Good day and a warm welcome to today's Q3 call of the RENK Group AG. Kindly note that this call is being recorded, and all participants are in a listen-only mode. Following the presentation, we will move on to a Q&A session, where we would be happy to take your questions in person via the audio line. Having said this, I hand over to Christian Weiß, Investor Relations.
Thank you, operator. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining our pre-close call today. My name is Christian from the IR team. Our CEO, Dr. Alexander Sagel, will guide you through today's pre-close call and will be available for questions afterwards. With that, let me hand over to Alexander.
Yeah, thank you, Christian. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and thank you very much for joining today's pre-close call. Before we go into more details, let me quickly summarize the key messages upfront. RENK remains fully on track, and our third quarter was characterized by a very solid momentum on the order intake side, solid and as planned operational execution, and important strategic progress in our production footprint. Having said this, the going live of our new modular production concept during Q3 here in Augsburg was clearly the highlight of the respective quarter and a true milestone for RENK in terms of operational implementation of our European Capacity Uplift program for the upcoming years. As a further highlight in the third quarter, we had the market launch of our two next new transmission concepts for tracked vehicles as a part of our next-gen mobility roadmap.
At the DSI show in London, RENK launched the new O76. It's a typical RENK acronym transmission developed for modern light tracked vehicles in the 10 ton- 20 ton class. The O76 transmission supports hybrid driving and is fully prepared for drive-by-wire and autonomous applications. In parallel, we also launched our next generation for main battle tanks, our so-called 406 transmission, designed to enable platform consolidation across future main battle tanks thanks to its modular design approach, realizing new performance benchmarks and including fully digital and drive-by-wire capabilities. Now, let me start first with the core performance. As mentioned briefly at the beginning, order intake developed largely in line with our expectations in Q3. While perhaps not reaching the same levels as in the first or second quarter of this year, it was significantly better than in Q3 of last year.
The demand remained quite solid, driven by continued momentum in our core defense markets and supported by various additional smaller but also some larger programs that were awarded earlier than anticipated. This includes, for example, a follow-on order for the K2 Main Battle Tank in Poland, originally expected for Q4, which already materialized during Q3, and where we also got a further order already in the first week of October, as you could read it in our yesterday's press release talking about approximately EUR 70 million for revenues. On the revenue side, we continue to grow year on year but accepted a lower production output on our lead plan for land transmissions in Augsburg compared to the second quarter.
This was entirely planned and related to the implementation of our new modular production line, where we had to slow down simply the production output during the summer months in order to execute the needed changes and installations. A truly important step to position ourselves for greater flexibility, higher efficiency, and more capacity. As a result, the revenue development after nine months is nearly on a similar level compared to H1 2025. In this regard, I would like to make one final comment on the topic of Israel. Nothing fundamental has changed here in the recent weeks, and the export embargo remains in force. We are, of course, in close contact with the relevant authorities of Germany and Israel in order to understand the further process.
While the export ban to Israel has not yet impacted significantly the third quarter, it could and most likely will affect the fourth quarter, resulting in a loss of revenues in the low double digits. Ladies and gentlemen, let me now turn quick to our segments, and starting here with the VMS segment. Order momentum in VMS remains strong throughout the quarter, supported, as mentioned in the beginning, by ongoing demand for tracked vehicle transmissions and follow-on orders for major international programs. As mentioned in the beginning, the earlier than expected award for the next K2 batch for Poland, as well as the second batch of the AJAX for Latvia, underlines our strong strategic position along NATO's eastern flank and demonstrates clearly the trust our customers place in our technology and in our production capabilities.
We also recorded additional order intakes from, for example, the Thor III contract U.S., the FATINA tracked howitzer program in Turkey, and also various VDA spare parts during the third quarter. On the revenue side, growth continued compared to last year for Q3 and nine months 2025, but was affected, as mentioned before, by the planned change in the production concept on the land system site in Augsburg. Apart from the planned production switch in Augsburg, we are making continuous progress in operational performance across all of our sites, confirming that we are well on track with our operational performance initiatives. Coming quick to the M&I segment, our Marine and Industry segment also delivered a very solid performance, mainly driven by the naval side of the business. In Q3 and 9M, order intake and revenues were well above last year's levels.
While the industrial part of the segment still operates in a more challenging and GDP-dependent weak macro environment, the naval pipeline is robust. We benefit here from rising global defense budgets and a steady flow of modernization and new build programs for navies in Europe, the U.S., and of course, in Asia. Positive to mention that also our newly integrated RAMI, formerly Cincinnati Gearing Systems, today called RENK America Marine & Industry LLC, contributed to this positive development not only with a new contract for the so-called ship-to-shore connector for the U.S. Navy, but also with a solid aftermarket revenue contribution. It may be also worth mentioning that the provision for quality issues for a European naval customer in the range of a lower single-digit euro value was released during Q3, which contributes with a positive impact on the segment's adjusted EBIT. Finally, a few words on our slide bearings.
The business is still facing similar challenging market conditions as the industrial transmission segment due to the mentioned weak macroeconomic industrial environment. The softer trend that emerged in the second quarter continued through Q3, both in order intake and revenues as well. To be honest, we were facing some operational challenges, which were mainly driven by open positions in the production area and therefore a resulting lower production output than planned. Overall, slide bearings did not reach last year's level in Q3. However, we have already taken the necessary steps to fix the operational issues by launching several measures and initiatives, including a massive hiring initiative, which, as a kind of preliminary status, is performing and doing well so far. With these measures in place, we are confident that the segment will gradually regain momentum and return to its usual strengths as we move into next year.
Ladies and gentlemen, to sum it up, we are preparing ourselves operationally for the upcoming years by simply doing our homework. Consequently, the implementation of our new modular production concept was needed and a strategic move in order to strengthen our operational base and support future capacity and efficiency improvements. In general, our sites continue to advance operationally, confirming that we are consistently, step by step, improving the entire production network. Compared to the revenue growth in H1 2025, our Q2 revenue growth was slightly softer, mainly due to the mentioned planned production change in the VMS segment. Order intake in Q3 remains stable, well above 2024 levels, and broadly in line with expectations. Overall, we remain fully on track to achieve our full-year targets and are well positioned to capture future growth in the years ahead. Ladies and gentlemen, I'm now looking forward to your questions.
Thank you very much in advance.
Thank you very much for your presentation, Dr. Sagel. Dear participants, we will now move on to your questions. To keep this conversation engaging, we kindly ask you to ask questions in person by the audio line. To do so, please click on the Raise Your Hand button in the toolbar on the lower part of your screen. We will give you the permission to unmute yourself. Please note additionally, you're not able to ask questions via the telephone dial-in. By now, it seems everything is crystal clear, Dr. Sagel. We have no questions and no virtual hands. Now, we have a virtual hand from Joy Ohaat. Please go ahead. You can unmute yourself now and ask your question. Joy, unfortunately, we cannot hear you. I give you the permission to unmute yourself.
Good morning. Can you hear me?
Yes.
Yes Ohaat
There we go. Sorry. That's my lack of IT skills causing that delay. Thank you very much for the comments this morning. I just wonder whether you might be able to give us a little bit of detail around the group's free cash flow performance for the nine months or for Q3 and turn to the kind of direction of travel for cash.
Yeah, Joy, good morning. I always have the same problems, by the way. I'm always talking and talking and talking, and I forgot to unmute. Fully understandable. To be honest, we do not have yet a clear picture on the cash flow. The numbers are currently generated. As you know, we have overall, if you look on the year-end level, always a target to hit a cash conversion rate of above 80%. For the time being, I need to patient your questions up to the official upcoming nine-months call. Sorry for that.
Thank you. Just one more strategic question around the performance of the slide bearings business. Has this changed your view about potentially disposing of this business in the future, or is there any change there in terms of your thinking?
First of all, the operational performance, as I just highlighted in regards to Q3, is something we will solve. All the measures are defined, and these are not rocket science measures. We are really confident that we get this very soon under control. If you talk about this investment of the slide bearing business, I'm sure you are pretty aware that slide bearings is a wonderful business. It's a growing business. It has a huge market potential if you look forward up to 2030. However, this is also clear there are absolutely no synergies between the slide bearing business and the rest of the transmission.
For the time being, we keep it as you see it for 2025, I mean, in our portfolio, but I would consider it 2026 to have a more closer look on what the best and appropriate future of this very attractive segment could look like, how the future could look like.
Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Just one final question, if I may. With the introduction of the new transmission assembly process in Augsburg, does that change the point at which you might need to introduce a second shift into assembly?
That's a very good question. My CEO is not here, so I can talk freely. In general, we do expect that the introduction of the modular production line concept will enable us, most likely by growing output demand if you look on 2026, so next year, to continue for the time being, at least partially, maybe even the full year in 2026 in a single shift mode.
Okay. Okay. Wonderful. Thank you. Thank you very much. I will leave it there. Thank you.
You're welcome.
Thank you so much for your questions, Joy. Dear ladies and gentlemen, kindly note that it's still possible to ask questions. In the meantime, we will move on with Daniel. Daniel, please go ahead and unmute yourself. Daniel, unfortunately, you're not unmuted. I have given you the permission. Maybe we move on with Marie-Therese. In the meantime, Marie-Therese, you're now able to speak.
Everyone has a problem with unmuting.
Obviously, all right.
Can you hear me? Do you hear me now?
Yes.
Fine. Yeah, it is indeed a bit complicated. I'm sorry. This is an off-the-shelf feedback, but thanks a lot for taking my question. Good morning. Two questions from my side. Can you, dear Alexander, give us an update on how the recovery in your output levels in Augsburg is now looking? You mentioned that you're fully on track. My second question is relating to the slide bearings. Can you give us a sense of the sort of non-recurring kind of restructuring organization expenses that will flow in Q3? Maybe even just a magnitude, that would be helpful. That's about it for now. Thank you.
Hi, Marie-Therese. Always good talking to you. I will try my very best to answer your questions. Starting with the first question about the recovery of the missed volumes, we do not change, despite the fact that we have this Israeli topic and despite the fact that we had a planned less or reduced output in Q3, we do not change our guidance for the year-end in regards to revenue. Please expect that this will be recovered during the fourth quarter as planned. The second point, I think I got your questions in a way that are there additional non-recurring one-time costs for what I considered or what you could consider for the measures in order to bring the operations back on our slide bearing business. To be honest, we are not talking about the restructuring.
We had, very simply speaking, a couple of handfuls, three handfuls of open positions which were not filled during the summer season, exactly in the third quarter for various reasons. Maybe someone was not taking care or whatever. It's not a lack of people because this is what we see currently. As I mentioned before, we started a massive, a very controlled and focused initiative in order to hire people. We are getting people and we are closing these open positions. As a consequence, when we had these three handfuls of open positions in the production side, we could not perform in the production as expected. The measures to bring it back are very simple. I would not talk about non-recurring costs. It's just to hire enough people. We are on track. The rest is to balance internal production, external production, and that's it.
From my point of view, we do not consider any NRC. It's not a restructuring. It's a fixing of temporary problems.
Okay, I got it. Thank you very much, Alexander. Thanks. These were my questions. Thank you.
Thank you very much. [Foreign language] .
[Foreign language].
Thank you so much, Marie-Therese. We will now come back to Daniel. Please go ahead. We try again to unmute you. Maybe we have the wrong microphone device chosen. Daniel, I've given you the permission. I apologize. At this point, it seems not that he's able to speak. Just a quick reminder, if there are still open topics you would like to discuss with Alexander, just let us know by raising up your virtual hand. Otherwise, we would come to the end of today's earnings call. Thank you for joining and you showed interest in the RENK Group AG and the conversation. Should further questions arise later, please feel invited to get in touch with Christian and his team. A big thank you also to you, Alexander, for your presentation and the time you took today. With this, we say thank you and goodbye.
Thank you very much. Goodbye.