will host a short deep dive regarding some important topics with our executives.
In total, our presentations will take about an hour, and it will be webcast live on our corporate website. You can follow our stream with simultaneous translation into German and Chinese.
Of course, our executives will be available for your questions. Therefore, there are two consecutive conference calls, one for analysts and investors from 10:15 to 11:15 A.M. CET.
Moreover, we have one call for media representative, of course, and that will take place from 11:30 A.M. to 12:30 P.M. Both conference calls will be webcast on our corporate website, of course. The annual results conference ends after the conference calls approximately at 12:30 P.M. You can follow the whole event in one stream.
For an active participation in the conference call for analysts and investors, you already received your dial-in data, and participants of the media conference call received their dial-in data by email beforehand. Now, I would like to welcome our speakers this morning, our CEO, Ola Källenius, and our CFO, Harald Wilhelm. Ola, Harald, stage is yours.
Yeah, thank you very much, Steffen and Tobias, and good morning, everybody. This is a very special event for us this morning because it's the first results conference as Mercedes-Benz Group. We're now a pure-play company. Since February, that's also reflected in the name, and of course, we're very proud of that. The year 2021 was a truly transformational year for Mercedes-Benz. Its strategy translated into great products but also into financial success.
I think the Mercedes team demonstrated the potential of this company despite supply chain and COVID constraints, and I wanna thank all of our colleagues around the world who made this performance possible. Now, let's take a closer look at last year. When we met about a year ago, we had given ourselves a list of tasks to focus on in 2021.
We have navigated through this year in a very strong fashion. We have increased our financial robustness. We have managed through the pandemic and the semiconductor shortages and produced very healthy results in spite of these challenges. It's also been a year of accelerated strategy implementation. We made some big decisions last year, especially in the summer when we announced our accelerated path into electric vehicles.
All our new architectures from 2025 forward will be electric only. We are now, in an even quicker way, shifting our capital allocation and our engineering resources towards the path of zero emission and decarbonization. We have also established, as I mentioned, a new company structure. Our so-called Project Focus was successfully implemented, dividing Daimler into two very strong pure-play companies.
A truck and bus company on the one hand, and a car and van company on the other hand. That was done. The numbers today. I think it's important for you to understand what this split into two companies mean. That means we have, since Q4, what we call continued operations, and we also have discontinued operations.
As you can see from this chart, and Harald is gonna go into this in much more detail, we will look at Mercedes-Benz Cars and Vans, Mercedes-Benz Mobility, and the Trucks & Buses industrial businesses from Q4 are in the reconciliation. One reminder also, all the figures that we're presenting today are preliminary and unaudited.
Now, if we look at those figures, I think what stands out here is, in spite of constraints, we grew our revenues, and we more than doubled our EBIT adjusted. The EBIT, including the deconsolidation result, Harald will talk more about that. But here we can see a modest growth in revenues but turned into significant growth in profitability as well as another year of very, very strong cash flow production.
That leads to a net industrial liquidity at the end of the year, and this is, mind you, post the spin of EUR 21 billion. So we have a strong position that we can now write the next chapter of transformation for this company. If I go into more details, what's the messages on cars and vans?
I think really there are a few number that stand out when we look into the details of 2021. On the one hand, we grew our top-end vehicles by some 30%. We have the most attractive product portfolio in the history of this company, and especially the top end of that is finding its liking with Mercedes customers and fans around the world.
On the Maybach side, on the AMG side, and of course, the legendary G-Class, which saw another record year. Growing that by 30% still pales in comparison to what we did on the EV side. The EVs grew by almost 100%. We introduced four new battery electric vehicles last year, and that product offensive continues this year.
The response when we started this next phase of our product offensive into electrification was tremendous. The EQS, many customers around the world, dealer, other partners contacted us and says, "Wow, this is almost like a spaceship landing on Earth.
What's this car all about?" We have been encouraged by that. A smaller sibling of that vehicle we presented in the fall coming into production this year, and there are more products to come. The BEV, or battery electric, push is at full force.
Also in terms of making traveling from A to B, as far as Mercedes is concerned, in style, safer, we were the first company to get a Level three approval, an international Level three approval that was obtained here in Germany, which means we now have a vehicle that in some situations can actually drive on its own.
It takes over and is responsible for the driving situation. That was also, for us, a bit of a moon landing and a first step into new territory. The push into software, intelligent vehicles, autonomous drive, and making the experience safer, but also more pleasant, for Mercedes customers around the world, also picked up speed.
The financial results in the wake of supply constraints on the semiconductor side and other challenges in the second year of pandemic demonstrate what level of resilience that we have reached at this point. The break-even obviously has been further reduced, and we will continue with this discipline going forward.
It's not a call to take a break or to rest, but to celebrate the work that has been done so far. Also in transformation, we are making significant progress in some of the operations that towards the end of this decade or into the next decade will be very different.
On the powertrain side, we have created plans for our main powertrain plants, and I've already started the transformation and the transition in some of those ICE-based operations towards an electric future. If we go in a little bit deeper and look at the sales, yes, solely due to semiconductor constraints, we sold less vehicles last year.
As you know, it's part of our strategy to chase value and not to chase volume. We are a luxury manufacturer. Desirability, scarcity is a very important part of our strategy. It's not the main reason why the number came in lower than 2020, because we have demand which far exceeds this level.
At the same time, as I said, on the top end, so where we have, AMG, G, and also Maybach plus the S-Class family, you can see that we grew by 30%, electrified vehicles by more than 60%, and the BEVs doubled. We intend to continue on this path, focusing on, ramping up the electric vehicle side, but also have a clear focus on top-end vehicles because it drives desirability, but it also drives profitability for the group.
If we take a look at our premium van business, indeed, in spite of the supply side, they were able to grow slightly. Also on the premium vans, we see a significantly higher demand at the moment in the market than what we can deliver.
Of course, we're looking at everything we can do to shorten supply times, working with our delivery times, working with our suppliers to gradually improve that situation. The electric vehicles grew here as well, albeit on a relatively low level, but there's so much more to come.
On vans, as you know, we also made the strategic decision that our van business is going to become an electric van business, and we've kicked off the work on a truly, fully dedicated purpose-made electric van architecture, which will drive our product offering from the mid of this decade forward. We're very exciting about that.
The transformation of vans is moving at the same pace as it is on cars, and it's very exciting. If I look at CO2, two years ago, when we moved into the new era of targets in the EU, we were all looking at 2020 as almost the start of a new way to count.
We switched from NEDC to WLTP, and we met our targets last year. People were saying, yeah, but for 2021, the super-credits, the phase-in credits, they go away. So we have to take just as big of a step in 2021 as we did in 2020. We did. Indeed, we actually took a bigger step, even bigger than we had expected.
Our target for Mercedes-Benz in the E.U. is at 125 g using WLTP, and we came in significantly below that. Why is that? It is because we have already reached an electrified part of the overall sales in Europe that sits between 35%-40%.
Quite a bit faster than maybe we had thought a couple of years ago, and we're looking at building upon that, of course. You can see how quickly electrified vehicles in one of the most important regions here reached a high percentage. This year, as I mentioned in the significant scaling of our electrified vehicles, we're also looking at expanding that electrified footprint to all the relevant markets around the world.
Very excited about that, and the demand is very high, and that goes literally in all markets from east to west. Overall, this is one stepping stone on the way to our clear commitment with Ambition 2039 to become a fully CO2 neutral company by then across the whole value chain, supply base, our own operations, the product itself, but also the product in use. Now, Harald, why don't you dive into the numbers and explain to us what happened in 2021?
Yes, sir. Thank you, Ola, and hello, everybody, also from my side. Let's have a look now at the cars and vans financial a bit more in detail. Well, I think, I mean, the numbers speak for themselves. Sales down by 5% exclusively due to the semi constraint.
Revenue is up by 11% despite the sales down. How is that possible? Very strong mix and pricing, in particular, in the higher segment. Third, the adjusted EBIT a plus 105%. Next to the mix and the pricing, also cost at work. Basically you see all pillars of the strategy at work, yielding tangible results in the numbers.
Finally, we convert that also into cash flow at a conversion rate of 0.9, yielding EUR 12 billion of cash flow before interest and tax, I mean, adjusted. Let's have a look a bit more in detail, I mean, how we could get there, looking at the bridge. Well, you can see that even with a lower volume, the bucket volume structure net pricing has a very significant EUR 9 billion walk year-over-year.
Let me give you a bit of color on that one. I mean, the volume impact in there obviously is negative, but it's negative at a low single-digit billion euro number. That leaves us basically with a structure and the net pricing impact, which is significantly positive at about approximately equal weight, i.e. mix and pricing.
That has been very much fueled by the S-Class, the GLS, and also the GLE. We also had benefit from the used car prices situation. Here, positive effects are in the order of magnitude of a low single-digit billion euro. However, let me remind you very clearly, this is not due to a residual value provision release. This is the underlying used car business, which had been doing better.
Looking a bit out forward into 2022, we can say that we expect that to continue, but maybe at a slightly moderate level with a kind of a stepwise normalization moving forward. Looking on the industrial performance of the walk, we see basically two key issues in here. Number one is a significant increase in raw material cost, which is not completely visible to you on the walk here, as it has been strongly mitigated, reduced by commercial efficiency.
The second key point is the same situation caused stop and go in our sites in the facilities and in the whole supply chain. That caused significant incremental cost on the logistics side, on the stop, on the go, on air freight, and the like. That is another significant piece in the industrial performance.
Looking on fixed cost, while selling expenses are slightly negative year-on-year, let me remind you that in 2020 we had a benefit on the healthcare and US pension effect. As well on the admin side, you see a slight negative year-on-year. Again, we had a pretty strong short-term working impact in 2020, which we didn't have again in 2021. What else on the walk? I mean, the R&D, slightly negative as guided. That is completely in line with our technology roadmap.
On the other section, you have a stronger at-equity result from our JV, BBAC in China, and valuation impacts from ChargePoint, and a bit of discounting on non-current provisions, which was favorable. That leaves us with an EBIT adjusted of EUR 13.9 billion. A return on sales of 12.7%.
On the booked side, the EBIT booked numbers slightly higher. If you now look on the Cars standalone, that means a 13.1% on adjusted return on sales. For Vans, an 8.3%, may be a number you did not expect. In Q4, we had a very strong run at 14.8% return on sales, adjusted for both combined for Cars and Vans, driven by strong net pricing, product mix, and favorable used car performance.
Let's have a look at indicators of change. We told you in 2020, on October 6th, I think, that we would change a few things as part of the strategy. The top line going more into luxury, profitable growth, developing the sub-brands.
Well, I think you see the traces. If you look into the revenue per unit, that came up by 26%, 2021 over 2019. We said we would reduce, I mean, the fixed cost by more than 20% between 2019 and 2025. You see the active workforce came down by -3%. That's a total workforce of Mercedes-Benz Cars.
If you look at the white collar where that reduction applies, not to the blue collar, obviously, that's a much higher percentage, and that explains why fixed cost is already down by -16% by the end of 2021. On the R&D, on the investment side, we said we would also reduce by more than 20% between 2019 and 2025, but we said we would not compromise on R&D, and that's what you see here with a -5%, i.e. we're not harming our future or postponing any critical projects.
Whereas, on the investment side, on the PPE side, we really put on the brakes by stretching, using existing facilities more intensively, by reusing existing assets more and investing less into new assets. We don't stop here. We carry on with this path as we outlined last year towards 2025 and even beyond.
Looking at the cash flow evolution, going from the EBIT side to the cash flow before interest, I mean, and tax. You see a cash flow reported of EUR 10 billion, adjusted, I mean, twelve billion, conversion rate of 0.9. How could we get there?
Basically a pretty balanced working capital with a slightly negative charge of EUR 700 million, despite the bumps going throughout the year with the semi. We had an increase in the unfinished products and on raw material side in the year. Whereas on the finished products and on the used cars stock, we had a favorable impact.
On the full year on the pay book, we also had a positive impact. Whereas in Q4, it was slightly negative, as we commented already in the call two weeks ago. Moderate, I mean, investment on the M&A side in terms of, I mean, the number, but strategically were important with YASA.
That's what you see in the EUR 118, that high-performance electric engine company which we acquired in 2021. What else to mention on the cash flow chart? Well, you can see that the investments overall into PPE and into intangible is well-balanced with the depreciation and amortization. That obviously helps the cash conversion rate.
In the others, you find, in particular, payments related to diesel matters, and some valuation items on the Cellcentric JV on the truck side in 2021, as well as valuation on ChargePoint, which is obviously a non-cash item. The adjustments very much refer, as you know, to legal proceedings, diesel and the cost restructuring measures, as well as M&A.
Looking at Mercedes-Benz Mobility, what happened, I mean, over there. Well, a pretty busy year, as next to the operational side, we completed, I mean, the phase one, i.e. basically the split of Daimler Mobility into two companies. That, as called phase one, has been successfully completed. That was a massive undertaking. Some further smaller portfolio transactions will still take place in 2022.
On the business side, I mean, the new business has also been impacted by the shortage of the semiconductors and also some lower penetration rates. The portfolio all in all has been lower, I mean, dealer stock, I mean, has been coming down as well as the transfer of the truck portfolio. However, the portfolio which remains is even stronger in terms of credit quality, and that means that the credit losses are on a continued very, very low level.
Also nice to see that the financial services products support the ramp up, I mean, of our electric vehicle sales by flexible customer solutions. At the same time, in 2021, we also refocused, I mean, the strategy of Mercedes-Benz Mobility to make it even more customer-centric and also to contribute to recurring revenues, I mean, moving forward. What is it basically about? I mean, four pillars.
Number one, seamless integration of the products with the Mercedes-Benz ecosystem. So as a customer, you should not even see the difference of acting between Mercedes-Benz Mobility and Mercedes-Benz on the industrial side. It's one interface.
Second, the transformation towards electric mobility also being supported by smart products on Mercedes-Benz Mobility side. Third is the full digitalization of our operations and processes end-to-end.
Fourth is to leverage data. It's a kind of a goldmine, I would say, where MBM is sitting on, and also to leverage that across the MB ecosystem. Looking at the key numbers, while the new business lower in 2021, I said already before, supply chain bottlenecks, the same left traces here.
We have a lower penetration rate in China and in the US The portfolio decreased by 11%. That is chiefly due to the truck portfolio leaving the books. But on the adjusted EBIT side, I think we could achieve a pretty significant step up. Let's have a look on the next chart on the adjusted EBIT walk and how we could get there. What are the key drivers?
First, the low cost of credit risk had a very favorable impact year-over-year. We provisioned in 2020 and in 2021, that was very remote. The second key point we had a very favorable interest margin evolution due to improved funding conditions. Also nice to see that mobility services and fleet business performance improved as well.
With this, we could get to a 22% return on equity for MBM in 2021. We expect a nice performance to continue also into 2022. However, 22% is not the new run rate. If you think about, I mean, 2022 for Mercedes-Benz Mobility, you should bear the following in mind. In 2020, we provisioned as a result of COVID. In 2021, the actual credit losses were extremely low.
We had to do literally no new additions in terms of new business being provisioned for. The provision level returned basically to the level back to pre-pandemic level. That means now moving forward, if you're doing new business in 2022, new business needs to be supported by new provisioning.
Second on the interest margin, I think we need to anticipate a normalization of the interest margin due to the increase in interest rates to be expected. Furthermore, I mean, if you think about 2022, as I said, there will be some more portfolio being transferred, I mean, to the truck side.
In 2021, we also had a favorable impact of a provision release for legal case in the UK for a low three-digit million euro, which we'll not have again. More to come on the guidance later. Now, turning to the group side. I explained cars, vans, mobility. What's left to explain here is the reconciliation in terms of the group impact.
Also, here you see the year-on-year impact of the discontinued operation, i.e. the Daimler Trucks & Buses, of 1.4, as well as with a little result on the 35% stake remaining in Daimler Trucks & Buses for the last 20 days of the year.
Very important note here, the numbers which we have on EBIT side, on cash flow side, are not comparable to the upcoming year-end disclosure of Daimler Truck, I think which is on the 24th of March, as we have a different reporting period. We report here 11 months and 9 days. We have a different intercompany eliminations and other stuff. Please, you cannot conclude from these numbers on anything for Daimler Truck disclosure.
Furthermore, you see in the recon impairment in our investment in BAIC Motor for a low three-digit euro amount in the fourth quarter. What else on the group EBIT walk? Well, I mean, we could get the EBIT adjusted to EUR 19 billion. On top of that, you see adjustments.
The key point in the adjustments obviously is the EUR 9.2 billion deconsolidation result of Daimler Trucks & Buses and Mobility Services. This is a pure valuation effect, I mean, without any cash implication. Furthermore, we have, I mean, in the adjustments, Project Focus transaction cost, as well as the suspended depreciation of Daimler Truck assets, which is in the order of magnitude of EUR 700 million.
Then the usual ones in the adjustments, M&A transaction, legal proceedings. All in all, the EBIT reported of continued and discontinued operations, including the deconsolidation gain, is EUR 29 billion. The discontinued EBIT is, including this deconsolidation result, EUR 13 billion. The continued operations result is sixteen billion, which exceeds the respective number for 2020 by EUR 10 billion.
I think this is a lot of numbers, but it's extremely important that we set the record right for 2021 for continued and discontinued, in particular when it comes to the guidance later. Now, going from cash flow before interest and tax to the free cash flow.
Again, I think cars and vans, I explained before, so what's left to say here? Cash taxes EUR 1.9 billion, significantly higher than in 2020. Well, obviously better operational performance has implications on tax. And then, we have in the other reconciling as well, some impact here from the discontinued, i.e. the cash contribution for eleven months and nine days from Daimler Trucks & Buses for EUR 700 million.
Again, you should not read anything from it, as I just said before. On the free cash flow side, we are therefore at EUR 8.6 billion for the industrial business reported, adjusted EUR 11 billion. The adjustments are again related to legal proceedings and cash outs as well as restructuring.
Coming to the net industrial liquidity. Well, we started the year with EUR 18 billion on a combined basis, including trucks. We ended the year with EUR 21 billion without the trucks, having transferred EUR 6 billion of cash over to Daimler Truck as part of the spin. Obviously, that was driven by free cash flow we talked about on the chart before of EUR 8.6 billion.
We paid the dividend of EUR 1.4 to you, and we have some other favorable impact, I mean, in the other, which is basically dividend and capital measures from Mercedes-Benz Mobility and a bit of FX effect. That leaves us with EUR 21 billion Net Industrial Liquidity. I think this is a very strong and comfortable level. It definitely supports a solid investment-grade rating, and again, even after the transfer of EUR 6 billion to Daimler Trucks.
Now, looking at the dividend proposal. The net profit, excluding the deconsolidation result, is at EUR 14 billion. The equivalent amount for the EPS is EUR 12.90. We suggest to exclude the deconsolidation result from the dividend base. This gain is a pure valuation effect, has no cash impact, and therefore we suggest, I mean, to exclude it.
We apply our dividend policy of about 40%. For the ones who calculate it already, yes, it's slightly below 40%, not big times. We like sometimes simple stuff, and therefore we propose a straight EUR 5 per share dividend for the AGM in April.
Important to note as well that inside you have EUR 0.70, which covers, I mean, the Daimler Trucks & Buses profit contribution in 2021. As part of the agreements, Daimler Truck will not pay a dividend to its shareholders for 2021. Looking forward, you should take EUR 4.30 as a reference point for the Mercedes-Benz Group dividend.
Let me say, I think next to this pretty impressive number of EUR 5 or EUR 4.30, there's also a message coming along with it. This is a demonstration of our belief as a management into the sustainable profitability and the ability to keep it sustainable moving forward. At the same time, you should read from there that capital allocation to you matters for us.
Now we're coming to the outlook for 2022. Well, before talking about the 2022 guidance, actually it's very important that we set the record right for 2021. Ola mentioned these are the unaudited, I mean, KPIs we're looking at here today. So, on this chart, I mean, you can see the unaudited KPIs for the continued operations, i.e.
Excluding, I mean, the truck for 2021, and this is obviously, I mean, the reference for the guidance for 2022. Another important change, the van business is increasingly contributing with its weight to the MB Group performance. After the spin, EUR 14-15 billion business. We wanna give you, I mean, more transparency.
It's an exciting business in the midst of the transformation, and therefore, we will split out the KPIs separately for cars and vans and also guide separately. For 2021, what are the key KPIs on the profitability side for cars, 13.1% adjusted and 8.3% on the van side. If you look on the cash conversion rate, that was at 0.8 for cars. At vans it was 1.3.
However, due to very low level of investment in 2021 of only EUR 200 million on the R&D side. The respective numbers were EUR 7 billion and EUR 0.5 billion for vans. From the group side, I think there's also very important number to note down, to pencil down. Here as we have the continued operations only as well, i.e. without Daimler Trucks and the deconsolidation result.
What does it mean? The revenue reference is now EUR 134 billion for 2021, and the group EBIT is EUR 16 billion, as well as the free cash flow on the industrial side, EUR 7.9 billion. Now, turning to the divisional guidance for 2021, I think we really want to emphasize the importance to read the assumptions on this chart, I mean, carefully.
Number one, we see a very strong demand for our products, our cars and the vans across the globe in all markets. Number two, we still face, I mean, semi-related supply constraints, which continue to impact us. Third, in particular today, we cannot project geopolitical developments or any other COVID implications, and therefore, these harbor further uncertainties.
Before we go to the numbers, maybe a few words on the same situation and the supply situation. As I said before, the demand for the products, I mean, is extremely strong. The visibility on the semi-supply capacity is improving. Semi-capacity is also coming back online, but there's still a high level of volatility, and there are selective bottlenecks which hold us back to translate that strong market demand into higher sales.
At this stage, it's not really possible, I mean, to give a prognosis when the supply bottlenecks, I mean, will be cleared. We expect the situation to stabilize in 2022 compared to 2021. At the same time, we carry on to give priority consciously to our top-end vehicles and to the electric vehicles.
What we did in 2021, which is not driven by semi only, but which is, I mean, our strategy in itself, we will continue to do in 2022. Our high level of flexibility in the plans, I mean, also allows us, I mean, to do that and to react to it. I think we could demonstrate in 2021 that we're able to do so.
At the same time, we intensify the interaction with direct suppliers and semiconductor suppliers to make the whole supply chain more resilient and more robust. What does it mean more concretely? We're working with the suppliers to secure capacity on the one side. On the other side, we're also working with them to develop technologies, step changes, for new chip generation.
All in all, that means we should have concrete agreements on supply quantities. We extend the planning cycles. We also develop safety stocks, I mean, in the particular spots of the chain. We also go into multiple sourcing sources. Overall significant progress on deep sourcing. We augment, I mean, our sourcing strategy and the contracts in many commodities.
However, at the end, if one important component is missing, you can't stop, you can't continue. You stop the car from being built. You know that. On that basis, what is the sales guidance for cars? Demand strong, as I said. Semicon holding us back on this. That means, from that perspective, we see the unit sales for cars slightly above 2021.
As per, I mean, the definition, the rules, that means up to 7.5% over 2021. So you can see we take a prudent view with regard to the sales development. If that changes, what we are hoping for, of course, we will keep you posted in due course. What does it mean for profitability?
We guide, on that basis, at 11.5%-13% return on sales adjusted. What is the walk over 2021? How do we get there? Yes, we have slightly more volume. We expect the mix to stay at a healthy level, as we had in 2021. We'll continue to the top-end growth, the top-end vehicle sales growth by more than 10%.
The used car results, I mean, should also be on a good basis, however, a bit more normalized, as I said before, probably half a ROS point lower, therefore, in 2022 compared to 2021. We'll further carry on the pricing side to improve it even further. However, on the other side, the raw material bill will come up significantly. You know it, in the various commodities which constitutes a substantial headwind for 2022. What else?
In 2021, we had a favorable tailwind from the depreciation, the higher level of depreciation, and also the other buckets we talked about before, that we cannot repeat from today's point of view in 2022, so we're losing that.
The R&D will go slightly up. That is, I think, I mean, in essence, how we get from 2021 to 2022 to that guidance of 11.5%-13%. But there is maybe also, I mean, a message in here in this 11.5%, you might read, again, this should demonstrate our comfort in terms of the resilience of our profitability, which we believe we can command in 2022.
On the PPE and on the R&D side, we see that slightly above our prior year, mainly due to the investments into a compact family, into MMA, as well as the new AMG all-electric EA platform. The cash conversion rate for cars should be between 0.8 and 1. On the van side for the sales, slightly above 21, same rationale, same background as on the car side, i.e., same induced demand being much stronger.
On that basis, we see a return on sales adjusted of 8%-10%. On the invest side, PPE and R&D, we see a significant step up. Why that? Twofold. Number one, we now enter really into full speed development of the all-electric van platform, fully fledged, covering the full segment coming online mid of the decade.
At the same time, we extend the life cycle for our combustion platforms into the next decade. Vans is in full transformation, and I'm sure you will join me in saying that is a fascinating business moving forward, yielding very nice tangible results.
However, in terms of the cash contribution, you will understand after the con-conversion above one, it therefore sits now for 2022 due to the investments below at 0.6-0.8. On the division side, the last on Mercedes-Benz Mobility, I think I gave the key elements already before. We now see the return on equity in the range of 16%-18%.
The key drivers being the normalization of cost of credit risk and the swing on the interest margin and the one-timer in 2021, which we will not have again in 2022. What does it mean at the group level in terms of the guidance? Again, the reference point are the continued operations KPIs for 2021 we talked about before.
On the revenue side for 2022, that means we should be slightly above. On the group EBIT, we should be at prior year level. On the reconciliation side, maybe it sounds a bit technical, but you should know the PPA, the purchase price allocation effect from the deconsolidation has a significant negative impact and probably therefore will almost offset the at equity contribution from Daimler Truck in 2022.
On the free cash flow side, the reference is EUR 7.9, as I said before, for 2021. On that basis for 2022, what do we see? The cash flow before interest and tax on the automotive segment, i.e., cars and vans, adjusted as well as reported, should be at previous year level.
When you go to the free cash flow reported and adjusted, we are facing the significantly higher cash taxes in 2022, the reason being that basically tax loss carry forwards have been exhausted, and therefore, I mean, the free cash flow on the industrial side should sit slightly below 2021 level in 2022. Maybe a short-term outlook on the first quarter. What do we see as we stand here towards the end of February?
Sales on the car side, I mean, should be around the Q4 level, constrained by the same situation. Pricing and mix, I mean, is on a healthy level. We see the headwinds of raw material, I mean, materializing. We should have also a bit of one-timer in the adjusted items on M&A transactions in the order of magnitude of EUR 900 million EBIT and EUR 700 cash.
That refers basically to two issues, reduction in our shareholding in Mercedes-Benz Grand Prix and the sale of our retail outlets. On the European CO2 side emission, we should be at the prior year level, as Ola pointed out before. That was a lot of stuff. Sorry for that. I hope it gives you some color. Back to you, Ola.
Thank you, Harald. It's called Annual Results Conference for a reason, so thank you for that detail. Now, what is our task list for 2022? I think it's all about building upon the positive momentum that we created in the last year or two. This year, our main task list is to scale the electric vehicles. As I mentioned, aim to double the sales of the battery electric vehicles again and also grow the overall electrified vehicles.
We're also on a path of accelerating our software development. We are really making progress now with MB.OS. We will go to market with our Level three autonomous drive functionality beyond Europe. On the intelligence side of the transformation, this is just as exciting as what's going on with electrified mobility, and you will hear more about that later in the year.
I think Harald pointed it out, we will continue to build on the luxury position of Mercedes-Benz with a growth of our top-end vehicles, make sure that we manage the mix and how we go to market in a very thoughtful way. Needless to say, we're working with our suppliers to alleviate the supply constraints.
We're still in this, but we have a much higher level of transparency and also deep sourcing and created ourselves more optionality. We think that we can tackle this step-by-step throughout the year because we also wanna shorten those delivery times to our customers. I know that many people around the world are waiting for their Mercedes. It's that special moment when you get your car, and we will do everything we can to serve our customers.
Never to forget, in uncertain times, it's important to have financial resilience. So the relentless focus on efficiency and making sure that we manage our fixed cost, that we are mindful when we allocate capital into CapEx, and other items, that we make the right decisions.
All of these things means that 2022 could be an even more exciting year than 2021. We're really looking forward to creating this future for Mercedes-Benz. But I also want to underline, this is not possible without the great team. I wanna come back to what I said in the beginning.
I wanna thank everybody around the world, that is, in the Mercedes team for making this possible and also making this possible in uncertain times, where we have to go beyond and be even more flexible than we have been in the past. It is this team that gives me confidence, the people at Mercedes, gives me confidence that 2022 is going to be a good year for us. As we say, this team, we are Mercedes-Benz. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Ola. Thank you, Harald, for your presentations. To everyone who's watching us online, we will of course have ample time for your questions. We have scheduled these conference calls. You know that that's coming up. Following a transition of the past years, we would, before we go there, just start with those questions.
We would like to ask a few questions, a couple of deep dives maybe on a few things, current topics. We've done it in the past, and I think there is enough stuff to address. I think, Ola, first of all, it just makes sense to start with the obvious thing this morning. We've all watched the news. We've all seen the terrible news from the Ukraine. What's your perspective on this?
How much can you say?
Yeah, in a situation like this, of course, we're very concerned. You think about the human side of this, and our thoughts are with the people in the Ukraine. It's a situation that we will look at very carefully, looking at our people first, and then business second, really.
In this situation, I think it's up to the experts, the politicians around the world, to seek solutions and hopefully find a way to de-escalate the current situation.
Okay, thank you. A little closer to the core business. Harald, already two weeks ago in the pre-release, we showed some strong financial figures for 2021. We've received a couple of questions from the media side regarding that special effect that resulted from the spin-off of Daimler Truck.
Could you be so kind for the non-financial experts among us to explain in layman's terms what those EUR 9.7 billion mean, and why they do not have certain impacts on tax, and if I remember correctly, on the dividend?
Well, thanks, Tobias, for that one. Let me try the layman terms. Why don't you try to explain it?
Because I'm not a financial expert.
Anyhow, well, what is it? As part of the spin, the Daimler Truck assets and liabilities are leaving the books, and you're required to compare it, I mean, that value of net assets, i.e., assets minus the liabilities leaving the books with the fair value of the business, i.e., Daimler Truck. That has been assessed by an external appraiser, and the difference between that fair value as it has been assessed, which is not the market cap.
Fair value as assessed by external appraiser minus the net assets gives the EUR 9.2 billion deconsolidation result capital gain. Pure non-cash item, no tax implications in essence on it, and that is the reason why we suggested to exclude it from the dividend base for 2021.
Okay, awesome. Thank you. Ola, I guess it's probably fair to say that the most frequently used term in the last year, at least in the auto industry, has been semiconductor shortage, unfortunately. Are there any lessons to learn, or is there anything that we would do differently going forward based on what we've experienced and managed in 2021?
In 2021, flexibility has been the key. The fact that we have been able to, in spite of these constraints, really juggle them and keep our operations running as smoothly as possible, it's really a testament to the flexibility of our production system, our procurement and logistics. It's also the time of partnership.
We have dug into this topic very deep, all the way down to the fab level, you know, what happens on the production of the silicon wafers themselves throughout the different tiers. We have a different level of transparency now. In the past, we relied more or less on the tier one suppliers to take care of this for us.
Whereas they work extremely closely with us to solve these problems, we have gone into deep sourcing, and we're now sourcing in a wider fashion, but also on the component side deeper.
Into multiyear contracts of that as well. It is, like Harald said, you have thousands and thousands of these components in a sophisticated car like this EQE that we have next to us, and it could be just one single part, even if you have all of them, one single part that stops you from finishing a car. We will continue now to map this out.
We have also redesigned literally dozens of parts to create optionality. Although this is going on and we have customers waiting for our cars, and I know that they're eager to get their cars, I wanna thank the team for what they have done. I think that what we learned in the last 12 months or 12 months plus is going to make ourselves more robust into the future.
We can also see the
An overproportional potential on margin growth.
That's why we give preference to that segment in terms of growth and also allocation of our resources in terms of development, industrial capabilities, financial resources.
Probably last question on one of the most important topics, CO2. Ola, we've heard earlier that we've undercut the European CO2 targets. Can you shed some light on the development in 2022, maybe also on a global scale, not just Europe?
The destination is clear. The destination is zero emission. I think, now more than ever, that decision that we made, two and a half years ago and last year's decision to say, "Can we go faster?" Yes, we can go faster, is the right decision. That's why this year is about scaling, doubling again the battery electric vehicles and significantly growing the overall electrified vehicles, including long range, plug-in hybrids, and really going global.
I mentioned in the presentation before that in Europe, already 35%-40% are electrified vehicles in 2021. Only a couple or three years ago, I don't think we could have imagined that. I can see that already high level in Europe that we can build upon that.
Now is also the time to really go global with our battery electric offensive. We're starting production in our facilities in China. We're starting production in our facilities in the United States.
For several of these cars, siblings, this car, EQE here, and also sibling cars of it. You will see that our footprint of electrified vehicles is really going global, this year. We will do everything we can in spite of semiconductor shortages and the different things that we talked about to also get the electrified vehicles out, to customers around the world.
On top of that, I think we have made tremendous progress also with our supply base. Most of our suppliers has actually signed up to Ambition 2039. To say, "We also wanna be CO2 neutral ten years before the Paris Agreement." We might not know every single action, or measure that needs to be taken to get there, but alone, if you have the commitment, that's the start to getting there.
Last but not least, this is the year where our production goes CO2 neutral. Another important milestone in terms of the path to a decarbonized future for this company and this year.
Okay. That's tough to beat as a final word, so I'm just gonna conclude here. Thank you very much. Thanks to everyone. Now the first part of our annual results conference ends here, but not the program of the day.
Next up are Q&As. As you know, we will start at 10:15 A.M. CET with the Q&A session for analysts and investors. Steffen will host that, and you will find your access information on the invitation to this event. Just a reminder for the journalists who are currently watching, your Q&A will start at 11:30 A.M. CET. Thank you, and see you later.