Welcome all to this Q2 Presentation by NORBIT. The company delivered a stellar quarter this morning. I guess I will leave the details to the CEO and the CFO. Welcome all. With that, Per Kristian. Per Jørgen, sorry.
Well, thank you, Kenneth, and thank you all for taking the time to listen in to our second quarter presentation. As Kenneth said, it was a good quarter. The quarter landed according to our plan. It's a new record with in excess of NOK 300 million in revenues. On this level, the EBITDA also comes in the right direction. We had in the quarter a new record also on EBITDA margin on NOK 78 million. This represents a relative margin of 25%. We say that we are on track on our 2022 target to deliver in excess of NOK 1 billion.
If you have a look on the four last quarters and try to make a sum out of that, you will see that it's already the last 12 months on that level. In the quarter, we have also distributed the dividend, which was decided in the annual shareholders meeting in May with 0.30 NOK per share. For first half, we've delivered NOK 550 million in revenues with 63% growth compared to first half last year. I think the quarter overall is as indicated according to the plan. What is awesome to see is that all three business segments has contributed very well.
Going forward, we see that having these three very diversified business segments is very favorable. I'm diving into each segment, giving you some highlights. Oceans, which is the largest segment, has delivered 29% growth, ending at a revenue of NOK 131 million. We've seen that the American region has been very good this quarter. As you see, the margin is also very good. This is the first time we deliver more than NOK 50 million in EBITDA in this segment. On this slide, you can see how this is decomposed. As you can recall, NORBIT started out doing sales of a first generation sonar called the iWBMS sonar.
In 2021, we released the WINGHEAD sonar, and we had a good growth on that. You see the light blue or blue-gray columns showing that also the first sonar family still is growing. The WINGHEAD is a good contributor to the growth. We're adding more. This strategy in Oceans to broaden the product offering is really helping us to continue to deliver growth. Coming slightly back to that after the outlook. Connectivity. Connectivity is back with full speed.
We've seen that in this quarter, we have a very good contribution revenues from our dedicated short-range communications product, the toll tags and similar products. These products have improved margins compared to what they had in the past. We see that our strategy of migrating that part of the business from tendering to business to business, where NORBIT takes a position as a technology partner for the client, gives us more long-term relations and gives us the ability to innovate in the value chain in a different way to bring value to the clients, which again, they are willing to pay for. The quarter ended at NOK 83 million, and with a 24% EBITDA margin amounting NOK 20 million.
The final segment, Product Innovation & Realization. This is where we sell the spare manufacturing capacity as contract manufacturing services, and we have some R&D services in addition to that. The demand for these services is very strong. You see we're delivering a good growth. We have also had some challenges when it comes to components in this quarter, but despite that, it's still a very good quarter, good growth and margins on the level which we are heading for also in the longer term. Revenues of NOK 112 million for the quarter, 42% growth year-over-year, and NOK 210 million for the second half, 44% compared to the same period last year.
There is some special pass-through invoicing in this, which Per Kristian will comment on in his part also. Maybe Per Kristian could give us some insight in the financial details.
Thank you, Per Jorgen. I will spend some minutes walking you through the main financial highlights of the quarter. Revenues in the second quarter amounted to NOK 315.3 million, representing an increase of 66% from the corresponding period of last year. Adjusted for the acquisition of iData, which was completed in July last year, the organic revenue growth was 55%. All business areas delivered record high revenues. EBITDA for the quarter was NOK 77.7 million compared to NOK 50.5 million in the second quarter of 2021. This represents a margin of 25% compared to 27% in the same period of last year.
The improvement in the results is largely driven by increased revenues in segment Oceans and Connectivity, and partly offsetting this was an increase in payroll expenses as we continue to scale the organization due to the activity, as well as an increase in operating expenses. Of the approximately NOK 21 million increase in operating expenses compared to the same quarter last year, iData stood for NOK 10 million, and the remaining difference is largely explained by an increase in cost related to consultants, legal advisory, freight, electricity and travel following easing of the restrictions. Operating profit was NOK 56.9 million in the quarter, while net finance expenses was NOK 2.5 million, and the profit after tax was NOK 42.8 million. All three business areas delivered improvement in the results in the quarter when compared to the second quarter last year.
Oceans result improvement was driven by an increase in revenues of 29% on higher sonar sales, while the gross margin was on par with that of last year's second quarter. This was partly offset by an increase in cost base due to continued strengthening of the organization to manage the activity level, as well as an increase in travel cost post-COVID. Connectivity had a solid result improvement compared to last year's second quarter. This was primarily explained by sub-segment ITS growing revenues by NOK 45 million, as well as iData delivering NOK 21.6 million in revenues. Part of the positive gross profit effect was partly offset by an increase in expenses of NOK 23.4 million, where iData stood for NOK 15.7 million. Despite the 42% growth in revenues from second quarter last year, segment PIR reported only a small increase in the EBITDA.
This was primarily due to the large share of revenue generation in this year's quarter being invoicing of extraordinary material cost on a limited set of components to a limited set of clients. These are components that are purchased at alternative marketplaces due to low availability, and we invoice this extra cost directly to the client without the margin. In total, NOK 33.4 million was recognized in such invoicing in the quarter. Adjusted for this effect, revenue growth was 7% in the quarter. As a result of this effect, the EBITDA margin fell four percentage points to 10% in the quarter. Next, balance sheet and financial position. Property, plant and equipment decreased NOK 2.9 million from the end of last quarter. Intangible assets rose NOK 6.8 million due to R&D investments in the quarter. Inventory increased NOK 36 million in the quarter.
The increase is both a result of the activity increase we are experiencing and also the fact that the supply market for components continues to be challenging, requiring us to hold more components in stock to mitigate the risk of component shortage. Trade receivables decreased NOK 18.3 million, despite revenues increasing more than 30% sequentially. The reduction was primarily a result of us factoring in a non-recourse facility for factoring, where we sold invoices for approximately NOK 70 million in the quarter. Trade payables was NOK 136.3 million at the end of the quarter, down from NOK 153.2 million at the end of the first quarter. Net interest-bearing debt stood at NOK 281.2 million at the end of June, a small increase from NOK 278.3 million at the end of March.
Our equity ratio was 49% at quarter end. As per the end of the second quarter, our net interest-bearing debt to EBITDA stood at 1.5 times. This is a decrease from 1.7 times at the end of the first quarter, following the results delivered in the second quarter. Our balance sheet remains strong. We have a solid liquidity position with more than NOK 270 million in available financing under our credit facilities, and this provides a solid foundation to finance our growth plans going forward. Lastly, the cash flow for the quarter. Cash flow from operations was NOK 44.9 million, primarily explained by an EBITDA of NOK 77.7 million, a net increase of NOK 29.7 million in working capital and NOK 2.5 million in net finance expenses.
We invested NOK 23.4 million in the quarter, explained by NOK 17.8 million in R&D investments and NOK 5.7 million in investments in machinery and equipment. The guidance for 2022 is reiterated, where we plan to invest between NOK 50 million and NOK 60 million in R&D. Investments in the machinery and equipment is expected to be between NOK 40 million and NOK 50 million gross and before lease financing. We expect the major share of the second half investment to be financed with leasing. Cash outflow from financing was NOK 6.4 million, explained by NOK 18 million in dividends paid, repurchase of shares, partly offset by an increase in borrowings. I will then give the floor back to Per Jørgen for the outlook section.
Thank you, Per Kristian. It's exciting to have a look in the outlook. Before doing that, I'd like to remind you about Norbit's strategy for how to cope with the uncertainty in the current supply chain and the market. Norbit has for a long period had a clear strategy of building security stock on components. We're benefiting from having R&D resources in-house. So when there is a shortage on some component, which some component could be completely not available, we can use our brilliant engineers to do some redesigning to make use of alternative components. It gives us a very good flexibility to have in-house production, where we can do reprioritization and replanning to have the flexibility to catch up on possible delays.
This has been very fruitful, and we continue to work according to this strategy. Having a look into the short-term outlook, meaning for this year, in the Oceans segment, we have some seasonality. First and third quarter is usually slow. The first quarter is usually the slowest quarter. Second quarter is better, third quarter is down again, and fourth quarter is very often the most busy quarter. It's often some element of budget flushing also in the fourth quarter. We expect the next quarter in Oceans still to show growth compared to the third quarter of last year. But the seasonality would make it probably less than what we've seen for second quarter.
In Connectivity, we have quite good visibility today. We expect the second half of this year to be at the same level as first half. We see that this mentioned orders on products for business clients where we are more like a technology partner is very helpful on the standard DSRC products. The recurring revenue stream from iData gives us a solid foundation going forward in the subsegment Smart Data. In Product Innovation and Realization, we expect to deliver a third quarter in line with second quarter. It will require that we get the needed material. The mentioned strategy for building security stock helps us.
The priority on the security stock is also affected by the fact that in the Connectivity and Oceans segment, where it's Norbit proprietary technology to be delivered out in the market under Norbit branding, we will secure more materials in than in the contract manufacturing where we need to rely on the commitment from the clients. Adding to this outlook, I'd like to give you a reminder on our strategy looking towards 2024, which was presented exactly one year ago. First this target for this year, 2022, NOK 1 billion as mentioned in the introduction. Last twelve months is already NOK 1 billion. We have good belief that we will be delivering in excess of NOK 1 billion this year.
As mentioned, there is some quarterly fluctuations should be expected also going forward. We communicated last year the ambition of delivering an organic growth, lifting the revenues to NOK 1.5 billion in 2024, with an EBITDA margin in excess of 25%. This ambition level is still valid. In addition to that, we continue to explore for value-accretive acquisitions, with a priority mainly in companies that could help to further lift Connectivity and Oceans. Little bit about the key elements in the strategy in each segment. I think the numbers on the part of this NOK 1.5 billion to be delivered from each segment speaks for itself.
The target for Oceans is NOK 700 million with the EBITDA margin in excess of 35%. As you might recall, it's in excess of 40% this quarter. In the long term ambition, it's 35%. You might say that this is not very ambitious, but continuing to grow, we see that there could be a very interesting business, with new products, maybe having less margin potential than some of what we have today. We find it as a sane ambition to aim for in excess of 35%. Oceans has a very strong market presence, with a broad distribution platform, in a combination of direct distribution with Norbit colleagues being present around the globe and indirect distribution.
We are growing, and we're planned to continue to do that by broadening the product offering to utilize on this global market distribution. We also plan to continue to increase the market presence to build some more presence by adding more seniors to support on the continued business development. As shown in the segment part of the presentation, we are expanding into new market segments to new subsegments. For Connectivity, last 12 months, we've delivered NOK 257 million. The ambition level for the 2024 target is NOK 350 million. It's the same margin ambition as for Oceans. We have delivered now a margin which is below this.
We see that we can scale Connectivity quite good without adding too much resources. More volumes on this business-to-business related sales of the DSRC products and continued scaling of the subscription-based revenues from iData being part of subsegment Smart Data supports the belief that we can deliver also better margins going forward. In Product Innovation and Realization, we continue to add new clients. We see that we benefit from synergies of being able to deliver both R&D services and contract manufacturing. I think I mentioned it a couple of times before that made in Europe, made in Norway is quite popular.
We see more and more customers really looking to do manufacturing in Europe and in Norway again, where they in the past probably has been looking to more low-cost countries. When you really prioritize to do automation and robotization, the labor cost level in Norway does not affect as much as it would have done in the past with more manual labor. We're broadening the industrial focus in this segment. In the contract manufacturing currently, it's a high portion of automotive revenues. We see an increased demand from electrification clients and also from security. Very interesting also for this segment going forward. With that said, the presentation is concluded, and I'll leave it to Kenneth if there are any questions.
Okay. Thank you for the presentation. It was nice to hear some color on it. We have actually received quite a few questions from the audience, so you're getting more attention out there. I'll just start, and I will try to go through them. I think the first one we have is on the revenue side, and how should we think about pricing and the product mix going into second half in 2023?
I think you have to look at this from the different business segments. If you look into the guidance we have given for third quarter and for the second half for Connectivity, I think the guidance speaks for itself. We are growing revenues quite a bit now. Obviously, we, as PerJørgen mentioned, have a plan towards 2024, and we also hope that we will take some steps in that direction next year. Obviously, with the inflationary picture that we're seeing now, we're obviously closely monitoring our margins, and of course, taking the necessary and appropriate measures to adjust prices in order to have acceptable margins within the business segments.
I think we managed that quite well over the last year. Remember that the component market has been quite challenging since the start of 2020. We definitely have some experience in maintaining margins and in adjusting accordingly. I think moving into next year, our ambition is to take some steps in the direction of the ambitions that we have for 2024, both on revenues and margins.
Yeah. Thank you. I guess, given you're running at NOK 1 billion, you should have some upside to this one. Yeah, but you are guiding above NOK 1 billion. On the PIR segment, I think I got a few questions actually on this one. First of all, are you running at full capacity? And then secondly, on the margin side, I think you said something in presentation you had been charging a bit more for the component situation, so that's a pass-through. How should we think about margins now for second half and going into 2023?
First, when it comes to capacity, we still have some headroom on the capacity, and we are, as we speak, adding more capacity. Part of this PPE investments Per Kristian mentioned in his part is for new assembly lines in the Røros factory, which will help us to increase the capacity quite smoothly. When it comes to margins, I think for the contract manufacturing, the margins shown in PIR, I think it's good margins. In our strategy, we've said that for the Oceans segment and Connectivity segment, where we have proprietary technology under own branding out in the international market, we're aiming for a margin in excess of 35%.
In the PIR segment, we've said that we're aiming for something between 8% and 10%, and we're above that as it is today. I think it's an appropriate level, this around 10%.
Yeah. Just remind us on the capacity side. Are you running a two shift or now at PIR some of the facilities?
It's during this year, it's been mainly two shifts. There is spare capacity also to add a third shift.
Mm.
We're scaling things so that the normal should be two shifts so that you have a third shift to have the headroom. Managing a factory like that, you should. We have the rule of thumb that we should be able to cope with the doubling and survive if it goes to half. It should be in between there.
Moving up to Connectivity now. It's a different segment than it was when we listed you back in 2019. On the auto part of it, you have some contracts with a-
Mm-hmm
... particularly within the truck segment. Could you share some color on how you see the market developing, and anything we should be aware of going into second half?
I think what's worth mentioning there, reminding you, is that it's towards the automotive industry in this segment. The main product which is coupled to the automotive macro is these wireless modules connected to the tachographs in the trucks which you can use to read out the driving resting hours for the driver remotely. The last 10 years, it's an average of 400,000 trucks being manufactured. Our client, Continental, has 80% market share. We've seen that what we deliver fits to this macro been quite stable. The margins on these products are not the best in our product mix.
We have announced earlier a big German client, which we delivered a lot, prior to COVID. They had an inventory build-up during the COVID, and they've been now scaling down the inventories again. We announced a new order to be delivered to them during next year. I think the product mix for Connectivity second half will be quite similar to first half, and hence, the margin should be in the same range.
For connectivity with the iData acquisition you have made, you have also acquired a more recurring revenue. Should perhaps the volatility we have seen prior to 2021, it should not be there.
It's at least more sustainable with this subscription-based revenue model. 4,500 clients, 45,000 vehicles being tracked. I think also this change in the strategy where we have more long-term contracts on the toll tags business, where we agree on annual volumes to be delivered on a monthly basis instead of, in the past, fighting in public tenders for something to be delivered in two months from being awarded and the price level is quite improved.
This has been a strategy since day one, since we met you, to try to develop the company or expand the company. Avoiding this cyclicality and low margin products.
Mm-hmm
which you see some of your competitor or peers have been in. Given your balance sheet, I guess you have enough room. You are still targeting M&A as a part of your strategy. Is perhaps Connectivity the segment that we should expect? Or is it split, evenly split between this?
I think what we've said is that we're mainly prioritizing companies that could fit into Oceans and Connectivity. With the core purpose of the company being Explore More, if we see all the things really being valuable for the company, hence the shareholders for the future, we will look into it. We're not looking for acquisitions in the PIR segment. We see that growing the manufacturing capacity organically is what we prioritize.
We just received a question on iData on our core OpEx within iData. It's related to the software platform development, or is it related to software platform development or indirect OpEx?
Well, I mean, it's a broad set of cost elements, of course. Obviously, we have some salary expenses there, which is in that number. There's around 110 employees in Budapest. Obviously, they have some direct costs attached to them.
Yeah.
We certainly have some costs relating to the software and IT ecosystem around iData, which ties into that, and also costs for fuel. It's about GPS trackers being installed in companies and obviously they're out and meeting and supporting their clients. I think we should expect that the cost base will increase somewhat in iData with the fuel prices being sort of an inflationary item in there. As I said, we are obviously monitoring that closely and will take the necessary and appropriate measures to adjust also the pricing to maintain acceptable margins in that company as well.
Just to follow up on this, but the platform is quite scalable.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
Yeah
Just to be clear on that one.
Yeah.
Moving on to saving the best for last, Oceans.
Yeah.
You're quite positive on the sonar sale in Q2, and I guess also that you mentioned in the report that the speed going into Q3 was quite high. Could you elaborate a bit on the cyclicality that you were mentioning in the report?
As mentioned, Q1 is typically low season. Doing surveying on boats, et cetera, is not as nice to do in January as it is during the summer. It picks up in Q2. Q3 is usually a bit slower, and Q4 is where we see the highest traction. Maybe what I could add to this is also that we see that it's an increased activity within the renewable energy part of the business. We announced and had in an earlier presentation on some contracts where we deliver our sonars to companies doing surveying related to offshore wind farms, et cetera. We see that also the U.S. market is picking up on that with some.
It's a tendency that it's an increased activity for that as well, where it maybe was earlier started in Europe. We also see some increased demand in the security field. We announced earlier a contract with a completely new sonar for surveillance purposes, where we do some diver detection solution. This has also been a contributor to the revenues in this quarter. That's then the first delivery of a system like that. With the uncertainty in the world, I think security segment will not go away. It will increase. This solution we're delivering there really takes care to protect valuable assets from intrusion from divers planning to do some sabotage, et cetera.
Mm-hmm. Yeah. No, we actually received a few questions regarding the security segment within Oceans. I guess you answered most, at least partly or mostly. There's a potential of further growth.
Mm-hmm.
I guess that's a few questions here around untapped niches for the Oceans segment that you see is still a broad range that you could tap into. You elaborate a bit on that.
Yeah
renewable side.
I think probably part of what we've done reasonably well is to instead of just fighting for market share in an established market, we've been looking if there are potential use cases where we can do some tailoring to open up the market and expand the market. We continue to do that. I think on a large exhibition in London earlier this year, we released a new version of the WINGHEAD sonar called WINGHEAD i80S. We've already have quite nice sale on that. This is added some functionality that makes it suited especially for light unmanned vehicles doing autonomous surveying.
We will continue to do that, to continue to innovate and make new features, add features to our solutions, to grow the market and expand the market.
Okay. Following up on this one. In Q1, you mentioned that the increased volume in Oceans required fewer third-party sales. That would obviously leave more left for Norbit or more value creation left for Norbit. Could you give some example or could you comment on this one, how it's been through Q2 and in looking-
Yeah, if I understand the question correctly, it has to do with the distribution?
Yes.
I think we've had some increased part where we do direct distribution compared to what we did in the past with more indirect distribution. I think it's comparable in this quarter compared to the past quarter.
I think that if you look on the gross margins in Oceans in Q2, it was on par with what we have seen in 2021. I think, yeah, if you look on it on a broader time series, you will see that the commission part is relatively stable, and I think Q1 was probably an exception to that.
Okay. Thank you. Moving on to the financial part, more on the CapEx side. You're giving a guidance both for R&D and also machinery and equipment. Given the inflationary pressure we see, how certain are you on the CapEx estimate for second half and perhaps moving into 2023?
We're relatively certain that we will be within the guidance range that we have provided. We definitely see that the inflation is obviously impacting some of the cost elements also on the CapEx side but not hugely. I think for the guidance that we have provided, I think you should take that. We're taking the inflation into consideration.
On the R&D spending, got a question here on this one. What kind of resource do you target on the R&D spending and also any product segments that can be mentioned?
I think what we have mentioned is what we might repeat. In Oceans, we've invested resources and money into this security segment and also some of the new versions of the WINGHEAD sonar as I mentioned. What I might add is that in the Connectivity segment, we've seen an increased interest from insurance companies, where they'd like some more added functionality into the toll tags with additional technology. I think it's been mentioned before also that we're working on solutions where you can combine this technology with also other technologies so that you could have some kind of collision or equal functionality also built into this product.
I think when some more of the development and some trials has been concluded, we might show some more business coming in that direction also.
Staying on the R&D, do you have any amounts or any target on return target you give? I guess you have it internally, but you-
Well, I think when it comes to the R&D investments, you have to look at them from different perspectives. They are quite different in nature when it comes to risk, the strategic importance for the different segments. Obviously, we measure all the R&D investments by the cash flow that they're generating. We don't have an explicit target or a threshold for when you can actually go ahead and move the investment forward. I think the most important thing is that we focus to minimize the payback period as much as we can on the R&D investments, and that's the main goal, overarching goal for how we are managing the capital allocation between the R&D investments.
It's a dynamic process.
Maybe I'd like to add to that having some ambition level toward 2024, if that were the end game for the company, of course we would prioritize only R&D investments which would contribute to that. It's our ambition also to continue to grow the company after 2024. We're also looking into technologies and products which could support the growth to 2028 and 2030. We need a balance.
On the net working capital, you have investments in inventory levels. Any projection on how it will carry on this one, or is it getting close to a cyclical peak, what you call it? If you understand.
The nominal working capital will obviously be a reflection of the general activity level and it certainly has increased quite a lot over the last twelve months. Our revenues have increased quite a bit as well. We obviously monitoring the working capital efficiency. It was around 27%, 28% now in Q4, if you analyze.
Mm.
Q2. It hasn't been that low since end of 2019. I think the efficiency part is moving forward as part of the plan. It will certainly fluctuate and particularly on the inventory side as the component market is quite challenging and we need to build stock in order to deliver according to our plans with the current lead times that we are observing. We have a target and an ambition to be between 25% and 30% of net sales. In Q2, we were in the middle. Over time, we hope to move closer to the bottom of the range.
I think with the current component market, we will probably not be there in the short term, but we at least have a longer-term ambition to increase the efficiency even further.
Okay. I think we are getting close to the end here, but I just have one final question from me, actually. Given where we stand today, are you more or less confident than you were three months ago? Yes or no?
I cannot recall how confident I was three months ago, but I'm happy with what we have presented, and I'm looking forward to come back and present the results for Q3 when that is ready.
Same here. I'm looking forward to the Q3 and the rest of the year. Thank you so much.
Thank you.
Thank you all for participating.