Welcome to the Getinge Q2 Report 2024. For the first part of the conference call, the participants will be in listen-only mode. During the questions and answer session, participants are able to ask questions by dialing star five on their telephone keypad. Now, I will hand the conference over to the speakers, CEO Mattias Perjos, and CFO Agneta Palmér. Please go ahead.
Thank you very much. Thanks for joining today's conference. With me, I have our CFO, Agneta Palmér, who will present the financials in a moment. But let's get started. We can move directly over to page number two, please. And let's start by looking at some of the highlights and key takeaways from the second quarter of 2024. Net sales increased by 15.7% in the second quarter, and the organic growth part of this was 8.9%. Order intake for Getinge increased by 14.4%, and the organic part here was 7.8%, thanks to positive development in all our three business areas. Adjusted gross margins improved in all business areas, and the adjusted EBITDA margin for the group improved 4.9 percentage points year-on-year.
This is mainly coming from the weak comp from last year, plus healthy growth, mix and price, mitigating the negative effects from inflation that we still see. These are effects that we continuously address through productivity improvements and structural changes when and where needed. All in all, this contributes to a solid financial position that enables investments in profitable growth also going forward. We can then move over to page number three, please. So let's take a look at some of the key activities that will drive future growth and profitability. So when it comes to our offering and customers, I'd like to mention that in the quarter, we launched Poladus 150. It's an advanced low-temperature sterilizer that meets an important need for our customers.
From a regulatory perspective, we received 510(k) clearance for our advanced clinical guidance digital offering, which enables digital clinical decision support. We also had EU MDR approval for our covered stent system, Advanta V12. Within Life Science, the GEW 888 neo washer was launched, which contributes to increased efficiency in the clean room, and it also reduces water consumption by 20%. In addition to this, we had a new version of our DPTE-BetaBag launched, and this is a version that is made from a larger portion of renewable materials. In the quarter as well, on May 15, we had a capital market update, presenting an updated adjusted earnings per share target of an average growth of over 12% in the years 2024 through 2028.
When it comes to sustainability and quality, the quality improvement work linked to the balloon pump Cardiosave and the ECLS system, Cardiohelp. We have, as previously communicated, paused active promotion in the U.S. of these products, but we are still able to sell and deliver if our customers see no good alternative. We are in close dialogue with customers and authorities, but it's too early to single out any specific trend in sales when it comes to this. In the quarter, we also submitted an application for CE marking of a new packaging for the ECMO therapy consumables, HLS, and PLS sets. We can then move over to page number four, please.
So as I mentioned earlier, the order intake grew by 14.4%, whereof 7.8% organically, and net sales increased by 15.7%, whereof 8.9% organically. Order intake grew strongly in EMEA and Asia-Pacific, and the decline in organic order intake in Americas is mainly due to a softer quarter for life science and for surgical workflows. All regions grew net sales organically in the quarter, mainly driven by an improvement in acute care therapies compared with the challenging Q2 of last year. We can then move over to page five, please.
So all this combined takes us to the outlook, where we reiterate our previous guidance for 2024, that we expect organic net sales growth to be 2%-5%, and in addition to this, we expect recent acquisitions to contribute with 3 percentage points-5 percentage points of growth. Quick, and this is, this is unchanged. We can move to page number six, please. We'll take a closer look to the, into the order intake, of the second quarter. So per business area, in Acute Care Therapies, we had 8% organic growth. This increase is mostly driven by critical care, cardiopulmonary, and, cardiac surgery.
Life Science had an 18.4% organic growth, and this was after a strong quarter in Sterile Transfer, and the development in Bioprocessing was still weak, as you've seen in earlier quarters as well. In Surgical Workflows, the growth was 3.4% organically, and an increase in all product categories except for Digital Health Solutions. So in summary for the group, this means 7.8% organic order intake growth and in actuals, 14.4%. We can then move to page number seven, please. And then from a sales perspective, Acute Care Therapies, organic net sales increased sharply, following higher sales of consumables in both Cardiopulmonary and Cardiac Assist compared to the difficult Q2 last year.
Life Science organic net sales decreased by 13.1% in the quarter, mainly due to washer disinfectors, sterilizer, and Sterile Transfer. However, sales from High Purity New England in the quarter makes up for almost all of, of this. And when it comes to Surgical Workflows, organic net sales decreased slightly, mainly due to lower sales in Infection Control. The acquisition of Healthmark contributes, continues to contribute to growth in a material way. So overall, for the group, acquisitions contributed to an increase in net sales of SEK 499 million in the quarter. Currency had a SEK -5 million impact on net sales for the group in the quarter. And when it comes to revenue from consumables, this was strong in the quarter, contributing to high growth in recurring revenue. Let's then move over to page number eight.
And if we take a closer look at the, gross margin and gross profit, gross profit increased by SEK 837 million - SEK 4,151 million in the quarter, where FX effects impacted by SEK +35 million . All business areas improved their adjusted gross margin, leading to a 3.8 percentage point increase for the group versus last year's low comps. Mixed price absorption and FX had a positive impact, while cost inflation still eats its way into the margin, and this is something we continue to address. For Acute Care Therapies, the adjusted gross margin improved by 3.6 percentage points, mainly due to increased sales, the product mix inside the business area, and, currency.
This was partly offset by higher costs for input goods, employees, and ongoing quality improvement efforts with regards to Cardiac Assist and to Cardiopulmonary. For Life Science, the adjusted gross margin increased by 2.8 percentage points as a result of favorable mix, price improvements, and currency. And this was partly offset by lower volumes and low absorption. In Surgical Workflows, the adjusted gross margin increased by 2.8 percentage points, mainly as a result of acquisition, acquisitions and price increases. And with that, we'll move over to page number nine, and I hand over to you, Agneta.
Okay. Thank you, Mattias. Let's have a look at adjusted EBITDA, which improved by SEK 486 million, and the margin came in 4.9 percentage points higher than last year. Adjusted gross profit had a positive effect on the margin by 3.3 percentage points due to those factors that were just mentioned by Mattias. So volume, mix, price, favorable absorption, partly offset then by inflationary effects. OpEx, adjusted for currency, had a positive impact of one percentage point on the margin in the quarter, coming from operating leverage and positive contribution from acquisitions. Depreciation and amortization adjusted currency had a positive effect of 0.5 percentage points on the margin. And finally, FX had a slightly positive impact on the margin.
So all in all, this resulted in an adjusted EBITDA of SEK 981 million and a margin of 11.8%. Over to page 10, please. Free Cash Flow amounted to SEK 0.3 billion, roughly. Higher operating profit had a positive effect, while higher level of working capital impacted negatively. Higher working capital is, to a large extent, related to seasonally higher levels of receivables and inventory. Even so, working capital days continue to be well below 100 days. We are now at 91.6 days. We remain below trend on operating return on invested capital, with 11.1% on a rolling 12-month basis, which is still above the cost of capital. Let's move to page 11.
The change in net debt year-over-year is due to the acquisitions that were finalized in the fourth quarter of 2023, taking us to SEK 9 billion in net debt at the end of this quarter. If we adjust for pension liabilities, we are at SEK 6.3 billion. This brings us to a leverage of 1.5 x EBITDA. If we adjust for pension liabilities, the leverage is at 1.1 x EBITDA. Cash amounted to approximately SEK 2.3 billion at the end of the quarter. So all in all, we can conclude that the financial position continues to be strong. Let's then move to page 13, please, and back to you, Mattias.
Okay, thanks, Agneta. Let me just briefly summarize Q2. We continue to grow orders and net sales, and we've also launched a large number of value-adding products in the quarter, which I think is particularly encouraging. We reiterate our guidance for the full year, 2%-5% organic net sales growth, and in addition, we expect the recent acquisitions to contribute with 3 percentage points-5 percentage points of growth. The adjusted EBITDA margin came in 4.9 percentage points higher than last year, thanks to healthy growth, mix, and price, mitigating the negative effects from inflation, which we continue to address through productivity improvements and structural changes as needed.
All in all, this contributes to a solid financial position that enables continued investments in profitable growth for Getinge. The current priorities for us are really about addressing remaining quality-related challenges in Acute Care Therapies. It is to work with sustainable productivity improvements, and it is to continue creating added value for our customers. So with that summary, I open up for questions, so we can move to the Q&A part of this call, please.
If you wish to ask a question, please dial pound key five on your telephone keypad to enter the queue. If you wish to withdraw your question, please dial pound key six on your telephone keypad. The next question comes from Erik Cassel from Danske Bank. Please go ahead.
Hi, good morning, and, congrats on the good results. First, I'd like to ask about the short-term trend you're seeing in the customer loss within ECMO and balloon pumps. If a transition happens, my indication is, well, that customers make that decision relatively fast. I mean, if you see a real risk, you act on it, basically. That's the way it, it's been, but why, why should it be different to you? Why can't you really say anything about that now?
Yeah, thanks, Erik. I mean, it's definitely one theory. It's, it's just difficult to predict, the s ome of the customers we expect will take a little bit longer to evaluate, why, they should change, if they should change at all. So we're just humble about that, really. But I are sure you have a point, but I think it is a little bit too early to predict, and we, we don't see any, any customer loss effects in, in either of the product categories, at the moment.
Okay, thank you. Thank you. And then I just wanted to ask, how much of a stocking and pull forward effect do you think there is in ECMO and balloon pumps right now in this quarter?
Well, we can't really measure that, and I don't see why there should be a pull forward or stocking effect at all, actually.
All right. Perfect. Thank you. Then last one, you talk about strength in critical care in order intake. Are you seeing some sort of trend shift or market, big market share gain post the Philips exit in the U.S.?
It's too early to say, and we, like we said before, we think this is going to be favorable for us, but the strength right now, it's a little bit too early. It's just one data point here, so I would wait a quarter or two before making any conclusions on this.
All right. Thank you very much. I'll jump back in queue.
Thank you.
The next question comes from Rickard Anderkrans from Handelsbanken. Please go ahead.
Good morning, and thank you for taking my questions. First one, you know, at the capital markets update in May, you mentioned having cleared 90% of FDA's quality record backlog. Where are you now, and do you think you can complete the remaining issues or outstanding tasks before year end? That's the first one. Thank you.
Yeah. Yeah, I think the update here is that we've made continued progress. We are, I mean, closer to around 95% now, I'd say, and we are confident that we should have worked this through before the end of the year.
Very clear. Thank you. I also noticed that there seemed to be a bit of a step-up in extraordinary quality costs in the quarter, I guess somewhere around SEK 200 million, compared to SEK 100+ million in Q1. So how should we think about H2, and how confident do you feel about the visibility of these costs? Any swing factors we should think about?
Yeah. Firstly, correctly noticed that this is a step up in the second quarter, but we expect in the second half of the year to sort of normalize and go back to quarter one level. So roughly SEK 200 million in this quarter and then some hundred million SEK per quarter the rest of the year, coming in roughly for the full year in the range of SEK 500 million.
Very clear. Thank you for taking my questions. I'll stop there and get back in the queue.
The next question comes from Mattias Vadsten from SEB. Please go ahead.
Yes. Hi, my first one would be if you could share a few more words on APAC. I mean, growing orders 17% organic, quite strong in all segments. So maybe a few general words, and maybe also what is happening around ECMO in China, please. That's the first one.
Yeah, thanks for the question. I think that we, we've had some good traction when it comes to Surgical Workflows, some larger projects in Asia-Pacific. I think that's the only thing I really wanna single out. There's nothing else that kind of stands out. We are overall positive about the market opportunities in Asia-Pacific going forward, including China. I think if you look at the demand for healthcare is expected to be continued to be strong, and we have, in general, good market positions in China as well. But there's nothing in the quarter that I would single out particularly here.
Okay, good. And the ECMO is more or less business as usual in that region, in China?
Yeah, it depends what you mean with business as usual, but yes, I guess that's a way of expressing it.
Okay, good. And then, I think a quite strong contribution from acquisitions as it looks, at least here in the quarter. Any special movements that we should be aware of here, or if it's just a good performance? And then if you could comment on the margin profile for both acquired companies as well in this quarter.
Yeah, I think it's great to see the contribution from both Healthmark and from High Purity New England. So strong growth from both of them, and trading a little bit better than we expected when we acquired them. But again, nothing, I mean, they're strong companies. I mean, Healthmark is obviously a much more mature, more established company with many more customers. High Purity New England is reliant on fewer customers, but doing really well with those right now. So overall, good solid development since we acquired them last year. So it's more or less three quarters under our belt now, and encouraging performance thus far.
Okay, and then the last one for me. For full year margin expectations, I think you stand at some 12.7% here, EBITDA rolling 12%. If you could share any thoughts on whether you are set to expand margins in the second half to move this up a little bit further for the full year? That's my last one. Thanks.
Thanks. So we don't give guidance on the margin for the full year. We have activities to address the cost base. That is what we can share. And we are, as you know, very exposed to the product mix that we see, which is in the second quarter, highly positive, but that is different structurally profile at the second half of the year, as you are well aware. That is how we can comment on the margin.
Okay, thank you very much.
Thank you.
The next question comes from Oliver Reinberg from Kepler Cheuvreux. Please go ahead.
Oh, yeah, good morning. Thanks for taking my question. I mean, I want to come back in the first question on the strong performance in ACT, and obviously, you called out the kind of large contribution from ECMOs and all the cardiac assist. So I'm just wondering, is there any kind of color in terms of, is there any kind of unusual support in there? I mean, you talked about that there's no pull forward effect. In theory, I guess one can imagine that, some clients order quickly before there's any kind of potential restrictions from the kind of legal department. So can you just talk around that factor? And also, has there been a kind of a major improvement in the order backlog that you had for cardiac assist? That would be question number one, please.
Yeah. No, as I said on the first question here, I think that is one theory, but it's not something that we are aware of. I think the only thing that has changed is that we've had a difficulty to supply in parts of the offering for cardiopulmonary, and we've been able to improve the capacity and the supply situation there. So that's a positive, and I think we will be able to sustainably serve our customers better with this. But whether there is a pull forward effect, well, because our customers expect some restrictions going forward, we have no evidence of that at all.
I mean, if we saw that, we would be informed about it, but we don't see that right now.
Okay. I guess on Cardiac Assist, the kind of order backlog in the Q1 call, you talked about that this is the kind of couple of months. Can you just give any kind of color, how significant this order backlog still is for pump space?
Yeah. We have still quite a number of balloon pumps that are waiting to be shipped. We have a small decrease month by month, quarter by quarter, but but still quite a few pumps to ship. But no material change. I think small steps in the right direction, but no material change from previous quarters.
Okay, thank you. Second question would just be on the orders in ACT Europe. These actually look quite strong. I think you had 18% growth in the second quarter, 12% in the first half. I guess there was obviously some kind of support from unwinding comps, but on back also that you still have the kind of CE mark issue for Cardiac Assist. Can you just provide any kind of color what was driving these orders in Europe and for APAC for ACT, please?
Uh-
Yeah, we can say that of what you mentioned, we had, of course, an effect last year also on the order intake in quarter two, where we had different, limitations to our ability to, to deliver, so that impacted. We, also have with now with the distribution agreement that we have for stents, we have a slightly different ordering pattern, bulk orders rather than, sort of recurring orders for, for that, product type. But overall, we, we see good, activity, with our customers in the market, and that is what we also see in the order intake.
Okay, perfect. Last question for me, just in life sciences, I think you talked about a better demand, in terms of orders for sterile transfer. I mean, do you see this as a kind of turning point and any additional color you can provide in bioprocess, please?
Yeah. I think when it comes to Sterile Transfer, it's encouraging to see the better book-to-bill ratio now. So hopefully, this is now very near the end of the destocking that's been going on for quite some time. Again, we're humble about this being our one data point, but I think it looks more promising. We have from our biggest existing customers, better order intake, and also from our new customers for Sterile Transfer, we have also strengthening order intake. So a good step in the right direction here for sure. And Bioprocessing, it's as I said, it seems to have bottomed out in most parts of the world, while China still is difficult for us.
Perfect. Thanks so much indeed.
Thank you.
The next question comes from Kristofer Liljeberg from Carnegie. Please go ahead.
Yeah, thank you. Three questions. First, coming back to the previous one on Life Science. Now, you have had four consecutive quarters with order growth. When do you expect this business segment to start grow again? Then I just wonder about the new packaging approval for ECMO in Europe or CE regions, the timing for that, and if you have any dialogue here around that. And then I wonder about when you had the capital markets update earlier this spring, you talked about more flattish margin development, I think, for this year, maybe also in 2025. At the same time now, we have seen a positive start to the year.
I think you said quality issue effect on earnings to be SEK 500 million, down from SEK 800 million last year, and you say that you still see no impact on customer behavior after the FDA letter. So is that comment still relevant, flat margin this year versus last year? Thank you.
Mm-hmm. Well, if we start with the life science growth, then it is, I think, encouraging to see the order intake continuing to be strong here. Sales is weak now because we have deliveries dictated by customers more weighted towards the second half of this year. So we do expect the situation when it comes to sales to gradually improve also for life science. But why don't you keep in mind that these are our large projects, rather long sales cycles, and our deliveries depend also on other suppliers and the overall project that the customers are running. So we're sometimes at the mercy of other people's plans in this part of the business.
When it comes to the newer packaging, we have submitted the applications for both HLS and PLS. We have a good dialogue with the notified body on this, but it's not in our hands to decide when this decision will happen. So it's a good dialogue, but I can't predict any date for reinstating the CE marks. When it comes to the capital markets update guidance, I'll just refer to what Agneta said earlier here, that we don't guide on this. It looks maybe a little bit more positive after this quarter, but it's too early to say.
We remain humble when it comes to the potential impact of the FDA letter to healthcare providers during the second half of the year. One theory is what's been stated by some of you here on the call, that we should see a quick effect of this. That may or may not be true. We just need to continue to evaluate this. We've factored in our base scenario, so to speak, in the guidance that we have for growth and what we stated at the capital markets update. I really cannot give any further color today on this.
Thank you. And just to follow up on Life Science, so what do you expect is that business to grow again in the second half of the year?
I didn't say exactly that. I said that we expect the better momentum sales-wise, because deliveries are more weighted now or phased into the second half of the year. But we don't give individual BA guidance here. So Life Science sales is factored into the 2%-5% growth that we have for the group.
Okay. That's fair. Thank you very much.
Thank you.
The next question comes from David Adlington from JPMorgan. Please go ahead.
Morning, everybody.
Morning.
Morning, everybody. I just wanted to focus again on ACT. So, I mean, the growth you've posted this quarter is the third best growth for a quarter for ACT, I think in your history, only beaten by Q3 and Q4 in 2020, where you had some fairly obvious tailwinds from COVID. I suppose, really, I'm trying to understand why in a normalized environment, why this has been your best ever growth quarter in ACT? It's not really very clear to me what what's been the real growth driver here. And then secondly, I just wondered why you didn't highlight Q2 was gonna be so strong, given the fact you had a capital markets event, you know, halfway through the quarter. There was no indication that Q2 was gonna be so strong.
I just wondered if anything changed post the Capital Markets Day? Thank you.
Yeah, when it comes to ACT, I mean, the largest explanatory factor is obviously the weak comp from Q2 last year, where we had a lot of challenges in both cardiopulmonary and Cardiac Assist. So, there's a comp difference effect here that is significant. Combined with this, we have, like I said, on one of the earlier questions here, that we have been able to improve supply. We have had many customers on allocation for a long time in when it comes to our ECMO therapy products. So that is a positive change as well, which is sometimes difficult to predict the timing of. So that's kind of the biggest explanatory factor.
Then we have strong performance when it comes to critical care as well. It remains to be seen whether this is an effect that we can count on also going forward. I think it's a little bit too early to pass verdict on that.
Can I just come back on a couple of things? Firstly, the comp was only down 5% last year, so yes, it's easy, but not doesn't really explain, you know, more than 20% growth this quarter in itself. And then secondly, just with respect to that comment around, you know, why not highlight Q2 was gonna be a strong quarter at the capital markets event?
Well, we never intended to talk about individual quarters during the capital markets update. Even if it's a strong quarter relative to last year, we don't see this as a particularly strong quarter. This is not a performance that we're happy with. I think that's important to underline also.
Okay, thanks.
Mm-hmm. Thank you, David.
There are no more questions at this time, so I hand the conference back to the speakers for any closing comments.
All right. Thank you very much. I think we've already summarized the second quarter of 2024, and appreciate everyone taking the time to listen in today. So, I think with that, we'll close, and I wish you a good rest of the day. Thank you very much.
Thanks, everyone.