Hello, welcome to Idun Industrier's conference call here for the first quarter of 2026. My name is Carl Korsheden, and I work as an equity research analyst here at DNB Carnegie, with a focus on these more acquisition-intensive companies such as Idun. I would just like to remind you that there is a chat function, so if you have any questions, please feel free to send them into the chat, and then I will read them out here to the management team in the room. With that said, I will leave over to you on the first quarter.
Thank you, welcome to the presentation of the first quarter 2026 results of Idun Industrier. I will start for those of you who are new to Idun with a very brief repetition of who we are. Idun is an industrial group of companies with net sales of about SEK 2.4 billion, with EBITDA around SEK 330 million. We consist of 20 group companies that we divide into manufacturing, which is about 60% of sales and profit, and service and maintenance, which is about 40% of sales and profit. Idun is primarily a Swedish and Nordic organization. All of our 20 group companies have their base in Sweden, three-quarters of sales is generated in Sweden.
More than 90% of sales is generated in the Nordic countries, and we have subsidiaries in all the Nordic and all the Baltic countries. A few words about Idun as investor, we look for market-leading companies, market-leading companies within manufacturing, industrial trading, and industrial services companies. If there is one thing to remember about our business model, it's that we really work actively with a pilot school. It is starting from that we prefer to invest in some 80%-85% of new companies, so we have lots of former owners on the board of directors and still operating in our companies, and we have co-ownership in all of our group companies in the management.
In total, more than 100 shareholders in the group, and in the management team, all of us are quite substantial owners in terms of how much money we have to invest in the company. For you as an external shareholder, there's a quite unique alignment of interest between you and all the way down to each individual group company in Idun. With that said, over to the first quarter results. It was a strong quarter for Idun, sales growing almost 16%, and EBITDA even a bit more, with plus 17% in the period. We had really good earnings per share, 30% up. Organically, sales and profit is growing in the quarter.
We had a solid cash flow. We made one acquisition of a new group company in the quarter in January, Mouldex Sweden, which provides services and spare parts to sawmills, particularly planes and mainly in Sweden. Our group company Stegaföretagen made two add-on acquisitions. Since the first investment in 2014, we have continuously made 2-4 investments per year up until now. EBITDA growth from 2020 up to 2025 has actually been 30% per year. This is not a pace we can guarantee to continue with. It will be faster in some periods and slower in others, but historically, profit growth has been quite strong.
We are not the fastest-growing compounder, so we are quite happy if we make those 2-4 acquisitions per year and growing sales and profit step by step. Here, we see sales per quarter, six years back, and to the right, you see the split between organic and acquired growth. It could be noted here that it's quite as a stable growth year-on-year, and we see some slight seasonality with typically the second and the fourth quarter being slightly stronger than the rest. But it's not so big differences. Then the same picture with EBITDA, rolling 12 months, and profit per quarter, step-by-step growing. It could be mentioned here on the split organic acquired, we also added the parent company cost.
Actually, they went down by SEK 1 million, contributed positively in the quarter. It's not that we are cutting costs in the mother company. It was the case that in Q1, we had some additional legal costs related to the central refinancing that we made end of March, that was around SEK 1 million. On the other hand, we are saving SEK 20 million annually on lower interest costs. This slide. It shows rolling 12 months sales, gross profit, EBITDA margin. The message here is stability. It is not like the margins are jumping up and down. You can see that in 2021, 2022, part of 2023, the growth was slightly faster.
We all know that the last years have been more tough in terms of the economic environment, but we keep growing slightly slower, but the margins are really stable. With that, over to you, Oskar.
Thanks, Henrik. Starting off with our business area manufacturing, we can see that both sales and EBITDA are increasing. Sales up by 15.8%, from SEK 366 million to SEK 424 million. For EBITDA, we went from SEK 52 million to SEK 64 million with improved margins. As mentioned in the CEO letter, Fredahl Rydéns, that deliver coffin and urns, had a strong performance in the quarter. Also our group company TURAB, hydropower turbines for hydropower plants, achieved improved results. This is also the first quarter where we had Trikåby, our acquisition from the fourth quarter 2025, contributing in the full quarter.
Can be mentioned for Trikåby, that they have a lower gross margin, but the EBITDA margin is better than the group in average. That helps us going forward. The other companies within manufacturing, they face some group companies face markets where the customers tend to remain cautious and continue to work on the market there. Our other business area, service and maintenance, also here, we see that net sales goes from SEK 203 million to SEK 235 million, improving 15.6%.
The EBITDA margin, it goes down a bit from Q1 2025. It's in the same level or almost in the same level as the year before, 2024, 14.2% compared to 14.4%. Last quarter was up on 16.4%. Last year was a strong quarter. Stegaföretagen, that has a lot of car washing, had good volumes throughout 2025, but also in the quarter, and with good gross margin and EBITDA margin. Hard comparison period. In the quarter, here in 2026, Ståthöga MA Teknik, maintenance for heavy industry here in Sweden, they started the year very strong.
Hopefully that can be seen as a sign of a better economic environment going ahead. We have also mentioned in previous reports, we have had some struggling with profits in Triton, still black figures. We can see that they continue to improve profitability, and we are glad to see. On the other hand, ILEMA air emission measurements and P&L Nordic, a competence tool system for industrial companies and also service program for practical upper secondary schools in Sweden, have met lower market demand mainly from the end users within pulp and paper industry.
They all the companies still achieve good profitability and are also well-placed to meet further demand going ahead. Looking at our cash conversion and net debt. Net debt increased by SEK 66 million in the quarter, mainly due to the acquisition made in the quarter, mainly with Mouldex Sweden AB mentioned by Henrik, and also that Stegaföretagen did two add-on acquisitions, JoMi System and Ecosign. Since we have done quite a few investments during the last 12 months, we have another SEK 40 million in EBITDA that is not in the books yet. Looking at the leverage at the moment, reported is 2.5.
Given that extra EBITDA into account, we will end up at around 2.2 or 2.3. We also lowered our interest cost by another SEK 7 million in the quarter. From a rolling 12 months period, we have went from SEK 75 million to SEK 55 million on an annual basis. We are also, we also have the opportunity to redeem our last outstanding bond here at the 30th of June this year. If nothing changes, we have the opportunity to save another SEK 8 million on an annual basis. Looking at cash conversion, rolling 12 months, we are at the level of 58%. We see going ahead that we should be able to go above the 60%.
Over the next 12 months, we see that we should be able to increase this level from this point. Just a reminder of our financial targets. We have EBITDA growth of 15%, where we see that 10% should come from acquisitions and 5% from organic growth. As mentioned in the first slide, looking at the 2020 to 2025, we have achieved 30%, we hope that we can continue to deliver on high levels, but at least this 15% over a period of time. Net debt under 3.5 x, at the moment we are reported at 2.5x.
Taking into account the new companies, we would go to SEK 2.2 or SEK 2.3. Dividend policy, this year we have a dividend of SEK 1.15 per share.
The last slide, let's repeat some key takeaways from the first quarter. Sales growth, 15.7%, EBITDA growth 16.8%, earnings per share growth 30%. We invested in one new group company and two smaller add-on acquisitions. A few words about the future, well, we all read the newspapers and listen to the news, there are obviously significant uncertainties in the macroeconomic environment, especially regarding what will happen in the Middle East. But, assuming that that will stabilize or calm down in the coming months, we have positive indications from the group companies, we believe that the development could be quite good. We also think that the operating margins should be able to increase slightly in 2026.
We have a strong group of companies. They all have strong market positions, high market shares, and we are convinced that they will be able to manage in the even in a more negative scenario. Finally, Idun still has a strong financial position, and we see good opportunities for more investments. Yes.
Thank you very much for that. Again, if you have any questions, feel free to type them in the chat. We've received a couple of them so far already, let's go through those. One question is on seasonality aspects in recently acquired entities. Are there any quarters that are particularly strong, particularly weak or so on?
No, not really. Trikåby, the biggest one, is not really a very seasonal company, Mouldex. The short answer is no, there should not be any additional seasonality effects.
Got it. Thanks. Yeah, you're also mentioning the report that competence development across the group companies, including within AI. Could you elaborate on how you approach AI implementation?
Well, I should say that we, the typical group company within Idun is not that big. It has maybe 40 to 50 employees, and it's a factory somewhere. We manage each company individually through the board of directors as, well, you know that's our business model, meaning that we don't have one way of implementing it. It's company by company, but it could be in the way I guess most of us use AI in preparing the doing market research, preparing documents, taking notes in meetings, and so on. But it's, we are sending people on training. We are having the discussions to make sure that AI is being more actively used, but it's not one way of doing it for Idun.
Okay. We are also looking with external cooperation to implement the AI within production to see efficiency within the production as well. Yeah.
Yeah.
I think a lot of us, both at eighth quarter, and in the group companies use it for office work and, Copilot, ChatGPT, Claude and so on to get better efficiency in everything we do.
Yes. Yeah, that's clear. Also have a question here on your comments in the report regarding M&A. You mentioned that you are in several promising dialogues regarding new investment opportunities, and if you could share any more detail on that, and potentially if that primarily refers to new platform acquisitions or if it's add-ons, and if it's in any particular, I guess, end market or category you're particularly active in at the moment?
No, it is both. It is both new platforms and add-on acquisitions. Well, no, I don't think I can be more specific than that. We, as you know, are, at Idun, looking quite broadly. It is manufacturing, for example, which is the biggest part of what we do. That's broad. I don't think it would be right to start specifying what kind of manufacturing, for example.
Yeah, that's fair enough.
As Henrik mentioned, we have two business areas, we do three things, manufacturing with own products, mainly, and then, industrial services, for industrial companies, and also industrial trade. Going ahead, we will see that we will continue to do acquisitions within these three areas.
Yes. Yeah, that's clear. Just on the organic growth in the quarter, quite strong. If we look at each of the business areas, could you give any indication how roughly that has developed per business area if we look at organic growth?
We can see a small trend shift. I would say that in 2022, I mean, business area manufacturing had a better EBITDA margin than service and maintenance. The last three years, service and maintenance have had a better EBITDA margin. Now, for the 1st quarter, we see that manufacturing has a slightly better EBITDA margin, but I will also say that it's a mix from the acquisitions made. Also, the last couple of acquisitions, I would say that they have a higher EBITDA margin than the rest of the group in average. That can also add something.
We have said internally that the business areas, they take turns in leading. Also, as Oskar says, it also individual companies. And we really see in especially during the last years, where the economy has been a bit more challenging, that it's, we benefit from the diversification that we do have. That the group companies are active in very different end customer markets.
Mm-hmm.
That's good for us. It's not like it's only construction or only a certain industry, but many.
Yeah, I see. On the, yeah, roughly 5% organic top line growth, is that, would you say, is primarily driven by service and maintenance this quarter, or is it more manufacturing, or is the split fairly even contributing to that overall 5% growth figure?
The sales come from both business area. The EBITDA would come more from manufacturing than service and maintenance.
Yeah, that's clear. Did you observe any, I guess, signs of hesitancy among your customers, if we speak more broadly basing, given, I guess, the macro backdrop? You mentioned the, I mean, conflict in Middle East in the report, for instance, and so on. Have you seen any signs of slowdown among your customers? Also, if you have seen any shifts in, I guess, organic momentum throughout the quarter? I.e., did it become better or worse at the latter part of the quarter compared to the initial thesis?
One specific industry where we have some exposure and where we've seen, well, some hesitance or tougher circumstances is the pulp and paper industry, where we have a couple of our group companies are delivering products and services to them. Here, we have observed, well, declining sales and they have laid off people. For example, P&L Nordic, we provide education and training systems and trainings for pulp and paper workers, and they have stopped these kind of trainings for the moment as a part of cost cutting measures. That could be one thing.
To the second part of your questions, we did see, for example, in Ståthöga MA Teknik that provides heavy maintenance to industrial companies, pulp and paper mills, but also steel mills, that March was strong. It's too soon to say that to make the conclusion that it's turning around. Still, it was stronger in the end of the quarter than in the beginning for this company.
Yeah. Well, that's encouraging. I have another question here on, even though you only own 49% of Stegaföretagen, could you say something about the potential in that business, both organically and through M&A?
We have Magnus, the CEO and the main owner, and Daniel, who's the CFO for the company, very good entrepreneurs and continue to build Stega, and they see a lot of investment opportunities going ahead. A strong pipeline also for Stegaföretagen.
Organically, I would say that, I mean, Stegaföretagen is a group of company in its own right, and active in different areas. The potential for organic growth differs from.
Mm-hmm
... from part to part in that group, in addition to the M&A opportunities that Oskar mentions.
Hmm.
There are opportunities in Stega, absolutely.
Yeah, that's clear. Yeah, maybe on Stega particularly when you talked a little bit about it now in the quarter at that may have hampered margins a little bit. I guess they were quite tough comps year-over-year given the weather and so on. Is that, yeah, is that something that also affected you throughout the remaining quarters of 2025? Are we still meeting sort of tough-ish comps there over the next few quarters, or is the situation more normalized?
Still, tough comps. I would say that one of the toughest one were here in Q1. Stegaföretagen delivered the solid results during the whole 2025. Strong co- comparison periods. That's correct.
Yeah. Do you believe, you can still achieve a similar high level, or is it, more of a, yeah, that was maybe a little bit extraordinary strong and now, maybe a little bit back to normalization, or how do we think about that?
We will see how many wash their cars and how frequent, during the year, and time will tell.
Yeah, fair enough. Fair enough. You've also have been talking a little bit, I guess, a couple of quarters ago about some cost savings initiatives, mainly, I guess, in the service and maintenance division. Is that something still currently ongoing, and can we expect anything more from that? On the ones you have already, I guess, taken, are you seeing any effect from those? Is there more to do there, do you think?
This has to be answered almost on a company by company basis. Yes, we have taken out some costs, and we will see that in 2026. We are already seeing it, actually. A number of employees have left in those group companies where it has been necessary, not for all of them. Going forward, I would say there are a few group companies, I should maybe not mention which ones, where some more people will leave. I hopefully think we have most of this actually behind us. Again, back to the uncertainties, it depends. I mean, if the Middle East crisis will grow worse and continue, this might of course change. Provided that this, i t will calm down, we have most of the cost savings actually behind us.
Yeah, that's clear. Yeah, I mean, you have obviously done quite a lot of acquisitions recently. Some of them, or at least Trikåby, are a little bit larger one. Can you say anything in terms of the multiples you've been paying for these more recent deals, and how if that stands out anyhow relative your history?
No. It's still within the history, as we say, between 5x to 8 x EBITDA, and all the three most recent investments or acquisitions have been within this range. Exactly where you are in that range depends on the size of the exact business and whether real estate facilities are included or not. No, we are still paying the same multiples.
Yeah. That's encouraging. Yeah, you mentioned you did two smaller, I guess, bolt-ons within Stega this quarter. Is it possible to give any magnitude or numbers there on sales or margins? How much can we expect from that?
Around SEK 30 million in sales each, and SEK 3 million of EBITDA each. We only take into account 50% of that. I would say for Idun Industrier, we add another sales of another SEK 30 million and EBITDA of SEK 3 million.
Yeah. Thanks. Yeah, maybe one last from my side. Also, if we look at these acquisitions conducted now coming into the group, have they been performing according to plan or exceeded or, yeah, coming worse than expected, or how have those developed?
I would say that it's a short period of time since for those three in November, December, and January. All three companies have come on board in a good way. They are performing according to plan, and we are real happy so far. But it's also too early to tell. I mean, in a year's time, we will know more. So far so good.
Yeah. Yeah. Encouraging. I think that was all the questions we had. Yeah, maybe if you want to wrap up the quarter, and then we can say goodbye for today.
No, a really good and strong quarter for Idun. We are happy. Thank you for listening, and have a nice Valborg.
Thank you. Bye.