Alternatively, you can ask a question via the Question tab above the slides. Your question will be addressed during the live Q&A session. You can type your questions at any time during the presentation via the Question tab above the slides. I would like to now pass the conference over to our host, Per Wallentin, CEO. Please go ahead when you're ready.
Hello, all. My name is Per Wallentin, I am the CEO of Knowit. We also have Marie Björklund here, our CFO, who will take us through some numbers later on. We can take the next slide with the highlights. We can take the next slide again. First, I would like to take you through some operational highlights during the first quarter. The trend that we pointed out in Q1 with longer sales cycles and clients remaining in wait-and-see mood has continued, even accelerated in Q2. This impacts our growth, of course, primarily our profitability and margins. Every percentage point on utilization have a large impact on revenues and results.
This means that we don't have a huge decline in utilization, but it impacts profits to a quite large extent. Our clients still demands digitalization projects and our competence, but we see longer lead times and that some customers' smaller budgets driven by the higher market insecurity. For us at Knowit, this means that we increase our sales focus even more, looking for new projects, but also that we have a very close dialogue with our existing clients and maintain good relations. We spend a lot more money on sales and less on recruitment. Furthermore, we look overall our internal efficiency, reducing costs where needed, and making sure that we optimize our organization. We still see challenges in utilization on more junior consultants as well as administrative roles, while the technical experts, software developers are still in demand.
As in Q1, we see good demand in cybersecurity, defense, and some other sectors. These are sectors where we have high competence and a strong position. We can take the next slide, please. We will now take a look at our business areas more in detail, starting with Solutions, our largest business area, reporting net sales of SEK 962 million for the quarter, corresponding to 5% decline, including acquired entities. The EBITDA margin was 5.2%. Margin decrease is following lower utilization, primarily in Norway and Sweden. Of course, we focus a lot on implementing measures to restore profitability levels, reducing costs, and becoming more efficient. We somehow noticed some stabilization towards the end of the quarter. Next slide, please.
Going over to our business area, Experience, reporting net sales of SEK 395 million in the quarter, a decrease around 2%, including acquired entities. The EBITDA margin was 5.1%. We have a stable revenue development in Denmark and Norway, but are challenged in Sweden, impacting the overall utilization rate. We have also here initiated work to reduce capacity and overhead costs in the quarter already. We have a strong focus on sales and have had that also, of course, in previous quarters, and this opens up for new opportunities even when the market is going down. We can take the next slide, please.
Going into our business area, Connectivity, reporting sales of SEK 267 million in the quarter, unchanged in existing business compared to last year. The margin was 7.2%. We meet challenges in sectors like automotive and see increased risk in telecom, while the defense industry remains strong. We have been successful in extending existing assignments, and we also see good inflow of new clients in this business area, despite that we have a more challenging market. And to highlight, our Polish business continues to develop well, thanks to a strong ability to adapt to market changes quickly. We can take the next slide, please.
Our business area, Insight, reporting sales of around SEK 236 million for the quarter, growing by 1%, including acquired entities. EBITDA margin was 7.6%. The challenge to utilize pure management consultants remains, but demand for cybersecurity and legal competence remains high. We also see good demand, as we have talked about before, in the defense and in the energy sector. We increase focus on sales a lot, and implement measures to reduce costs in this business area as well. We can take the next slide, please. Q2 in figures, and now I would like to turn over to you, Marie, who will take you through some financials in detail. Next slide, please.
Thank you, Per. Looking at the group as a whole, we delivered sales of approximately SEK 1.8 billion, compared to SEK 1.6 billion recorded for the same quarter in 2022. This contributes to a growth of 7% and -1.8% when comparing Knowit now and including the acquired units a year ago. Adjusted for FX effect, this decline was -2.5%. EBITDA, adjusted for acquisition and integration costs, which was for this year, minor, low, amounted to SEK 77 million for the quarter. Quite a large decrease compared to the same quarter last year. This leads to an adjusted EBITDA margin of 4.4% in the quarter. Last year, it was 8.5%, so here we also have a decrease.
As we already mentioned, this margin decrease is due to a slowdown in demand, causing lower utilization, affecting several markets and all business areas. We have increased our hourly rates, the negative growth of comparable figures is coming from our utilization. We see longer sales cycles and difficulties utilizing junior consultants in specific, but not exclusively. Challenges are biggest in Norway and in Sweden, which are also our biggest markets, and Sweden, with all four business areas present. The share of subcontractors is still high, not growing as a share of total revenue. If anything, this quarter has been a quarter of execution for Knowit, as we've had a very intense focus on sales, at the same time, of cost reductions to strengthen our resilience in a tougher market.
Cost reductions will be of other external costs, such as travels, conferences and events, but also staff costs. We expect to see effects during the fall. Next slide, please. In the first half of the year, we delivered sales of approximately SEK 3.7 billion, compared to SEK 3.3 billion recorded for the first six months of 2022. This contributes to a growth of 12% and 2% when comparing Knowit now and including the acquired units a year ago. Adjusted for FX effect, the growth was 1.5%. EBITDA, adjusted for acquisition and integration costs, amounted to SEK 275 million, a decrease compared to the same month last year. Our EBITDA margin was 7.4% in the first six months. Last year it was 10%.
We are, of course, very concerned with the margin development, and as I mentioned, we have initiated several actions to reduce costs and increase internal efficiency in combination with full focus on sales. As you can see, the figures for half year are better than the ones for the quarter, both concerning the growth and EBITDA margin. This stresses the fact that the effects of the slowdown and the challenges due to low utilization that we mentioned already in the first quarter, have accelerated into the second quarter. Again, I want to stress that we have full focus from our side on actions to protect our margin. Next slide, please. This slide shows the development over time and also on a rolling 12-month basis.
Our adjusted EBITDA for the latest 12 months is at SEK 549 million, and revenues at SEK 7.2 billion, at an EBITDA margin of 7.6%. As mentioned, all our energy towards breaking the trend of the margin. Next slide, please. This is an overview of our net debt development. We have SEK 700 million in used credit facility, and we have a total credit facility granted of a little more than SEK 1 billion, SEK 300 million due in 2026, and SEK 750 million due in 2027. Future considerations, amounting to SEK 90 million, with a decrease since last quarter, mainly because of the payment of Creuna and Asane earn-out, but also since some revaluation of future payments.
Leasing debts amount to SEK 592 million, an increase towards last year because of new leasing contracts in several places, for example, Oslo and Stockholm. The amount has a small decrease since last quarter because of amortization. This totals a net debt of around SEK 1 billion, divided with our EBITDA of 712 on a rolling 12-month basis, we are at the leverage of 1.4. This means that we still have a stable balance sheet and a good financial position. This means that we are well within our financial target, which is set not to exceed 2. Next slide, please.
We do have a solid platform and a strong position as a digitalization partner in the Nordic region, the share from the public sector have increased compared to last year, mainly driven by an increase in the defense sector, but also by acquisitions. In other parts of the public sector, we notice greater caution than previously, driven by the need not to drive inflation, hence, budget remains stable or decrease even though prices go up, impacting volumes. Even though we're not satisfied with the recent quarter's development, we see demand for our competence and a big need to continue digitalization in several sectors. Back to you, Per. Next slide, please.
Thank you, Marie. Well, to summarize before we open up for questions, we present a quarter where negative trends regarding demand have continued. This, of course, affects utilization rates. We focus to move consultants to sectors with higher demand, for example, defense, end-user, cybersecurity, et cetera. Of course, we also focus on sales and close dialogues with existing clients. In addition to that, we work to improve internal efficiency and to reduce costs. We expect that these actions to improve profitability will have effect in this fall and, of course, early next year. The market outlook for the coming year is uncertain, and the market visibility is low, but we have a strong position to continue delivering growth and profitability even in a market like this.
Now we will open up for questions.
Thank you. If you would like to ask a question, please press star followed by one on your telephone keypad now. To revoke your question, please press star followed by two. When preparing for your question, please ensure your phone is unmuted locally. Alternatively, if you have joined via the web, you can ask a question using the question tab above the slides. Our first question comes from Raymond Ke from Nordea. Please go ahead when you're ready.
Yeah. Hello, Per and Marie. Can you hear me?
Yes. Thank you.
Yes, we can.
Great. Okay, two questions from me. Could you first, perhaps, comment on the market development and project availability, throughout Q2, and if you perhaps see any changes in the trend towards the end of the quarter? Thank you.
Yes. We saw a decline market already in the end of Q1, and we, as you probably remember, we talked a little bit about that re-reporting Q1. This trend has accelerated in Q2 and especially in the beginning of Q2, but it's not an acceleration in the end of the quarter. It's a stabilization.
You also talk about focusing on generating sales. At the same time, you talk about better cost control, such as cutting back conference and spending and travel. It sounds to me like you might be cutting back on marketing activity that should be driving sales. Could you perhaps just concretize your plans to drive sales going forward for us?
Yes, a good question, we don't have that much marketing activities, and we never had. This position that we have in the market is a lot about close relationship with the customers and meetings. We don't have that much spending in marketing activities to cut down on from the beginning. It's more activities that we do decrease is connected to, of course, recruitment, and we have had also some marketing activities back in the days connected to that. Less recruiters, of course, and of course, slow down spendings connected to our internal work in different ways.
When we talk about sales, of course, we have dedicated sales people, and we try to increase the amount of those people and increase their focus. But in such challenging times that we have had now in the quarter and what we expect for our focus for the fall as well, is to increase sales among people that are in leader positions, but also connected to more senior consultants. So all over, it's a much bigger focus on sales. And this is unfortunately, also possible to do due to that we have now a higher or lower utilization among some of our consultants. So we have people available to sell.
We didn't have that, a lot last year or the years before. It's that focus that have shifted.
Okay, very clear. Thank you. I'll get back in line.
To remind you, if you have joined the call on the telephone line, you can register your question by pressing star followed by one on your telephone keypad. When preparing for your question, please ensure your line is unmuted locally. We have no further audio questions registered. I will now hand over to the management team to go ahead with the questions submitted via the web.
Thank you. We have a first couple of questions from Tom Guinchard at Pareto. First question, could you share the dynamics of the public sector business price versus volume or demand? Is pricing more difficult here compared to the private sector, Marie?
Well, we have been able to increase prices, and we can't really see that we have more challenges in the private sector. We've been able to raise prices beginning of this year, in the public sector, as we have many of our agreements are indexed. Overall, we haven't really had challenges yet in terms of pricing. Was there another part of that question?
No, I think you answered it.
Yeah. Then another question from Tom. I think this would be better suited for you, Per. On utilization, how has the trend developed throughout the quarter, worse towards the end? Your thoughts on Q3, are order books and project size, lengths covering the summer months, or are you finding new projects to maintain and improve utilization?
It was a little bit the same question as from Nordea, and we don't see a worsened situation in the end of the quarter. We saw that in the end of Q1, but now we are somewhat flattening it out. That is good because then we have something to a platform to work towards, to create profitability in this market. Of course, if you look at Q3, we have a lot of focus on sales, but my understanding connected to, I've been in this business for quite a few years, the sales cycles are quite long.
When there are hesitations connected to some customers, you won't get new deals in one day, rather, like in a couple of months. I think that we will have to bear in mind that sales cycles are quite long in this business.
Great. We have a question from William Balfour at Highclere Investors. Do you think you're losing market share?
No, I don't. If you compare to Q to last year, I think that we have gained market share.
Great. A question from Evan at [audio distortion] . Actually, three questions. First two, I think is best for you, Marie. Can you give some indications on how many percentage points the utilization rate declined this quarter? That's the first question. Second, what kind of covenants do you have on your debt? Any covenants tied to the net debt to EBITDA?
Well, we don't disclose the utilization rate, but what I can say is that each percentage unit means a lot for us. It has declined at least a couple of units this this quarter. The covenants, I'm not going to give you the details of a covenant. We have a couple of KPIs connected to our covenants. We are well within in target on those, and we have a headroom, so, there's nothing to worry on there.
Thank you. Third question from Evan for you, Per: Give some thoughts on your increased hiring efforts last year compared to the down cycle we are now seeing.
Yes, I suppose that you think about, for example, the Q3 2022, where we hired quite a few people. Back then, I think that we did have a really strong market, and we had a strong market in Q4, and at least in the beginning of Q1. I think it was the right thing to press on the pedal to recruit a lot of people in Q3 2022, as we had the information we had back then. Of course, maybe with the information that we now have in Q2 2023, it would have been good not to hire some of the more junior consultants back then. I think that it.
It's still a good thing that we did recruit a lot of people last year because a lot of those people are utilized right now. For example, if we look at the really good growth that we have had connected to ERP competency in Insight in Norway, where we did recruit a lot of people the last quarters, almost all of these people are utilized.
Okay, great. We have another question from William at Highclere Investors: What is the scale of headcount reductions needed to restore margins?
We don't disclose that either, but as Marie just mentioned, at least more than 1% of utilization, and you know that we are around 4,000 people. We are not talking about big programs to lay off programs. It's more taking care of the consultants that we see have a long-term inability to get utilized in each area or in each sector. It's connected to individuals, not to big programs.
Great. There is another question relating to the same subject from William. What is the current size of the bench?
We don't disclose that either.
I understand.
We are more... sorry.
No.
As we are more on... Yeah, we have a bigger amount of unutilized people. The size of the bench is bigger now than before, as we also mentioned, the bench is not huge, and some of the people in that bench is probably decisions that we have to take, that they are not able to get utilized within a couple of months, and some of them are probably possible to get out in new assignments. That's the agility and the work that we have to do, and that we have done, since this situations did occur in the end of Q1, beginning of Q2.
Great.
We have to bear in mind that we have lead times connected to that.
Yes, thanks. We have a couple of questions from Jesper Stugemo at Handelsbanken. First one, can you give some color on the actions regarding the internal efficiencies and the reduction of cost? How big do you anticipate it to be, and how much will it cost?
Well, we haven't communicated any figures here, but as I mentioned, cost that we can quite fast take care of and postpone is conference costs, travels, events, and then, of course, we also have the staff costs taking a little bit longer. On the cost side, we haven't communicated anything for the next quarters there either. But I do want to mention that this quarter, we had like a restructuring cost that wasn't substantial. We are quite conservative in adjusting our EBITDA, so we have not done that or mentioned this. I think that it was like SEK 1.5 million or something, so nothing unusual. I have no information about what will come this fall.
Great. Second question from Jesper I think maybe we touched upon, but let's repeat. How is the public sector developing, and do you see any increased competition here which could lead to lower prices?
Well, I can take that question as well. As, as we've said, we can see that the defense sector is increasing, but in other parts of the public sector, we've noticed a greater caution that is driven by the need not to drive inflation. Budgets remain stable or decrease, even though, as I said before, the prices is going up.
Okay, the last question for now, at least from Marco: Do you predict an increase of the employee number during the year, or will it continue to stabilize and slightly decrease?
Uh.
Um-
Our focus right now is... Yes. Sorry, Marie.
You take it, Per, and I'll come after it.
Our focus are, right now is not, of course, it's not growth, it's restoring profitability. We don't expect organic growth this year. We expect focus on margins in a lot of different ways that we talked about.
Just to add to that, our focus is to have the right capacity, and that means that we can reduce the capacity that where we don't think that there's a demand. It will not mean that we will stop the recruitment, because in some areas and some entities, we see that there is really high demand. We will have focus on recruiting people with the right competence and people that will go into assignments within very short from when they come to us.
We have no further questions from the written part, so I'll hand over to the operator.
All right. Thank you.
Thank you so much.
We also have no further questions on the phone lines.
Thank you so much, we wish you a nice day and a nice summer.
Thank you, and don't hesitate to call if you have additional questions. Thanks again.
Thank you.
This concludes today's call. Thank Thank you for joining. You may now disconnect your lines. Have a great day.