Good morning to OHB's Analyst Conference for the Annual Report 2021. I'm Marco Fuchs, the CEO of OHB, and I'm very happy to present you the results and walk you through the presentation. Of course, we will be available for questions. It's a pity that it's a digital event again, like last year, but I'm sure we are all used to now, well enough to use also the functions to participate and have a good Q&A session. I'm here at OHB's headquarters in Bremen, together with Kurt Melching, our CFO, for the Q&A session. Lutz Bertling is online for questions. Daniela Schmidt is here with us. Irmgard Runkel, CEO of GEOSYSTEMS, recently acquired company, is here with us, and Chiara Pedersoli from the Management Board of OHB System.
There will be a broad team of OHB leadership for the Q&A session. I hope you have been able to download our material. As always, I quickly walk you through the slides, and then we will have, of course, time and, of course, hopefully the technical facilities to discuss and further explore. The year has been a good year. I think you have seen that. Profitability is nice. I think we have been very successful with our digital activities in 2021. In that respect, I think the tone is very optimistic and positive, and I am happy to quickly walk you through the slides. The reporting structure, I'm sure this is well known. There are three segments, Space Systems, Aerospace, and Digital.
That is now the first full year where we report numbers based on that. I don't want to go into the logic and the reasons for that. That has been discussed many times. The key takeaways of 2021 are that profitability exceeded our guidance. EBITDA is at EUR 84 million versus EUR 80 million that we guided, and the EBIT is at EUR 47 million versus EUR 45 million. That's very good. The overall revenue is lower than expected. We were expecting it to be around EUR 1 billion, and it now turned out to be at EUR 917 million. Of course, that results in a higher EBIT margin, which now is at 5.1% instead of 4.6%.
The earnings per share is at a historic peak with EUR 1.58. We have increased the dividend recommendation for the annual meeting on June 1st to EUR 0.48, which obviously has been now proposed by the Management Board and the Supervisory Board. That results in 12%, because previously we had 43%, and the EUR 0.05 are, yeah, I think a good increase. In terms of the overall numbers of the year, here you can see EUR 917 million total revenues, which is a little bit lower than expected, and we're not quite happy when we saw that there have been quite on the subcontractor level some reductions.
As I said, profitability has been very good, resulting in this record level of EUR 84 million EBITDA in 2021. If I look quickly through the three segments, we see that Space Systems comes in at EUR 756 million, which is roughly the same level as before. What needs to be taken into consideration is the fact that with the restructuring, some of the activities that used to be within Space Systems have been transferred to Digital. There is a little shift of people. The headcount has been reduced. What is now OHB Teledata in the Digital department, for example, Digital division, for example, used to be just an activity within OHB System.
If you take that into consideration, the results are in line with expectation, as you can see, the EUR 61 million EBITDA and EUR 33 million EBIT. In terms of Aerospace, the numbers doesn't look that nice. The revenue is at EUR 97 million, and it's a steady decline over the last couple of years. What you don't see is that we have really worked through the restructuring quite a significant way. Yes, of course, revenues in 2020 and 2021 are low compared to where we came from when we were in full-fledged of production for Ariane 5. We have been able to do the turnaround.
We have regained profitability, and we have prepared ourselves also with provisions for the reduction of headcount and other things that had to do with the restructuring. When you see just EUR 1 million EBIT here, our level of confidence and our level of being happy with what those results are is higher than that number, because we believe that starting from 2022 onwards, and then of course, when the production of Ariane 6 increases, we do see that MT Aerospace, which is the main part of the consolidated Aerospace division, is regaining. Yeah, of course, the star in its first year of appearance is the Digital segment. EUR 101 million revenues is good. We're happy with that result.
EBITDA at 16% and EBIT at 14% is good. It shows that profitability in this area is good. Having said that, a big part of that has been regrouping, restructuring from existing activities, but there has also been significant new business, especially in the profitability in the services that we provided for a micro satellite to be launched and put in service early last year has been very significantly helping us to achieve the results. Of course, just in February, we completed our acquisition of GEOSYSTEMS, and Irmgard Runkel is here with us to show you a few slides on that and give you a little bit of background on why we believe GEOSYSTEMS fits very well in our downstream strategy.
That obviously is at the core of the Digital division in terms of building satellites, launching satellites, and operating and using satellites as the overall, let's say, arc of the OHB business model. Looking into the balance sheet, yeah, of course, the structure in 2021 has not been very different from the previous year. The non-current assets basically at the same level, EUR 378 compared to EUR 376. That is not really different. A little bit more property, plant, and equipment and a little bit less in other stuff. Slightly higher intangibles, yeah, but there's not much difference there. What you see on the asset side is an increase in contract assets, that is ongoing projects.
WIP, work in progress, has increased from EUR 310 million- EUR 382 million. That's the most significant change. Cash was with EUR 96 million at a good level, and, yeah, the rest has been pretty much the same. The contract assets have to do with a number of large projects approaching the end. So that is going to change within this year, and that's of course very much the core of the business model of the Space Systems division. On the equity side, of course, the equity increase is nice. We were able to almost by EUR 30 million to increase the equity from EUR 223 million- EUR 252 million. The rest on this slide is not that significant.
I think what is the other side of what I just said, the increased contract assets, the WIP is obviously current financial liabilities is higher. That's something that has to do with the elongation of some of the projects. The financing of the ongoing work has been increased over the comparison of last year. What was not good was the free cash flow. We are at -EUR 15 million compared to the free cash flow of the previous years, where we have been always positive. Net debt, because of what I just said, the increased contract assets is higher than in previous years at EUR 164 million, and excluding the pensions at EUR 60 million still, which is still higher than before.
CapEx at the same level, more or less than in previous years, and own work capitalized, you see EUR 16 million compared to 14, 10 and 17 is pretty much also at a normal level that we see. Return on capital employed with 12% is an increase compared to last year or the previous year, 2020. The net debt, I talked about it. Let's start with the light blue, the net debt excluding pensions, which is really, I think, the number we should look at. Increased by EUR 42 million, that is significant. It's still at a healthy level, but obviously, that relates to the work in progress increase that I just earlier explained. Investment spending, again, here you see the same numbers that I just previously quickly showed.
Own work capitalized is at our average level, same with CapEx. Even though we invest quite heavily in new things and on many factors, new satellite platforms, new products, investment into rocket factory and many other things, you see that we are more or less at a level that I would call healthy for OHB. Free cash flow, I'm not so happy with that number. I guess it explains itself, and Kurt will go into more details on that if there are further questions. The order backlog with EUR 2.1 billion is at a normal level.
If you look at the curve here over the years, you always see the years when there is an ESA Ministerial Conference, 2019 or 2016 or 2012, it is rather low. The year after it increases because of the transformation of program decisions at European level into contracts. Obviously, that is something we hope for also in the next year, in 2023, after the Ministerial Conference of 2022 will take place later this year. Going to the overall development over the last five years, you see here from 2017 to 2021 almost a flat development.
Yes, of course, there have been impacts in 2020 and 2021 from the pandemic, but you see that the group is at this level between EUR 860 million and EUR 1.03 billion, a slight uptick, and the interesting part is, of course, looking to the right side, the guidance and the outlook. We explicitly confirm our guidance that we gave two months ago at our Capital Market Day. The outlook of the years 2023, 2024, 2025, we do confirm explicitly. Numbers have not changed. This is exactly the same set of numbers, and we are confident that we are on a good way in 2021 to meet our guidance. We have, of course, the plan to also implement the outlook.
Same as on the EBITDA and EBIT side. You see here that with EUR 84 million, historically, we had a record year. We do plan to have this year EUR 97 million EBITDA and EUR 60 million EBIT. Yeah, of course, the same is true for the development in the years 2023, 2024, 2025. What I just said earlier, we do expect this to come. If you ask why this is becoming more profitable, I think there are three reasons, more or less, and I guess we will answer all of them. I think the main reason is that we'll answer them at the discussion. The main reason is that we have been able to overcome the loss-making enterprises at MT Aerospace.
The second part is clearly that there is a significant contribution of the Digital division. The third part is that we are also increasing profitability in Space Systems, the main large programs, which have always been a mix of projects making money, some projects not, and so on. We are since quite some time working very hard on improving that ratio. We are confident that the profitability also in OHB System satellite projects will see a steady positive development. Yeah. Looking back at 2021, it was a year of good progress. We had a growing project portfolio. OHB Sweden was selected as a prime contractor for the Arctic Weather Satellite mission. We had a contract for the Lunar Gateway that was signed.
We have future opportunities around the SpaceLink project. We have been selected, this is still an evolution. We have, of course, also long-running projects that are moving to a completion. There will be the launch, basically, of EnMAP in the next couple of days, literally. The satellite is in Florida at the launch site. It will be launched on April 1st . We also see the completion of Heinrich Hertz, H2Sat, as we call it internally. MTG is also moving to the launches of the first satellite later this year, and then the continuing satellites also over the next years. Yes, EnMAP ready for launch on April 1st .
Very important, because it's a hyperspectral imaging mission that answers a lot of questions about, as the name said, EnMAP, environmental mapping for plants and yield forecast, resource management, forest management and forest monitoring. It's a very broad range of application that comes out of hyperspectral technology. We're very happy to launch this program now. It is a strong heritage now for us. We had the first hyperspectral mission we were in charge of was the PRISMA mission we did out of Milano. Now EnMAP is following, and we are working currently on the hyperspectral payload for the European Copernicus mission, CHIME. It is under development in our Munich facility, OHB System, Oberpfaffenhofen facility.
That is an activity that we believe very strongly in. That's why EnMAP now also with a payload from Oberpfaffenhofen under our full responsibility is very significant for us. Aerospace turnaround in full swing. I talked about it. The AION program has been stabilized very much for the overall AION program. Of course, ESA has been very helpful in this, and member states have been willing to finance or co-finance this development. We are very thankful for that. MT Aerospace is also enlarging its cooperation with other rocket manufacturers, like, for example, Boeing for the SLS.
This has been extended, so we are quite happy that MT is now able to diversify more away from this single dependency of the Ariane business. That hopefully, of course, will go on in the future with new technologies like additive manufacturing that is now showing the first results in 2021 and going on this year. Also hydrogen storage and tank technology is very much on the way. Diversification is a key word that we see in Augsburg at MT. In the first year of our Digital segment, we launched a microsatellite in a one-stop shopping fashion for manufacturing and operating and selling data that has been done very successfully in 2020.
2021 was the launch in early in the year. We had a significant contract won in a competition in Luxembourg, the LUXEOSys operating for the NAOS satellite to be launched. We have also extended our commercial footprint, a couple of activities, and the one we are looking at is today in this presentation is GEOSYSTEMS, an acquisition we just did a couple of weeks ago, or we concluded a couple of weeks ago, and Irmgard Runkel will talk a little bit about this in a minute. Actually, yeah. She will come to the desk after this slide because I like to quickly summarize the rationale why we believe GEOSYSTEMS is a compelling and strong acquisition. Of course, it develops our downstream portfolio.
Of course, we believe that the downstream portfolio is very key to the Digital division. We do see a sizable market there. We do believe that the OHB as a space company being involved in the development and building of satellites, the launching of satellites, needs to also be involved in operating and using data. I think that has been discussed many times. It's a very core factor of our strategy, and that helps us to really understand better the future of the satellite development, but also, of course, it helps us to develop a healthy share in the application business. Why do we believe that GEOSYSTEMS is more valuable as part of OHB?
Because we believe that the OHB brand, the access we have to the customer environment is helpful. GEOSYSTEMS will remain a separate company with individual management under Irmgard's leadership. We do believe that we can be very helpful in growing, and we do see synergies with other activities we have in the OHB Digital portfolio. This concludes my first set of slides, and I would invite Irmgard now to show a few slides detailing GEOSYSTEMS from her perspective. Thanks for the moment.
Thank you. Let me give a little bit of an insight who is now new in the family of OHB. We are a set of specialists in geoprocessing and the related IT. We bring the needed expertise to build services on satellite data. Here we see a big potential if we look to EnMAP and the launch and the data coming along with EnMAP. As you can see, we are not really a startup, what you just brought aboard. We have an experience over more than 30 years in geo IT, and we bring along all the competence, the domain expertise. We are the solution providers for various market segments. The competence we have is software development and also a very in-depth domain know-how if it comes to customer and special markets.
We do have a strong partnership with Hexagon, and Hexagon is a global leader in digital reality solution. They are providing tools, platforms for Geo-IT, and we are the top seller for Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. Therefore, we can build up our expertise on those globally distributed products. Over these 30 years, we were able to establish a good database and a good customer database. It's a trustful and a long-lasting customer relations, not only in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland, but also globally. The change enabled us over the last years to show you a permanent growth in our sales over the last years. We are pretty stable. Together with OHB and with our pretty sound business plan, I'm pretty sure we can go along that road.
For those of you knowing the geo IT market and the players in Germany, maybe you know us as a typical software vendor. I think we go along with the paradigm change to service for the future. Let me explain a little bit the end-to-end solution from sensor to information. This is exactly where we fit in. OHB has a perfect knowledge and a strong footprint in the data acquisition if it comes to satellite and sensors. On the other hand side, the customer needs accurate, fresh, and reliable information. In between data acquisition and this what the customer needs, we do have value-adding services. That means we need to work with the data to bring exactly the information to the ground.
Value-adding services means we need to have knowledge in data in dynamic data processing for various data sources, adaptation to the user's needs in combination with other sensors and information. This is also valid for the fusion with geo information itself. Finally, the aggregation for the decision-making. Here we talk about artificial intelligence and all the related algorithms that we can embed. Together with these value-adding services, we speak about the downstream services. This is the information finally for the customer in a usable, readable, and reliable information and integrated into the business processes of a customer. This is where we bring domain along. The best is always to give you a little bit of insight about our customer story or success stories with our customers. This is just a selection. Let's talk about mining.
Using numerous huge amount of data over many years, here data management is key. Agriculture per se is always using remotely sensed data. Our customer base is on the one hand side, the funding, paying agencies and funding of farmers, and on the other hand side, it's a private sector, companies optimizing, pursuing, and all the activities on the field. No doubt, security and defense needs reliable and trustful information for situational awareness. If you speak about telecommunication, it is a little bit different. They need 3D information, so height is a key information to optimize the signals for our mobile facilities. Survey authorities in Germany has a duty to provide up-to-date satellite and basic information to other authorities. Of course, ESA is always to build up a future knowledge. Why do they all spend money in these downstream services?
They need reliable information. They are looking for cost reduction and relieving staff from recurring jobs which can be done by automation. They wanna be ahead of the competition, and they need to have a solution which enables them to seize the investment for many years. It should be secure for the future, and they wanna do the business critical decisions based on this information. We think we offer a pretty strong synergy potential with, for our customers as well as for other entities for OHB Digital. So we can push not only the downstream sector, but also their products and their services. Okay. Thank you. I hand over.
Yes, thank you very much, Irmgard, and Irmgard, and I think we will have time to discuss this a little further on. I just want to conclude the presentation with a quick outlook that of course around us, the world has changed over the last weeks and especially I mean the war over the last four weeks has really been a very, very bad unexpected event. We had in Germany of course a very deep let's say reaction from the government to this. The concern is very high that this is a fundamental change in the security.
What you can see is that on February 27th our Chancellor Olaf Scholz made a very strong reaction in the light of the war in Ukraine and proposed an additional extra fund of EUR 100 billion as a special fund separated from the annual budget for security and defense. There will be a future increase of defense spending to comply with the committed 2% GDP within NATO. This obviously has an impact in the sense that the outstanding procurement activities, like for example, the telecom satellite systems SATCOMBw , have now been stabilized in terms of budget.
There is also, of course, currently, as the war goes on, a very heavy relying on our existing SAR-Lupe satellites, and there is an activity around remote sensing and Earth observation that obviously creates an expectation that investments in European and German security will also include space investments. If you look at the chart, you can see that what we have been talking about over the last years many times is that German defense budgets not reaching the 2% criteria over many years is now going to increase, and we will see the 2% soon.
Of course, the question of how the special fund is allocated is a matter of political debate. What we can see is a change here, a fundamental change, and I think it's worthwhile to highlight that. Of course, though, unclear in detail, but as a fundamental direction, we will see this happening, which also creates certain opportunities. The other big story, of course, of OHB is the expectation of the ESA Ministerial Conference coming up in November this year. Yes, of course, Earth observation will also here be the big topic. We see the next generation of the Copernicus program to be decided.
We hope that the Earth Explorer 10 Harmony is on the agenda for confirmation, where we are a part of a bidding consortium. The Arctic Weather Satellite constellation now, after developing the prototype, we do expect a hope for the constellation to go on. In terms of telecom, there are technology programs that will mature around quantum key distribution. Also in the science and exploration domain, we do see decisions on additional missions in the Cosmic Vision framework program. What is uncertain, obviously, is exploration of Mars at this point in time. Venus and Mars are on the agenda of Europe, but Mars obviously now with the developments we saw around ExoMars are pretty uncertain.
What we also see are a couple of specific OHB-related programs moving on. We do see, in the safety and security domain, Hera mainly, also the FlyEye second-generation telescope, to be followed by a series of telescope products, and a number of other programs. Of course, we do expect also updated support for the Ariane 6 program, because independent access to space for Europe obviously is now very, very important. We are very happy to see the Ariane program now maturing to soon become operational.
I believe that the European ESA member states will also prepare for the future of the Ariane program and think about and hopefully initiate future developments or future versions of Ariane moving onwards, and making sure that this period of naivety in terms of strategic, let's say robustness in European access to space comes to an end, because I think it's very important that the Ariane program becomes very resilient and robust in order to allow Europe access to space in the way that the programs, the satellite programs also required. I'm concluding a view of this year with the financial calendar.
I think what the message is that we are very optimistic of the year 2022. We do have a number of in terms of business perspectives that are on our agenda. Of course, I was focusing very much on the institutional part in terms of security, defense, and of course, ESA. There are other initiatives going on which we have presented at our Capital Market Days and other occasions. Of course, we will keep you informed in the course of this year. Looking at the financial calendar, you can see the points coming.
Today, we have this analyst conference, but only a couple of weeks ahead in May, early May 11th, we will have our first quarter report. Then on June 1st, the Annual General Meeting, which will also be a digital event, and that is followed by the regular course. We're just reporting here the conferences, the investor conferences in the fall, but there will be more events, some of them digital, some hopefully then also in person. I invite you all to stay in close contact with us, with Martina and her team, with Kurt and his team, with myself, just to be updated and informed about what's going on at OHB.
I would like now to open the floor for the Q&A session, and I'm looking to Marcel, and he is nodding, and he does have a few questions, I think, lined up. Please, Marcel.
Yes. I think we should start with Alexander Hauenstein, who raised his hand really early. I would just add you as a panelist, and then you should be able to ask your question. Just give me a sec. You should be able to talk now.
Yes, hello. Alexander Hauenstein from DZ BANK . Can you hear me? Can you actually hear me? Hello?
Hello. Yeah.
Yes. Hello. Alexander Hauenstein. Thanks for taking my questions. I've got four questions, actually. First, coming back to the potential from the increased defense budget for the Bundeswehr, but also maybe for other NATO partners in Europe. I'm wondering, on the one hand, I think it's most likely not included in your general January outlook for the upcoming years until 2025. Is that correct? On the timeline regarding potential clarity or visibility, is there any idea when you say this might come on the specific agenda for our side? Is that something which we have to wait for the Ministerial Conference, or is discussion already starting right now? That's my first question, please.
Okay. Concerning the military, the maybe increased military budget, this is obviously not included in our forecast, which we have given on the Capital Market Day. This is completely new and a new opportunity for us, a new challenge for improvement of the figures we already proposed. The second question, sorry, Alexander, was not absolutely clear for me.
I can-
I haven't really understood what you mean.
Yeah. I'm wondering when you expect any further clarity on that front. Is that a discussion that is already starting these days, or is it something that will be coming up probably in November at the Ministerial Conference in more detail?
As a military issue, this has nothing to do with the Ministerial Conference in November. These discussions are in principle starting with our customers. We propose some ideas what we can do and how we can improve the reconnaissance situation and what we can do to add additional values for the Ministry of Defence. This is already starting in principle. Ministerial Conference is completely other issues which has nothing to do with these military issues.
Okay, thank you. I thought it might be somehow mixed up in a certain way. Thanks for clarification here. Coming back to something which you raised right now, the electro-optical reconnaissance systems. I heard something about a project satellite or a project GEORG. Is that something that is underway already, or is that a future potential project?
Since quite some time we are doing an upside program for our government, and that is underway since quite many years. That's not a new project, that is an ongoing project.
Okay, thank you. Coming to numbers, please. Looking into 2022, you already gave your top-line numbers, which you are guiding for. Can you speak a bit about the quarterly development of the earnings progression, please? Any idea how we should think about the modeling, the bigger milestones coming in? Anything that could help us a bit for getting a better and clearer picture for the course of the year, that would be helpful. Thank you.
Yes. Yes. In principle, the logic in 2022 will be nearly the same as in the previous years concerning turnover and total revenues. Major milestones of the program are also in this year, in the third and fourth quarter. In this first quarter, this year we have really no absolutely major milestones and nothing. The total revenues in the first quarter will be comparably low as it was in the last years, it's in the same area. The real improvement of earnings and revenues through increases will happen also this year in the third and fourth quarter.
Okay, thank you. My last question, coming back to Ariane 6. I understand on the one hand that you're diversifying from what you have presented so far with regard to potential customer Boeing, et cetera. I understand that there is an increasing need from the clients for independent space access, as you said. Does that mean we should look for definitely higher demand from the client side regarding Ariane 6? Is that the right interpretation here overall? I understand that first indications are already underway. Is that correct?
Yes, we're of course hoping for that because Ariane 6 now coming to completion will be the backbone of European access for many years. Yes, of course, we as a supplier are optimistic about the successful program and hope that the numbers will be hopefully higher than we were concerned about the last years. I mean, you know, when a program is in development, everybody is looking at risks and concerns and so on. Now coming to the market introduction, yes, we do hope that Ariane 6 will be a successful program and carrying the main load of European independent access to space. It's a market out there.
There are other alternatives, but we of course support Ariane and hope that Europe regains its position that it used to have under the Ariane 5 era.
Okay, thank you. The ongoing developments are also some kind of special driver on top what you have been guiding for before, for this segment, right?
Yes. As I said, we're optimistic about this segment now based on the progress we see with Ariane, based on the implemented restructuring we did over the last years that was painful and expensive. The market is catching up because obviously when you look at what we see now with the implications of the war and the fact that Soyuz is not available anymore, neither in Kourou nor in Baikonur for Western customers, you saw that some of the constellation satellites that were planning to launch Soyuz from Baikonur had to change. Obviously, now the fact that Soyuz is discontinued for the time being from Kourou, that increases the market potential for Ariane 6.
Understood. Is there any impact from a potential, let's say, disruption of cooperation at the ISS or any related work to that for your company?
Of course, the cooperation between Western partners and Russia in space is impacted. We saw that with Soyuz, we see it with ExoMars, we see it with other activities. It has not been impacted yet with the International Space Station. Of course, we hope that it remains that way. We just saw recently a few days ago that there have been new people arriving at the space station. Russians have arrived there. We hope that that continues because I just remind you that we have Matthias Maurer, also a German astronaut up there. Who knows?
The impact on OHB is clearly more with ExoMars and that is clearly a mission with luckily from our side has been completed more or less in an industrial way, but it has not been launched. The ExoMars mission to Mars had to be interrupted, and it's at this point in time pretty uncertain how that will continue because not only the rocket that was intended to be used is a Proton from Kourou provided by Russia, but also the lander that comes from Russia. So the whole technical configuration the current configuration is not feasible without Russian contribution. So it's not so easy to come up with a solution for ExoMars. As I have said, we have completed our work.
Yes, of course, there might be some storage and refurbishment work coming at a later stage. That's okay.
It's a pity because this program has been very much at our heart over many years as a very strong OHB representation and participation in exploration.
Okay, thank you a lot. Thanks a lot for the detailed explanations and all my questions, and I give it back to the queue. Thank you.
Okay, thank you. Next up will be Aymeric Poulain. I'll just add you as a panelist as well. Just give me another second. You should be able to talk now.
Can you hear me?
Yes.
Yeah, sorry for that. Thank you for taking my question. You said that the world has changed, and yet your guidance hasn't. So could you give us some indication of the risks that could derail some of the plans this year? Especially, you face some supply chain issues in back end of last year. Are we gonna see some similar issues this year? A lot of industrial companies are warning about semiconductor and other shortages in the supply chain. You mentioned also Soyuz launchers that will not be launched from Kourou, and that could be quite a sizable part of the launches planned this year.
Does that involve some delay, potential delay for some of the satellite launches you were expecting? And then on the kind of, as a potential offset, you highlighted the military budget's increase in Germany. Would you have a figure of the exposure, sales exposure of OHB to the military budget and what kind of share you think it represent of the space part of the German military budget? Thank you.
Good morning. I will take the question on the supply chain. We definitely see delays on EEE parts. They will not have effects on the launches that we're gonna see this year or next year, beginning of next year, for the simple reason that the satellite are already I mean, all the parts are already here. Where we see an impact, or we could have seen an impact, would have been on other projects which we are developing. We have at least for some of the developments, taken some measures to have multiple suppliers, to discuss very closely with our suppliers. They're our strategic partners since many years. We have already ordered some parts that we will need in next year.
We are working with our suppliers together to minimize the impact for the future projects. For these projects, for this year and for beginning of next year, I can confirm that there is no impact. Question on the numbers maybe.
Yes, concerning the numbers, it's completely right what Chiara just told you. At the end of the day, we carefully cooperate with our supply chain and looking very carefully on it. We are also looking carefully whether there's any impact from this Ukraine issue, but actually we have no direct supplier from the Ukraine. Maybe that some of our subcontractors or suppliers have some, but we are just investigating it and looking for it. Up to now, we see there are no major impact. The influence of delays of launches due to non-availability of launches and also to this area at the end of the day, there may be some influence that may lead to the issue that some launches will be moved for one month, two months, whatever, in this area, I believe.
It's the case, for example, we have problems to transport our SAR satellites actually to the U.S. due to non-availability of aircraft. Very simple. At the end of the day, we are looking carefully what opportunities are in the worldwide market we can do, but it's a little bit unclear. This may lead to a move of few weeks at the end of the day, but no major issues. This also may lead to some shift of milestones to the next year because there maybe that's a full operational services for example, for SAR satellites are not available this year as expected. In this case, we have not a direct impact on revenues, but we may have an impact on the cash situation because then we can only fulfill major milestones at the beginning of next year.
This may be an impact, but at the end of the day, it's a little bit too early to make very clear announcements on this because we are under investigation. We are looking forward and try to do our very best to minimize the issues. At the end of the day, all these issues are supply chain issues, electronic components issues, and this war. These are not good obviously, but at the end of the day, we see no absolutely major impact on it. We also believe in the best case for Galileo that we can. We are just working, making progress in our work. We are just trying nevertheless to achieve milestones, even if the launch can be not performed. In any case, we believe that we will finalize the satellites, get the final acceptance of the satellite.
To be very clear, we are not responsible for the launch of the Galileo satellites. Launch of Galileo satellites is an issue of ESA and European Commission. They bought the launcher, and they perform the launch at the end of the day, with our support obviously. There's a little bit uncertainty in the room, but we are... I'm looking nevertheless positive in the future.
On military?
Mentioned before, this military opportunities that may come to OHB will improve our situation overall, may lead to new orders, to new order intake, which are actually not part of our guidance. Also here, it's too early to say clear figures and it's too early to say when potential order intakes will come. We hope that something happens this year, but it's a hope at the end of the day. It's also much too early to say it very clearly in terms of figures and in terms of scheduled dates.
Historically, if I may follow up, the percentage of sales that you would attribute to the defense budget, Germany's budget would be what? 5, 10% of the group sales? Would it be a good estimate or?
Actually, we have, as also mentioned before, I believe that this part, we actually have something around 10% of military sales at the end of the day. I believe due to other programs that are already in the loop, independent on the war issue and independent increased budget, is more or less stable. It depends on whether we are successful compared to our competitors to acquire good contracts in this area. I'm optimistic, and we believe that or we can assume that in the next years, the military part of our sales will be hopefully increased.
Thank you.
Okay, next up will be Richard Schramm. I also add you as a panelist. You should be able to talk now. Okay, maybe we will continue with Harry Breach first then. Harry, I will also add you as a panelist. Oh, I see Richard Schramm is ready to talk.
That doesn't work now. Can you hear me now?
Yeah, yeah, Schramm, we hear you.
Okay. The video is not working, but that's not so important, I guess. I just wanted to clarify on this delay in projects from last year to, yeah, obviously this year, which is around about EUR 100 million, quite a sizable amount. Is this kind of new safety cushion built in your guidance for the current year or is this just the delay, obviously, going forward here due to the ongoing problems in the supply chain, as you just signaled? That would be my last question.
In principle, this was an expected delay. We have, especially in one or two programs, there are some delays due to several reasons, due to technical reasons, due to also in, to some extent, still corona impacts. This is more or less expected, and this will not influence our guidance for 2022.
Okay. That's included there, right. Coming back to the military, I mean, the only precise project you have on hand here or following is this SATCOM project. Can you provide an indication when this really might be on now or when it comes in your books? I mean, you're working obviously on this for quite a while, and you signaled that it might be now accelerated due to the current situation. Is it a fair assumption that a decision is very likely for the current year on this one?
Yeah, we hope, of course. You know, yes, SATCOMBw 3 has been on our list and, of course, also on the list of the Bundeswehr since quite some time. Yes, what we now see strengthens the priority and now the taking decisions on making the extra funds available makes it a very strong and likely the procurement will go on as planned. We do expect that this procurement will go on within this year. Having said that, obviously, it's intended as a competition, so it's not so clear how fast it is going.
Obviously, being a competition, it's not so clear how the outcome will be, and we are competing, and we are optimistic. We do see this as an immediate priority that we expect from our government to be implemented, starting within this year.
Okay. Thank you. One other clarification, please, on these problems with the Russian launchers, which are now no longer available, so we have to switch to the American ones. As already signaled, this might cause some delays. Should we also expect some extra costs involved there? Isn't that a risk then also on the bid side for your guidance here?
Well, as Kurt explained, we are not responsible for those launches contractually. We do expect yes, that there will be a solution sooner or later. I think the key, the main point is if we look at Galileo, we are optimistic that it will not impact the service level of the operating constellation. Our satellites that have been launched so far are doing well and are in orbit. The Galileo overall performance is good and will continue. Of course, the 10 satellites that we still have on ground need to be launched sooner or later. I see that there might be some storage coming, there might be some refurbishment work coming.
I think if I look to Chiara, there might be some repositioning of the teams because I'm sure Chiara was planning to have some of these people doing other things. I'm not sure, maybe I hand it to you, but it changes your plans if those satellites need to be refurbished soon. I don't know, but this might be something for Chiara to comment on this later.
Yes, there will be maybe some reshuffling needed depending on the actual impact on change in the launch. Also, transporting the satellite to the launch site. If we have to transport them by ship, we have to see whether the containers are fit for this type of trips and if we don't find any other solution with another airplane. Therefore might be an impact on the distribution of resources inside the company. I'm sure we'll be managing.
This, by the way, should be paid. I mean, this is not on our expense.
Yeah.
Hola.
Yeah.
Yes.
Okay. Finally, quick one on this ExoMars, where you said that this project from your side was almost finished. Obviously it's now completely on hold, and we run the risk of seeing some impairment. It will be compensated for us, and you have no financial risk involved there.
Yes. At the end of the day, we expect, or I absolutely expect no substantial economic negative impact on it, on our figures.
Okay, thanks a lot.
Okay, thank you. Next up, we'll have Harry Breach right now. Harry, you should be able to talk.
Can you hear me?
Yes, we can hear you, Harry.
Yeah. Perfect. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah, just hopefully a few smaller ones. Just think back in the third quarter, you talked, Marco, about a couple of small programs and cost overruns that affected Space Systems margins. It looks as if Space Systems was, you know, fully back to normal in the fourth quarter in margins. Is it reasonable for us to think those cost overrun issues are now completely behind us? There's nothing else?
Yes, that's our expectation. You are completely right. We mentioned on the nine-month report that we have from one daughter company a negative impact on one project at the end of the day. This is reflected already in the nine-month report with some smaller impact on the first quarter. This, the first quarter, this will be overcompensated to other improvements in project, cost improvements and increase of contract value. At the end of the day, this leads to the figures we present now for the full year 2021, and for 2022 we expect no more major negative impact on this issue.
Great. That's clear. And then just thinking sort of maybe more on the positive side, sort of with Aerospace, the sort of profit contribution last year was, you know, quite variable quarter to quarter. When we think about 2022, should we be thinking about the sort of profitability in the last quarter, maybe about EUR 1 million, something like that, as being a sort of reasonable run rate to assume for 2022, or do you think Aerospace could do a bit better?
Let's say it's not unreasonable what you are saying. Our expectation is absolutely stabilization of the project, of the company, and of the programs itself. We had these problems last year also due to the restructuring costs, the cost resulting from the leave of roughly 100 employees. This is now over. We expect stable business in 2022. We have also usually, due to the nature of the business, maybe not so or a little bit weaker first quarter, but at least in quarter two, three and four, we expect stable, good business with good results and good profitability.
Yeah. Clear. Good. Kurt, can you remind us what the impact of the restructuring costs were last year in total for Aerospace?
There was something like.
There was something in 2020 already. We have built up also accruals in 2020 of EUR 2.7 million. The total amount we spent for this cost are EUR 4.1 million, and accordingly the difference is what is reflected in 2021.
Right. In 2021, if I'm thinking more or less correctly, it was about EUR 1.5 million impact.
Right. That's correct.
On the P&L. Yeah. Clear. Thank you. Maybe, guys, just in terms of the new order bookings in the fourth quarter, and forgive me if I'm just completely missing something. It's definitely possible. Did SpaceLink has the booking of that contract moved into this year, or were you always expecting it in 2022? Were there any other orders apart from SpaceLink maybe that moved from the end of last year into this year?
Maybe Lutz can answer that. I think Lutz is online. Lutz, can you hear the ask? Do you want to take on this question?
I can take it. Hello, everybody. With SpaceLink in, what was it, September, we agreed on a co-engineering phase to optimize the SpaceLink satellite design for their operational need. This led to a final specification which was delivered to us only in the week before Christmas, so obviously, you can't sign a contract in the same year. We then discussed the contract in the first quarter of this year. Actually, the final outcome is that SpaceLink will go a bit different route, which is, there will be in parallel two things. One is the development of a, call it Block 0 or initial operational capability, which means, of a series of or constellation of smaller satellites, which are good for the initial market demand.
In parallel, the development of the final operational capability or Block 1, as I call it, which will be adapted to an uptaking market demand. We are currently working on both. This, I would say, change of the overall setup, how SpaceLink will realize the constellation, of course, has again changed the way how the satellites will be contracted. We are currently discussing with them both the Block 0 and the Block 1 implementation.
Thanks, Lutz.
2022 was pretty clear because if you receive the final specification as planned only just before Christmas, then obviously you can't sign a contract in the same year. We need to come up with a new offer then, and so on and so on.
Yeah. No, that's clear. When we think about SpaceLink, we should probably, you know, not in our models, we should not maybe be assuming any material revenues from SpaceLink this year or maybe next year as well.
No, I think on the Block 0, so the initial operational capability, this will start an implementation with material revenues second half of this year. But clearly on the Block 0, it's a bit different than Block 1. Block 1, we are selected. Block 0, there's a new competition ongoing. It's a down-selection to 2. We are one of them. Final offers are due in beginning of next quarter. Then they will select, but Block 0 implementation will clearly fully start this year. Block 1 or FOC will continue on a slower pace this year.
Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Maybe some slightly higher level questions maybe. You spoke about the SATCOMBw 3 program. Are there any other requirements for satellite or space assets for the Bundeswehr that you can talk about? I appreciate there may be some that you can't talk about, but it would be very helpful if there are any other examples of requirements or anything similar you can share with us.
I can take that one as well. The German forces are looking for different ways of improvement. They are looking for immediate measures to support Ukraine and Eastern allies. They are looking for short-term improvement capabilities for the German forces, and they are looking for mid-term improvement capabilities for the German forces. Now, we are not that much on the short-term thing. Space is always a bit longer, but we have made quite a number means more than 10 or 20 proposals which are reaching from improved services offerings up to full satellites, full additional satellites to the German forces.
I cannot go into any detail here, but beyond what we have in the plans of the German forces anyhow, like SATCOMBw 3, we have offered additional possibilities to improve reconnaissance as well as communication. Currently, there's a prioritization process ongoing in the Ministry of Defence, 'cause as you can imagine, there's many ideas coming from industry, but there's many ideas as well coming from the operational forces, what they want to get. We are in this prioritization process, and I expect that there will be a kind of, let's say, prioritization list coming up in Q2.
Clear. Yeah. Thank you.
Of course, I cannot go into any detail which type of satellites precisely we have offered and so on, because this is all classified.
Yeah. No, of course, I understand. It's sensitive. Maybe last question. Guys, when we think about ESA, and we think about the budget that ESA had assigned to collaborative programs with Russia, you know, is it reasonable for us to think about some of these funds from the budget being reallocated to other programs and for OHB, could there be, you know, maybe a material or meaningful upside if they transferred funding away from Russian collaborative programs to other programs?
Lutz, you wanna take that one?
Yeah.
I'll take it again. Honestly, compared to what ESA plans for the Ministerial 2022, in terms of increase of budgets, the reallocation of budgets which were originally assigned to cooperation programs with Russia is honestly in the overall ESA frame a minor thing. ESA plans for very significant increase of budgets. The current situation will lead to increase of budget on ESA side as well. For example, in the Versailles Declaration, there's a clear statement that sovereignty in terms of reconnaissance and communication space-based shall be increased in Europe. This means, for example, that for the independent communication constellation, which Thierry Breton and his team is planning, budgets have increased. European Commission has put higher budget, ESA is putting higher budget.
If you see those increases, which ESA is anyhow targeting for, the overall amount of all of the cooperation program which might be reallocated is not making a big difference. The really important point is that space is becoming more important. ESA budget will continue to go up. We see from the space summit which happened in February that nations are supporting it. This is the real business opportunity. It's less the relatively limited money which could be reallocated from former cooperation programs with Russia.
I understand, Lutz. Is there any talk or any approximate estimates out there for the kind of level of budget that might be agreed at the Ministerial, or is it just too early to say?
I mean, that's pure guessing. If you look at what ESA targets, then one can say that they target, on average in the different lines they have, like exploration and human space flight and so on and so on average, they target something which I would, without having calculated precisely, but out of my mind, on average, roughly a 40% increase. I don't believe they will get it. So my gut's feeling, but this is really just my personal estimation, is more around, something like, a 25% increase perhaps. Which still will be very significant.
Yeah. No, that's great. Would it be for the three years coming at this ministerial-
Exactly. Yeah.
to set the budget? Yeah. That will be versus the 2019 budget.
You know, that's my estimate. That's it's not that ESA has confirmed it. They cannot because they get their money from the nations and so on. I mean, the final outcome we will see after the ministerial. If I'm looking in my crystal ball, then that's more what shines in my crystal ball, and I hope that it's not too foggy and that I'm looking close to reality.
Lutz, that's really helpful. I don't have a crystal ball that works. Thank you.
Okay. We have a follow-up question on the ESA Ministerial. Any estimate on the project volume for OHB? Maybe Lutz needs his crystal ball again for this question from Richard Schramm.
Yeah. That's really then very difficult to say because this is then kind of a double crystal ball. First, how big the overall budget will be, and then, how successful will we be. What we can say is that in more or less all ESA lines, perhaps with the exception of human space flight, we are very well positioned. We have projects in all of them. We have things where we believe that we have very good chances to win. We have extended since, in particular, the last, I would say six, seven years, we have extended a lot our footprint. We are now a player in science. We are now a player for Copernicus in Earth observation and so on.
We have actually increased our opportunities. We have set up very good cooperations with other partners in Europe where we believe we can have very successful proposals technically, price-wise, in terms of geo return, which always plays a good, an important role in ESA. If you look at the overall percentage, we might get, it should at least not be less than last time. Being more precise is really difficult at this stage.
Sorry.
Okay, last question is also on the SpaceLink order from Zafer Rüzgar. He wants to know the reasoning behind the final volume, which is currently higher at $350 million than your initial amount. The reasoning for that is the first part of the question, and the additional question is the financing of the project is secured from the customer's point of view and how much will OHB finally invest in that project?
It seems to be for me again. As I said earlier, between the ATP which we originally signed or let's say as was content of the ATP which we signed, if I remember well, at end of September last year, was this core engineering phase, where we together with SpaceLink and some of the major equipment supplier did a phase where we optimized the satellite design compared to what was originally specified by SpaceLink and then tendered out. Optimized means, it's about the capacity and the link capacity which you can offer, and the number of connections you can offer.
We came to a design which is, let's say more sophisticated, which offers actually better value for money, significantly better value for money, which betters the business case of SpaceLink a lot, but which leads as well to satellites which have higher capabilities than what was in the original specification of SpaceLink. This is why at the end, the value of the price, let's say, of the satellites was going up as well. If you look at percentage of capacity increase and percentage of price increase, it's a very, very valuable thing for SpaceLink.
Again, here we speak about final operational capability and we are having now a situation where SpaceLink is going for the split into its initial operational capability, what they call Block 0, and then final operational capability, which they call Block 1. This brings me to financing. Like all of these projects of startups, it goes through different financing rounds, which means of course the financing for the overall project is not done yet. It would be a miracle if it would, because all these startup projects going through different rounds, phase A, B and so on, seen it before. That's the same here.
It's a bit as well the reason why they are now going for a stepped approach, which by the way is from my point of view the right thing to do, because the feedback they got from the financial market was, "Hey guys, this is a market you need to develop. Such relay satellites don't exist today. So if you need to develop it, you will not need the capacity which you're planning in your full operational capability at the beginning. So why invest such a high amount at the very beginning? Let's go for a stepped approach." Overall, it will be more expensive, yes, but we test the market with a lower investment before going to the full investment.
Your SpaceLink's initial operational capability will be more adapted to the initial market demand. I see it actually as a more mature approach, which they are going now. As I said, for the Block 0 or initial operational capability, there's a down select of two suppliers. We are again one of them, so we are pretty optimistic again.
Thank you. Last question for now, from Zafer Rüzgar, on OHB Digital. How decisive were material shortages for the revenue decline in the digital segment in Q4 or are there other burdening impacts? I don't know who wants to take that one?
Kurt will you?
Yes, in Q4 the total revenue is a little bit lower, the margin, too, compared to previous quarters, since in the previous quarters we have finalized a contract with a high profitability, and that's the reason for the extremely good margins in the first quarters and the little bit lower margin in Q4 . This depends really on one single project and contract.
Okay. Thank you. There are no further questions, so I think we can now conclude the Q&A part of the session.
Yeah. Well, thank you very much. Since Marcel, if there are no further questions, I think we can conclude this annual analyst conference or annual report 2021 analyst conference. Of course, we are available also after this and all of you of course should contact Martina or Marcel or Kurt and his team. We are very happy to hopefully see you again digitally at our annual meeting. Actually, what is upcoming and where I would invite you all to come in person is in late June, it's I think June 22nd, we have a very nice booth and representation at the ILA air show in Berlin that is taking place in person.
This might be a good opportunity to also exchange and hopefully you are following OHB also continuously and you will see the projects that we are implementing. Again, the next one on the list is April 1st, our launch out of Florida, the EnMAP launch on a Falcon 9 rocket hopefully then yeah successfully being delivered to space. From our side, thank you very much for your interest, and your coverage of OHB and we return back basically, I think, to Reggie and to the director to conclude this conference. Thank you.