Good morning, and welcome to Altron's half-year results for the period ended 31 August 2023. My name is Keith Chitaka, and I lead communications for Altron FinTech. With me today are Altron CEO Werner Kapp, CFO Carel Snyman, and Netstar's MD Grant Fraser. You can ask a question by posting it in the chat box or via our conference line. Aligned with our values of inclusion, you will see that our results are being interpreted on behalf of the deaf community. As a reminder, during the call, we'll be making forward-looking statements. Please look at the cautionary language contained in our presentation regarding the risks and uncertainties associated with forward-looking statements. Unless otherwise noted, all growth comparisons relate to the corresponding period of last year. With that, I will hand over to Werner Kapp to take you through the results.
Thank you, Keith, and good morning, everyone. You will notice that we are all wearing our Springbok rugby shirts today. Like many of you, I am a passionate Springbok supporter, a team that I believe represents our Rainbow Nation at its best. While it unfortunately does not paper over the real challenges in our country, their recent World Cup triumph illustrates the intangible power of a shared mission. When individuals play for a purpose greater than themselves, the outcomes achieved become extraordinary and often defy reason. This cohesion and motivation generated by a collective purpose not only leads to improved individual and team performance, but it also fosters a culture of resilience, innovation, and a relentless pursuit of excellence, ultimately propelling the team, or in our case, our organization, to new heights of success.
I spent a great deal of time in my first year as CEO with the people of Altron to understand what is it that drives them, and this is what led us to defining our purpose. I would like to thank our people for their input into this process and for all of their hard work and dedication. We recently launched our purpose video within the organization, and I'm excited to share it with you today.
Let's talk about tomorrow. Tomorrow could be so many things. It is both hope and fear, and it is unrelenting. Tomorrow always comes. The question is, are you ready? Imagine how tomorrow looked for South Africa when Altron opened in 1965, and then how we grew with the nation as it transformed tomorrow into hope. In the 1990s, as the internet began to rewrite all our tomorrows. Tomorrow became technology as a whole new digital world was born. But Mzansi has sometimes struggled with tomorrow, which is what drove us to find innovative solutions to some immensely important problems using the power of technology and South Africans' relentless ingenuity. It's been nearly six decades of building Altron into the South African technology giant. Six decades of do what you must, and if you don't have it, build it.
At Altron, we create real solutions for real problems that really benefit people. Transforming today into a simpler, safer and smarter tomorrow. Tomorrow's coming. Are you ready? Altron: Take on tomorrow.
Every day, we impact your lives in countless ways, powering healthcare, financial technology, connectivity, and South Africa's vital business infrastructure, all while safeguarding you, your assets, and your digital identity. What truly fuels our passion is Altron's 58-year legacy of using distinctive South African ingenuity to tackle real-world challenges and enhance our nation. We use technology to transform today into a simpler, safer, and smarter tomorrow. This purpose unites our organization, creating a shared vision and nurturing a high-performance culture that drives us to make a meaningful difference in the many lives that we touch. When I joined Altron in October 2022, I recognized the untapped potential. Despite our impressive assets and a prestigious customer base, our two largest assets, Altron Systems Integration and Netstar, were not performing optimally...
Moreover, our non-core assets, Altron Document Solutions and Altron Nexus, faced challenges due to specific events, notably the loss of the GBN contract. Our core operations showed promise in revenue growth, but earnings growth was softer. During my year in the role as Altron CEO, we undertook six crucial actions to lay a strong foundation for growth. We defined our aspiration to be the leading platform in IT services business in our chosen markets, and we defined a clear strategy. We revitalized our team and established a new purpose to nurture a high-performance culture. We invested in core capabilities and key leadership appointments, such as Carel Snyman, our new CFO, Grant Fraser, the MD of Netstar, and Craig Stewart, the head of our digital transformation business. We conducted in-depth business reviews to establish target operating models with measurable KPIs directly aligned with our strategy.
Our performance incentives now drive a culture of excellence. We implemented profit improvement strategies for Netstar and for Altron Systems Integration, which are yielding early results, and we are actively pursuing the divestments of non-core assets while simplifying our operational structure. These strategic steps have set us on a path of transformation and growth, enhancing our capabilities and positioning Altron for success. The benefits of our strategy execution are evident in our continuing results. Adjusting for the sale of the ATM hardware and support business of Altron Managed Solutions, which I will refer to as the ATM business going forward, on a like-for-like basis, we achieved a revenue growth of 11%. EBITDA and operating profit grew 26% and 32%, respectively, while our operating margin improved. Our continuing results, adjusted for the sale of the ATM business, is what we believe reflects our core operations going forward.
On a statutory basis, a heightened emphasis on cash generation led to a 27% increase in cash generated from operations. HEPS from continuing operations increased 19% to ZAR 0.50 per share. EPS from continuing operations was flat at ZAR 0.38 per share, negatively impacted by the ZAR 33 million impairment raised against goodwill held at group in relation to Altron Nexus. As detailed in our trading statement, additional provisions and impairments were required in our discontinued operations. For Altron Nexus, this totaled ZAR 334 million, and for Altron Document Solutions, ZAR 95 million, as well as the ZAR 33 million goodwill impairment referred to above. There have been no further material adverse movements from what was detailed in our trading statement. However, these provisions had a material impact on our group performance.
Despite a 3% growth in revenue, EBITDA fell 54%, with the group generating an operating loss of ZAR 106 million, resulting in a group headline loss per share of ZAR 0.63 per share and a group loss per share of ZAR 0.86. Now, these numbers are tough for me to present, as these provisions have, to a large extent, offset our hard work, which is evidenced by the improved performance of our core operations. Cash generated from operations increased 16%. This improved cash flow generation, together with a positive momentum that we are seeing in our continued operations, combined with our strong balance sheet, has allowed us to positively adjust our dividend payout. We have increased our dividend payout from paying out at least 40% to paying out at least 50% of HEPS from continued operations of ZAR 0.50 per share.
Now, turning to our strategy and how we are executing against it. To become the leading platform in IT services business, we are focusing on embedding customer obsession at every level of our organization. We are executing on three growth levers: growing revenue by partnering with our customers to get the most value out of their digital spend, driving operating leverage through improving our gross profit margin and disciplined cost management, and investing in data as a service and in scaling our Altron Security, FinTech, and Netstar businesses. Our strategy is enabled through efficient capital allocation, differentiating our client offerings through collaboration, as well as accelerating our high-performance culture. Lastly, everything we do will be done responsibly for our environment and our communities while adhering to the highest levels of governance. cusing on customer obsession.
Our customer engagements have highlighted that our customers are focused on ways to improve their understanding of their own customers, while also driving revenue growth and implementing operational efficiencies to boost profitability. We are at the epicenter of helping our clients thrive and deliver on these focus areas. What we are finding is that to enable them to focus on their own digital transformation, our customers are doing more services with less partners that they can trust. Through data analytics and AI, we are streamlining operations, making proactive decisions, and leading digital transformation. By way of example, we have recently deployed AI solutions to help a client improve form processing, effectively reducing what used to be a 10-day manual task to just 10 minutes. We are also keenly focused on enhancing digital identity security to protect customer data and fostering innovation to keep clients competitive.
Turning to our revenue, our growth from continued operations was 4%. However, this only includes four months of revenue generated by the ATM business. On a like-for-like basis, revenue from continued operations, excluding the ATM business, was up 11%, supported by a 6% growth in annuity revenue.... FY 2024 is a year focused on fixing, streamlining, and refocusing our base. We closed down and restructured non-profitable revenue-generating businesses to ensure that we have a core base that is capable of growing both top line and profit. Considering this, the 11% achieved is a pleasing result, given the increasingly tough trading environment that we are navigating alongside our customers. Focusing on the next growth driver, improving operating leverage by boosting gross margin and controlling operational costs.
Our efforts have increased gross margin by 8% in continuing operations, and we improved the gross margin efficiency ratio to 39%. Despite cost pressures, we've kept operating cost increases below inflation at 4%, raising our operating leverage from 0.77 to 1.17, implying that for every ZAR 1 of revenue we generate, ZAR 1.17 of operating profit is generated. Early results are promising, with a 26% growth in EBITDA and a 32% growth in operating profit in continuing operations after adjusting for the sale of the ATM business. Our margin expansion demonstrates our commitment to enhancing overall profitability. Our strategy is being applied to a simplified operating model. Altron Nexus and Document Solutions are classified as held for sale in discontinued operations, and we are actively seeking to exit these businesses despite market challenges.
During the disposal process, we are managing them for value and have strengthened both management teams. The businesses have been restructured, and profit improvement strategies have been implemented to improve cash generation and to return both businesses to profitability. Lastly, we exited the ATM business, which generated ZAR 216 million in cash through the disposal process. To establish a foundation for consolidated growth in our IT services sector, we are creating Altron Digital Business, effective from the first of March 2024, by unifying the operations of Altron Systems Integration, Altron Karabina, and Altron Managed Solutions. This initiative aligns with our strategy to become the leading platform and IT services provider in our chosen markets. Altron Digital Business will be led by Craig Stewart, who has extensive experience in the design and implementation of IT growth strategies.
Altron Digital Business and Altron Security will together form part of our IT Services segment from first of March 2024. This integrated approach will offer a comprehensive value proposition, enhance solutions for our clients, facilitate collaboration and cross-selling capabilities, and eliminate redundant costs across our IT services Own Platform segment remains unchanged, and Altron Arrow will fall under a new Distribution segment. We will now move to the operating performance of each of the businesses. These have been presented in terms of our current segmental reporting, with the new operating model taking effect first of March 2024. With that, I'll hand you over to Grant to take you through Netstar.
Thank you, Werner, and a very warm welcome, everyone. At our full year 2023 results presentation, I presented our profit improvement strategy for Netstar. I highlighted that we have an opportunity to claw back market share by refocusing on the basics, making sure we put the customer at the center of our operations, and extracting efficiencies across the Netstar business and building our big data as a service offering. I'm pleased to present what we have achieved in the first six months. It's early days. We still have a long way to go in our journey, and it will take some time to get there, but we are starting to see the flywheel effect. We have clawed back market share with net subscriber additions of 187,273, up 91%.
We achieved industry-leading growth, with our total subscriber base growing 26% to over 1.5 million subscribers. We now have over 1.9 million connected devices. To put that into perspective, we added over 80% of the total subscriber for the full 2023 financial year in the first half of our 2024 financial year. We have grown our consumer subscriber base by 8%, and our higher-margin enterprise business has grown by 13%, with key new logos added into the light and commercial fleet space, as well as within our car rental industry. The investment we made into establishing an in-house churn and retention team has stemmed churn from 22% at year-end to 16%, with a 95% customer retention rate.
Segmenting our customer base into consumer and enterprise allowed us to personalize the level of service each type of customer experiences, and the addition of 21 new fitment center partnerships has improved our fitment and onboarding process. At year-end, we were fitting one car every 4 minutes. Now, we fit four cars every one minute, with a 96% contract fulfillment ratio, up from 72% at year-end. Pre-fitments, where we install devices in vehicles held on the dealer floor before they are sold, are crucial in maintaining our over 50% market share in the dealer trade. However, it is important that we convert the new owner into a Netstar customer once those cars are being sold. The efficiency with which we do this is measured by our pre-fitment ratio, which has improved from 32% at year-end to 66%.
Continuing to focus on improving this pre-fitment ratio is a key contributor to growing profitability. Through driving product innovation to protect and improve our already high recovery rate, which is north of 90%, we have launched three new products into field trials. The first is a battery-operated wireless GPS product with an IoT SIM, which can be fitted onto movable and non-movable assets. This will not only allow our customers to better protect their non-motorized assets, but their valuable cargo as well. The second is an active RF device, which will improve our recoveries through the way it is installed, as well as reduce our installation time. Lastly, we developed a vehicle-to-vehicle communication device, which will further enhance our network coverage. We are building our big data as a service offering through partnerships like the recent SafeCity Initiative, powered by Vumacam.
This will further enhance the safety, visibility of our customers by offering an additional layer of protection in those precincts and tackling crime at a holistic level. Our investment into generative AI, coupled with machine learning, has proved invaluable to our fleet customers. This allows us to provide a proactive service, such as detailed information on the health of the onboard cameras and picking up targeted transgressions. Applying our machine learning capability to our vehicle data gave rise to the First Notification of Loss, a value-added service that our insurers are using to reduce fraudulent claims by matching claim data to collision data provided by our platforms. We are encouraged by our recent Ask Afrika award as the industry winner for the best customer experience in the car tracking industry for 2023 and 2024, evidence that we are putting our customers first.
The improvements in subscriber additions and key efficiency ratios drove a 12% growth in revenue and a 21% growth in EBITDA. Netstar surpassed the ZAR 1 billion revenue mark for the first time in a six-month period, recording the highest revenue on record. Profitability was impacted by higher recovery and prefitment costs. The benefits from the work we are doing on improving the prefitment ratio are targeted to flow through in H2. We have experienced pressure in Australia due to the legislative change of migrating all devices from 3G to a 4G network. This has opened up the market for increased competition, but we are focused on both retaining our customers as well as winning new customers. A reminder that in comparison to our peers, our operating profit is impacted by acceleration and depreciation over 3 years versus our peers who depreciate over 5-8 years.
A focus on working capital resulted in ZAR 180 million working capital improvement compared to FY 2023. As we optimize the management of our stock holdings, our debtors days, credit to terms, as well as the value of reengineering to reduce our bill of material costs. Cash generated by operations of ZAR 340 million, and free cash flow of ZAR 89 million were both up over 100%, underpinned by better working capital management. I'm energized by the early results we are seeing as we deliver on our strategy. Looking forward, we will continue to focus on improving our leading indicators, which are targeted to support a stronger future performance. With that, I'll hand back over to Werner.
Thanks, Grant. Moving on to Altron FinTech. The way I like to think about our fintech business is that it provides the core infrastructure over which a whole range of financial services and transactions take place. It is a backbone enabling innovation and product developments as clients, customers, and competitors evolve and transact. Our customer base is broad and includes major banks and retailers, as well as payment providers and other niche fintech operators, positioning us exceptionally well to grow as our customers grow. The four major businesses in Altron FinTech include our payment and collection business, which is our biggest revenue contributor at 59%. We support micro lenders with our infrastructure and own IP software, and we earn a fee for each service throughout the value chain. Despite an increase in competition in this space, we grew revenue by 5%.
Integrated Transaction Solutions is our second largest business, contributing 20% of revenue. It earns revenue from device sales, rentals, maintenance, and processing transactions. Revenue was down 8% due to abnormally high hardware sales in H1 2023 on the back of industry-wide technology upgrades. Card Personalization and Issuance, which sells and maintains large card printing machines, contributed 15% of revenue, which was flat due to abnormally high hardware sales in H1 2023. Credit Management Solutions, our smallest division, earns fees for own IP software installations and credit-related services, and it delivered a robust revenue growth of 17%. The comparable prior year period benefited from abnormally large hardware sales as POS terminals were upgraded due to industry-wide legislation changes. We therefore guided that revenue would be softer this year.
Despite this, I am pleased to report that Altron FinTech managed to grow revenue by 2%, supported by better-than-expected hardware sales and a growing annuity revenue base, with EBITDA growing 3% year on year. Looking at performance against the second half of 2023, EBITDA improved 21%. Going forward, we are looking at driving long-term, profitable annuity revenue growth through investing in POS terminals for rental, which will however impact depreciation. Customer acquisition was healthy, with 240 net new customers added during this period. I am proud of the team with their recent award as the PAX Technology Preferred Partner of the Year 2022. Overall, Altron FinTech delivered a solid, solid performance off a high comparative base. Our Altron HealthTech division achieved 8% revenue and 13% EBITDA growth due to an improved margin mix.
In the mature private practice sector, revenue increased by 5%, gaining 2.1 new customers for every customer churned and 1,326 net new customers. The corporate sector delivered 19% revenue growth, now contributing 25% of revenue. Our Altron HealthTech business is well-placed in a defensive market with a high annuity earnings base. We anticipate that the investments that we made into our platform and systems will deliver good growth as we expand our offerings and add new partners onto our platform. Turning to our Digital T ransformation segment, Altron Systems Integration's performance over the past four years has been disappointing, with EBITDA and operating profit consistently in decline. However, in H1, our profit improvement strategy delivered some promising results, with EBITDA up by over 100%, albeit from a lower base.
The EBITDA we generated in the first half represents 60% of the cumulative EBITDA achieved over the past 2 years, showcasing significant progress. While revenue grew by 5%, it was impacted by closing and restructuring non-profitable businesses, which were included in the prior year's base. The business delivered on all 3 areas of the profit improvement strategy that I communicated at our FY 2023 results. We signed the largest outsourcing contract in our history, delivered two of the largest workforce transactions in the retail sector, one of which was the largest workforce management contract on the continent, and we expanded our infrastructure business. Our rolling 12-month pipeline is up 60%, and operating expenses have been reduced by 12%. While there is more work ahead, these achievements are promising steps towards realizing our full potential.
Externally, Altron Systems Integration's notable achievements were highlighted by the following accolades received at the Huawei Rewards: securing the titles of Enterprise Sales Partner, Cloud Fast Growth Partner, and reaffirming our position as the longest-standing enterprise partner for 2023. Altron Karabina demonstrated impressive growth in a market where demand for specialized skills is high, but supply is limited due to skills shortages. Professional services remain the biggest contributor to revenue at 82%, while licensing revenue becoming a smaller revenue contributor. Despite these skills shortages, our revenue grew by 8%, mainly driven by software services and business applications. EBITDA expanded 29% as we continue to drive operational efficiencies through the business and focus on higher-margin professional services.
While we are investing in programs to improve our skills, such as our graduate program, we are realigning our revenue base to match our current skills delivery capacity to enable us to maintain our commitment to delivering excellent customer service. Turning to Altron Security, revenue grew 6% and EBITDA grew 10%, with EBITDA margin expanding. We saw increased demand for our own intellectual property software sales, which is also a higher margin business. LAWtrust and Ubusha are now fully integrated and provide complementary service offerings for our clients. The business is focusing on converting projects into higher-margin managed services to provide an end-to-end solution for our customers. An encouraging trend of consolidation in the vendor landscape is becoming increasingly apparent, where customers want to do more with a trusted partner. This is evidenced by our recent win with the University of Stellenbosch, as an example.
This trend will benefit our full service security offering going forward. Moving on to our last two segments, Managed Services and Other. Altron Managed Solutions announces the successful conclusion of the sale of the ATM business to NCR, effective 1st of July 2023. A total cash consideration of ZAR 216 million was generated over the disposal period, made up of a transaction consideration of ZAR 132 million and associated working capital released of ZAR 84 million from the effective date of the transaction. Looking at the remaining Altron Managed Solutions business, excluding the ATM business, growing margin, tighter expense management, together with 10% revenue growth, provided sufficient operating leverage to return this business to profitability, generating ZAR 19 million in EBITDA.
Altron Arrow experienced another year of strong performance, with 32% revenue growth and 65% EBITDA growth, supported by increasing customer demand and improved operating leverage. This business has been a great adopter of AI to streamline operations and to drive efficiencies, which is evident in the two percentage point margin expansion slide. I would like to thank all of our people for all of their hard work during this period, for achieving what I think is a pleasing and robust set of results in our continued operations. With that, I'll hand you over to Carel to take you through our financial performance.
Thank you, Werner. Before we work through the detail of the continuing operations summarized income statement, I would like to highlight that our current results only include 4 months of the ATM business performance versus 6 months in the prior period. In addition to our statutory numbers, we have included a column to show our results, excluding the ATM business in both periods, to provide a like-for-like comparison. Looking at our continuing operations, excluding the ATM business, I'm pleased to report 11% revenue growth for the period, supported by growth in all of our businesses.... EBITDA grew 26%, reflecting the operational leverage our strategy is delivering on and underpinned by the strong recovery in Altron Systems Integration and Netstar. Operating profit grew 32%. On a statutory basis, revenue grew 4%, with a 21% growth in EBITDA.
Operating profit grew 25% to ZAR 362 million. Our net interest expense was down 4% because of higher cash balances and the repayment of the overnight and overdraft facilities. Headline earnings and headline earnings per share increased by 21% and 19%, respectively, reflecting the stronger underlying performance of the business as we deliver on our strategy. Earnings per share was flat, impacted by the ZAR 33 million impairment raised against goodwill at a group level in relation to Altron Nexus. As Werner mentioned, our increased dividend payout ratio to at least 50% of HEPS from continuing operations, with an interim dividend of ZAR 0.25, up 56%. Our revenue growth of 11% in the current environment, excluding the ATM business, is evidence of our operations' high annuity base and defensive nature.
In terms of sales mix, Altron derives its revenue primarily from higher-margin services revenue, with a large portion of these being annuity-based. On a like-for-like basis, excluding the ATM business, services revenue grew 6% and contributed 63% to total revenue. This was supported by stronger services revenue in Netstar, Altron FinTech, and Altron Managed Solutions. Hardware revenue, which contributed 24% to total revenue, was flat. Netstar and Altron Arrow delivered strong growth in hardware sales, but this was offset by strong hardware sales in Altron FinTech in the prior period and impacted by the sale of the ATM business. On a like-for-like basis, excluding the ATM business, hardware sales were up 18%. Software revenue grew 9%, supported by stronger software sales in digital transformation. In our operational overview, Werner focused on EBITDA performance. In this slide, I will focus on operating profit.
I have stripped out the results of the ATM business, which contributed operating profit of ZAR 24 million in the prior period and ZAR 10 million in the current period. All our segments recorded growth in operating profit, delivering an increase of ZAR 86 million or 32%, demonstrating the solid performance of Altron's core businesses. Digital transformation grew operating profit by 62% to ZAR 115 million, largely supported by Altron Systems Integration, which expanded operating profit from ZAR 2 million to ZAR 31 million. To put that into perspective, in the first half of FY 2024, the business generated 80% of the past three years' cumulative operating profit, evidencing the successful profit improvement Own Platform segment generated an operating profit of ZAR 283 million, up 6%.
This was largely underpinned by Altron HealthTech, which grew operating profit 16%, and Netstar, which delivered 9% operating growth. It is worth noting that when it comes to Netstar, the growth in operating profit was less than the growth in EBITDA, and this is influenced by the business mix, with the Toyota business operating at a lower operating profit margin with a high depreciation charge. In addition, Netstar is currently in an investment cycle, particularly in upgrading its systems, which led to an increase in depreciation. Turning to Altron Arrow, a strong revenue performance supported by strict cost controls resulted in an operating profit of ZAR 37 million, up 76%. Excluding the impact of the ATM business, the Managed Services segment grew operating profit by ZAR 20 million. Overall, I am very pleased with the results of our core businesses.
Revenue growth in continuing operations, profit improvement strategies taking effect, and operating leverage improvements delivered a set of strong results. We invested ZAR 259 million in capital expenditure, of which ZAR 231 million related to growth CapEx. This was predominantly focused on capital rental devices in Netstar of ZAR 153 million and Altron FinTech of ZAR 16 million. A ZAR 22 million investment in our systems and platforms and ZAR 29 million to improve our user experience. As we grow our Netstar and Altron FinTech platforms, the investment in capital rental devices will continue to increase to support our growth, along with the associated increased returns as our infrastructure services a growing customer base. Our net working capital investment decreased to ZAR 829 million from ZAR 1.3 billion a year at year-end.
ZAR 398 million of the ZAR 447 million released was attributed to the impact from the provisions raised in our discontinued operations. However, Altron Document Solutions and Altron Nexus reduced their working capital by an additional ZAR 40 million, which is a significant improvement on the prior period. Altron Karabina, Altron Security, and Altron FinTech had higher working capital balances than February 2023 due to a few larger accounts receivable settling in September. This new working capital base aligns with our heightened focus on working capital and presents a more sustainable base. We will continue to work with the different business units to optimize working capital in line with performance....
Looking at working capital from a time perspective, you can see the improvements come through the reduction of net working capital days from 89 a year ago to 78, as we optimize and we shorten our working capital cycle. Group cash increased by ZAR 42 million from February 2023. However, in comparison to cash held at 31 August 2022, our cash increased ZAR 258 million to ZAR 723 million. Tax paid increased to ZAR 45 million during the current period, driven mainly by a change in tax legislation regarding the treatment of assessed tax losses, with only 80% of taxable income allowed to be offset against assessed losses going forward. Dividends paid during the period amounted to ZAR 72 million. Our net debt position as at 31 August was ZAR 558 million. This leaves the net debt to attributable EBITDA ratio at 0.23 times.
Our covenant ratios are well within terms, with flexibility to execute our strategy. We have enough headroom to execute bolt-on acquisitions to grow Netstar, Altron FinTech, and Altron Security, and to invest in data capabilities. We presented this capital allocation framework at year-end, and we are operating within that framework, but we do have excess capacity on our balance sheet, and we are actively looking for M&A opportunities. In line with the approved cash-generating ability of the group, we have increased our dividend payout. And with that, I'd like to hand you back to Werner, who will take you through his outlook.
Thanks, Carel. To provide you with a better forecast of our business, we are targeting the following medium-term guidance: achieving a combined operating profit margin for our platform businesses of at least 19%. This includes specific guidance for Netstar, where we are targeting an operating profit margin north of 16%. Achieving a combined operating profit margin for our IT services businesses of at least 7%. For Altron Systems Integration, specifically, we are targeting an operating profit margin of 6%-8%. Lastly, our target to triple 2021 continued operations operating profit of ZAR 370 million by 2026 of ZAR 1.1 billion. Reflecting on the past year, I used the time to February 2023 to work through the business and assess each of our operations.
The need for profit improvement strategies in Netstar and Altron Systems Integration was immediately identified and implemented and are yielding the desired results. FY 2024 is the next phase of our journey, where we are focusing on fixing, enhancing, and repositioning the business, building market credibility through doing what we said we would do, and ensuring that we have the right high-performance culture that understands that. As Jim Collins put it, Good is the enemy of great. Mediocre is not okay. Applying that culture to executing on our target operating models, supported by a robust balance sheet, will take us into the next phase of our journey, namely accelerated growth. Despite the challenges in the South African economy, I am very excited about this journey and walking every step of the way with our customers, partners, people, and shareholders.
With that, I will hand you over to Bronwyn Nielsen to host our Q&A. A reminder to everyone to post any questions you have into the chat box or via the conference call line.
Welcome to the Altron Interim Results Presentation Q&A, and I've got the management team, Carel, Werner, Grant. You've heard from them all this morning in terms of the presentation itself. We will be taking calls via the live conference call, and of course, you can enter your questions into the chat box, and I'll be sure to put them to management. Werner, I'm gonna start with you. There are a couple of questions coming through on cost-saving initiatives and what you've undertaken in this regard. They're also coming and saying, Good set of results.
Thanks, Bronwyn. Thank you very much. We certainly have put in a lot of hard work and effort over the last 12 months, and as I said, over the last six months, you know, I'd really like to thank our people in particular for that. From a cost savings perspective, probably three major areas. I mean, one, you know, we looked quite hard at our support costs, particularly in legal and HR, and we did some cost reduction there. I mean, you heard me reference, extensively deploying AI within our own operations, and we've had some good traction there, particularly in the Arrow business, you know, really optimizing our supply chain there. You saw some of the EBITDA margin expansion. And then a big focus for us was property.
I think a lot of people kind of post-COVID, you know, with work from home, all of a sudden, the need for property is not as big as it used to be. Coming into 2023, I think we had roughly about 98,000 square meters of property available to us. We really drove a considered property consolidation strategy, you know, by either subletting, by letting some of our properties go as those leases come up. I think over the next 18 months, you know, as some of that flows through into the business, we'll be occupying about 54,000 square meters. So significant reduction in our property footprint.
Carel, you've been in the business since June. Are you happy with the momentum that you've seen from a cost savings perspective?
Bronwyn, I think a lot has been done in the last six months. Obviously, there's always more to be done, and we continue to look at opportunities where we can streamline our cost structures and get more out of it. But I think, as the results show, a lot's been done. You can see it in the increasing profitability, but there's more to be done.
... No holds barred in terms of the questions coming through. Adam Isaacs from the Motor Industry Retirement Funds, saying, Altron released its annual report earlier this year, only to process large adjustments in the current year on items that were, in fact, evident at year-end. Please, Werner, can you advise on this? And what is your level of commitment to shareholders from that, that we won't be subjected to more unpleasant surprises?
Adam, thanks for the question. I think it's a very valid question. Notwithstanding the Anova matter, which is still pending, which we spoke about, I think it was about three months ago when we issued our trading statement, I'm cautiously optimistic that we cannot expect any more material provisions or adjustments in the two businesses that are held for sale, which is ADS and Nexus. As I've mentioned before, you know, we've got very competent and experienced management now managing those businesses for value until such time as we manage to divest from them. So, you know, fairly confident that there won't be any more material provisions going forward.
Kefilwe Ndlala from Mazi Asset Management: Thanks for the presentation. Good set of results. Could you please share any plans that are underway to effect disposals on the discontinued operations, Nexus and Document Solutions?
Yeah, Bronwyn, as I just mentioned, you know, we are actively exploring those options. Unfortunately, the nature of these processes, you can't really give an update until we have something material to tell the market, but it's getting a lot of attention from us, we're actively pursuing those kind of as we speak.
Grant, in terms of Netstar, you've been in the group since January. In terms of your profit improvement strategy that you referred to in the presentation, are you satisfied with the progress that you're making?
Thanks, Bronwyn. Yes, yeah, I'll be very, very happy, I think, with our progress. It is still early days in our journey. We've got a lot to look forward to. You know, really strong management team inside Netstar, really focused on, on what we're doing and how we improve efficiencies across the business.
Ernst Kaplan, on that note, saying, Werner, on the previous success of the unbundling of Bytes, what is the likelihood of a separate listing of Netstar?
Hi, Ernst. Thanks for the question. It's not something we're looking at at this point in time. I mean, you know, I think we've been quite clear about our strategy, where we wanna take the business, making sure, you know, we're a focused business now, making sure that we execute on those profit improvement strategies, continue to drive growth in some of our bigger engines, fintech, healthtech, the security business. You know, look, we look for opportunities to create value for shareholders at all time, but at this point in time, we're really looking to manage the business and really just, you know, you know, maintain and drive our market position and, continue to deliver good sets of results.
Charl de Villiers, Ashburton. Carel, I'm gonna put this to you: Can you give us an update on the scale or closure of the non-core business units that are continuously negatively impacting the group income statement? Is there an appropriate level of urgency from the executive to exit these non-core assets?
Charl, thanks for your question. Werner mentioned, you know, we are actively working at this, but just maybe to expand on that, the management teams we've got there now have really put an end to the cash bleed on the group. So both ADS and Nexus, while we're busy pursuing the sale, is being value managed for value. So, you know, we don't see a significant cash drain on the group. They will contribute a very small profit, but while that is happening, we're still pursuing the sale as aggressively as we can.
Another one for you, Carel. Chris Logan from Opportune, again, saying, Thanks for the presentation. Netstar's operating margin, for the first time ever, has declined to single digits at 9.9%. Is this not just a new low, and are you not just underpricing in an increasingly saturated South African market?
Now, a very good question. What Netstar is going through at the moment is an investment cycle, and that is required for the aggressive growth that they're on. They're investing in systems, they're investing in platforms, the depreciation charge coming through because of the success in their pre-fit conversion ratio. So all of these are coming through the numbers now, and that's a part of, you know, the business on being on an aggressive growth path.
Werner, what is your appetite for international expansion? And, and maybe, Grant, you can add to that in terms of, of Netstar's aspirations, considering your geographic footprint. Werner, let's start with you.
Thanks, Ernst. No, you know, I think in that slide that Carel referred to our capital allocation strategy, we are obviously fortunate to have a healthy balance sheet. We're able to deploy that into some of the organic growth initiatives and systems investments that Carel just referred to. We do have an appetite for international acquisition. I mean, we've specifically targeted, you know, places like Malaysia. Southeast Asia is a very, very attractive market, particularly in IoT and telematics, and also, you know, areas like Netstar FinTech, the security IT business. So we are actively pursuing opportunities at this point in time.
Grant, just from your perspective and specifically around Malaysia?
No, so look, it's an exciting market, you know, Werner and I spend a lot of time talking about it. You know, we certainly believe that, that that's where the next growth phase in telematics will come. And also, you know, there's new opportunities for us in Australia, and we'll continue to grow our market share in both these regions.
Just want to turn to the conference line. If we have any calls to come through via conference line, please indicate, and we'll obviously put your questions directly through to the management team. While we're waiting for that, Werner, I just want to come back to Adam Isaacs-
Mm
... and make sure that we have answered this question... in terms of management's confidence around the risks posed by the discontinued businesses, and, specifically whether they are being closely managed. Now, I know you've already stated that-
Mm.
But Adam goes further to say: Are they not just operating on auto, autopilot? I wanna make sure that we've given a level of comfort there.
Adam, I can absolutely assure you that, assure you that they are not operating on autopilot. As I said, we've got management teams very invested in that business. Myself and Carel, we review that business on a monthly basis. So no, that's definitely not the case.
Carel, in terms of your outlook for the next six-month period, what are you most aware of at the moment or monitoring carefully? It could, of course, be the external environment and the macroeconomic indicators that remain challenging in South Africa.
Yeah, Bronwyn, you're right. I mean, I think the next six months there are a couple of big events that's not necessarily under our control, but what we focus on as a management team is that, that we can control. And for me, that is to continue to keep the eye on, you know, cost management, operational leverage, continue to focus to manage all of our businesses for growth. So that's what we'll focus on.
Grant, in terms of your opportunity from a Netstar perspective, you've demonstrated real traction to this period. The next six months, what are you focusing on?
Look, we're gonna continue with our profit improvement strategy. You know, that's our, that's our key focus now, and to continue to grow our market share. We've got some exciting new products coming to the market, which I referenced to in the presentation. So that's our focus.
Perhaps just take us through those innovations a little further. I know you were very excited about them in the presentation.
Don't give away all of our trade secrets, eh?
So, look, I think the big three call-outs, we've got three products in field trials. The one is the new NB-IoT device. A wireless product can be utilized in motorized and non-motorized assets, including cargo, and there's a need for that in the South African environment. The second one is our new recovery device. I think with the increase in theft of motor vehicles and hijackings that we've we can see, I mean, the new barometer report has shown considerable increases in the first six months of this year, and I think it's our responsibility to bring a product to the market that can assist customers and insurers to reduce losses. And then the third one is our product, which is a vehicle-to-vehicle communication device to strengthen our ability from a network perspective.
So we're super excited about what we're gonna be doing through delivering on the next six months.
Miles Ferree is saying, Please provide an explanation as to why Netstar's EBITDA ratio has consistently underperformed by a thousand basis points per annum over the last five years. And Cartrack, how does Netstar management plan to close this gap? Obviously, how does Netstar management plan to close the gap with Cartrack in this regard? So, Carel, I'm going to talk to you about the numbers, despite the fact that you've only been in the business since June.
Sure.
But I'm sure you can throw some insight into or onto this situation.
No, and that's right. I mean, you know, the business, I think it's well known that Netstar went through a very difficult time in the second half of the prior year. And all Grant and his team's focus has been on rectifying and focusing the business, and with that comes increased cost pressure in order to be able to make the business resilient and to be able to sustain the growth. And so for us, that's, that's what we're focused on. With regards to the comment, the comparison to Cartrack, I don't really want to comment on Cartrack's performance. You know, we manage the Netstar business, and, you know, that's under our control.
And I think you're probably going to put a very similar answer to Chris Logan from Opportune, who is saying, Karooooo/Cartrack provides an average cost of adding a subscriber to the cloud at ZAR 2,293, and the average life cycle revenue per subscriber at ZAR 9,556. Can you provide similar numbers so we can gauge the economics attached to Netstar? The question is gonna be the same. We manage our business differently?
Yeah, I mean, you know-
I mean, ours is gonna be the same.
... we're going to discuss with everybody the metrics behind our business, but I really do not want to comment on somebody else's business, whether it's Karooooo, Cartrack, anybody else.
Grant, I have to put this to you in terms of the measurement and just likely your addition to Carel's comment.
So look, I think, you know, we made reference to the way we depreciate. You know, we do accelerated depreciation. So this is a little bit different to some of our peers. I think that plays a significant role. But we, you know, look, we've got our auditors having a look at it, and we'll make a comment a little bit later on in this year as to if we were gonna make any changes to how we view the depreciation.
Werner, in terms of the business going forward-
Mm
... the integration of a number of the different subsidiaries-
Mm
into the digital business
Mm.
Can you perhaps just talk to us before we close out?
Yeah. Yeah, sure. Thanks, Bron. You know, so, you know, our aspiration, as you know, is we wanna be the, the leading platform in IT services, business. And you know, what we really wanna do to achieve that now is, you know, the ASI business with that, that we've really now restored to profitability, the Karabina business, and the Altron Managed Solutions business, we're gonna put those three businesses together. We believe it'll create a powerhouse in IT services in South Africa. And the, the reason why we're really doing it is, firstly, as you saw in my slide, really simplifies our operating model. I'm a big believer in focus, basics, and simplicity. What it'll help us do is serve our clients better, and it'll also help us to really grow that business to scale.
You know, we'll be announcing that. We're busy going through that process right now, and we'll be ready to do that on the 1st of March 2024.
I know I said that was my final question, but one final question.
Sure.
As I put to Carel earlier, it is a tough economic environment.
Mm.
It continues to be challenging. What are you looking to over the next six months?
Bron, I think I'd probably reiterate, you know, some of what Carel said. We can't control externalities, so, you know, we're really focused on what we can do. I mean, having said that, you know, as I said earlier on, I'm exceptionally pleased. If you look at our continued operations, so really the businesses that we focused on going forward and where we apply our strategy, you know, 11% revenue growth, you know, EBITDA expansion, you know, 32% operating income growth, big focus on, on cash control. But I think the big focus for us is to maintain that our balance sheet is healthy. I think it's a very good thing to have at this point in time, build out our annuity business.
I think probably the one thing we don't speak enough about, we had some case studies, is really focused on our customers. You know, Grant also spoke about it, really walking that journey with our customers. So those would be the kind of things. I mean, we feel that if we, if we focus on that, control what, you know, what, what we can control, hopefully the rest will take care of itself.
Werner, Grant, Carel, thank you very much for joining us for this live Q&A session. Thank you so much for your questions. That brings us to a close on the interim results for Altron to the six months, 31st of August 2024.