Thank you. I'd like to start by talking about a very strong first quarter we've seen. We've seen a surge in order intake, bringing us up to 979 million SEK, which represents an increase of 74% compared to prior year. If we can look at our sales in US dollars, which is the predominant trading currency we use, we are at 100% increase from prior year. If we look at comparable units, the increase in US dollars is 62%. Part of the order increase we are seeing, or a non-insignificant part of the order increases in the quarter are related to sort of orders with longer lead times. The acquisition of Prevent took place in February, was announced on February 22nd. That has proceeded according to plan, has been well received by customers.
Our sales in the quarter grew by 47% in USD and 28% in SEK, our EBITDA margin continued to improve and has reached 9.5% in the quarter. If we move to the next page to give some background around NCAB. As a company, we are dealing with printed circuit boards, our mission is to provide printed circuit boards for demanding customers, deliver them on time with zero defects, produced sustainably at the lowest total cost. That means that we're normally not maybe the cheapest in terms of pricing, but we provide superior value for our customers. Our aim is to be the number one PCB producer wherever we are, and we are already in a position to be the global number one in our field. In total, now we are around close to 500 employees in our company. If we move to the next page.
Printed circuit boards, again, our product is the product to the left, which is the basis for any kind of electronic products upon which components are mounted to form a printed circuit board assembly, which then goes into any form of intelligent or electronic product. Moving to the next page, you can see that our focus in this industry, the global market for printed circuit boards, is a $65 billion market. We are focusing on the market, which is characterized as being high-mix, low-volume, and also demanding customers. This part of the market, we anticipate, represents roughly a third of the global printed circuit board market. Some of the characteristics for this market is that these products have generally a higher product value in relationship to the cost of the printed circuit board.
Also, these customers have very high-quality demands on their products, and the printed circuit board is a key component to secure quality in the final product. That results in a lower price pressure on the printed circuit board itself, and many of these customers also are of a size where they have challenges to buy from the leading factories themselves. Here we can provide the opportunity of aggregating the needs of many customers and give those customers access to the leading factories and the best technologies available. Our company, if we are moving to the next page, was established in 1993, and it has been a continuous journey of profitable growth. It started out in Sweden, expanding into the other Scandinavian countries and then further into Europe and the world.
We look upon our growth since 2008, we've had a compound growth rate of more than 15% annually, that has been predominantly organic, but also with additions of acquisitions. In the recent years, in 2020, we made two major acquisitions of Flatfield in the Netherlands and Bare Board Group in the U.S. As earlier communicated, we made the acquisition of Prevent in Italy in February of this year. Anders, over to you.
Okay. Hello, everyone. Next page there, we can see some info about the Prevent PCB acquisition we made in February. It was, of course, a good start for us to make another acquisition. Italy has been a focus market for us, and we think Italy is a very interesting market going forward. A lot of smaller PCB factories that have some financial problems, and we think that our niche will grow in Italy. This is very good for us to take a broader marketplace in Italy. The company we acquired had a revenue of roughly to €20 million and with good profitability.
Far, the customer reactions have been very positive, and I think also we have done great work with integration and all the people are very happy to work with us, and we see a good alignment with the team in Prevent and with our own team in Piacenza, which is about one hour away from the other office. That feels very good. Looking further on the next page, as you know, acquisition is an important tool for our growth going forward. During 2020, we have been looking into mainly Europe and U.S.A. to find more acquisition opportunities. We have identified about 120 companies that could be suitable for us. I mean, the market consists of very many small companies, typically started when a factory went bust maybe 10, 15, 20 years ago, and they grew to a certain size.
The market is fragmented with many small players. We are looking for companies in the high-mix, low-volume segment. They should be profitable. They should have the right customers. It's important, of course, for us to find companies that suit the NCAB model and where you're working. On the short list, out of these 120 companies, we have identified 30 companies, which we are now in progress of contacting and setting up meetings with. We are in the discussion with a number of those companies. Of course, it always takes more or less long time.
Anyway, it's good to see that we are in progress and have a lot of discussions. We can also say that the COVID pandemic have had a great impact on the possibilities for further acquisitions because many of the smaller companies without presence in China have had severe problems getting a relationship with the factories, and they don't have the same priority. I think here we can see that our presence in China is really useful and that gives us an opportunity in those cases. On next slide, we give you a small example of how we do with integration because I think we, compared to many other companies, work a little bit differently. We try to form the acquired companies into an NCAB company that might normally take 12- 18 months. We focus very quickly on changing the brand to NCAB Group.
Then, of course, main focus the first maybe 100 days is focus on customers and employees. It's important that we meet the customers in the acquired companies so that we can explain what we could add for benefits for them and so on. Typically, we can add a lot of benefits because we have our strong position in China and so on, and they can still keep the relationship with the salespeople they have in acquired companies. Of course, we need to take care of the employees in the acquired companies because the people are the most important assets. We do a lot of work with that. After that, we focus on operations, how to implement the factory in our team in China, how to work with sustainability in a good way in both companies. We look into IT tools.
We try to learn the best from the acquired companies and also merge into our IT systems. Of course, we try to find some benefit of scales from banking contacts, insurances, et cetera. After typically one and a half year, everyone should be fully NCAB office. That's the plan. If we then summarize in numbers the first quarter for us, we can see that our net sales amounted to 617 million SEK, so an increase of 28% versus last year. In dollars, the increase goes then to $74 million, an increase of 47%. Our EBITDA number to SEK 58.4, and up an increase of 54% versus prior year, and an EBITDA margin of 9.5%, which is an increase of 1.7 basis points.
If we look upon our different regions on the next page, I think that is also very positive that the growth we are seeing is something that is not just one special region or a few regions, but in fact, we're seeing organic growth in all of our four regions. Of course, we see the growth in Europe and North America further being boosted by the acquisitions that have happened in the last year. We have also seen the margins which we'll come into more detail where we have Nordics and East continuing to perform at a very good level. We're also seeing clear improvements in Europe and North America. Ken? Coming back to the growth, as you can see on the next slide, we have a robust, solid growth.
We see that gross margin is a little bit slightly lower than before, but that's mainly due to our acquired companies that have been on a lower EBITDA margin. If we compare the same comparable units, we should have been on 31.4%, so it's little bit down compared to 2019, you could say, for the comparable companies. Anyway, we continue to deliver good added value. Next page, we see that we have, as Peter said, had a fantastic growth in sales, 47% in US dollar and 28% in USD, and also for comparable companies in USD, 18%. It's good to see that it's taking over in most segments. Of course, the order intake is the really positive thing with this, was 100% in USD and 74% in SEK.
We have to remember, of course, what Peter said, that some of these orders are for a bit long-term deliveries because customers are placing orders more in advance than they have done before. Yeah, strong quarter in that way. On the EBITDA side, on the next page, we also see a solid development where we increased to SEK 58.4 million and an EBITDA margin of 9.5%. If we then exclude the transaction cost for Prevent PCB, we reported SEK 60.6 or EBITDA margin of 9.8%. That should be compared to 2020 of 9.0% because we had some transaction costs for the Flatfield acquisitions, to be honest. Earnings per share was a little bit lower, SEK 21 versus SEK 20, and the main reason is that we had roughly SEK 15 million in exchange rate gains in the first quarter of 2020.
That is the main reason why we have a lower earnings per share. Going into the segments on next page, Nordic. We can see that the Nordic have had a little bit slower start or slower recovery the rest of Europe. Still, we show a growth with 12% in revenue. Measured in SEK, it's a little bit down 3%. Anyway, it's good to see that order intake is ticking up. We increased by 46% in USD and 27% in SEK. This is in most areas in Nordic countries, but mainly driven from Norway, where we see a big boost in electrical vehicle chargers. That's really booming in that market. EBITDA slightly down compared to a strong 2020.
Still we are on our normal level around 40%-50%, so still rather stable. If we then go to Europe, it's the segment where we see the most growth, and we see very strong recovery in all our markets. Based on numbers, of course, Germany, Netherlands, and U.K. have shown the strongest upturn. We can see almost all markets in Europe is growing extremely well. We have to remember that the corona impact was very limited first quarter last year. We saw huge impact in second quarter, but first quarter 2020 was still rather strong. We can see that the orders have increased by 148% in U.S. dollar, and even for comparable units, it's close to 90% increase. We see that in new customers, we see that in customers, of course, placing order for longer deliveries, but a lot of new part numbers.
It's a solid, robust recovery in the European market. That's really great. We also see the good benefit from the Flatfield acquisition. The trend has been really positive and have shown a good growth. We also see that order intake in Prevent PCB has developed very strongly during the time we have had the company. This also reflects in the EBITDA, which more or less has doubled compared to last year. We increased to SEK 23.5 million, corresponding from an EBITDA margin of 8.2. We see a strong recovery in Europe, which is good. North America, also here we can see a good growth, mainly driven by the acquisition of Bare Board Group. We see that orders are increasing 19% for excluding Bare Board Group, and revenue was up 6% excluding Bare Board Group.
EBITDA also went up to 8.1%, and we can see more and more that we have some synergies from the acquisition of Bare Board Group, and we can see that we can align the business in a better way. We are very happy for that as well. Finally, segment East. Also here we see a positive development. Order intake increased 66%, and net sales 26%. Here on the other side, we can say that the corona pandemic affected the China business rather negative in first quarter 2020. Here we do have some positive impact with comparison with 2020. EBITDA also went back to normal level. I think also here comparison with 2020 were affected by the corona situation. The line about 12% is back on a normal level for East. It's also good to see in China that we're able to meet customers.
We had the first big exhibition in Shanghai around a couple of weeks ago. There's very positive drive in the Chinese market. Okay, go to the next page then. Look at some KPIs. Return on equity, 22% versus 36 last year, mainly driven by the share issue we made in April 2020. Net debt has come down also, of course, driven by the share issue. Still solvency very good. Net working capital, as you know, we're running a very asset light business model. We don't have much working capital, and we are just below 8% of last 12-month revenue. I think in that way, we're really efficient in how we use our capital. Still we have a strong cash, about SEK 458 million in available cash, so we are still geared up for further acquisitions in that way.
If we just look upon our medium-term financial targets, we can see that we have an average growth target of organic growth of 8%. In the quarter, in $, we are exceeding that target, although in SEK, we are below on the organic side. EBITDA target, we are exceeding the medium-term target. Our net debt versus EBITDA is considerably lower than the limit of two times. Regarding the dividend, we have proposed a dividend of five SEK per share for this year. If we then move to our strategic plan, we continue on execution of our strategic plan and our path to further increase market shares in Europe, USA, and the East. There are a lot of opportunities for us to grow in these markets. We also work on deepening our collaboration with existing customers.
The longer we work with customers, it enables us to provide greater value, and also over time, both growing sales, but also increase our margins. To this, there's also the opportunity of further expanding geographically outside markets where we're already present or potentially opening up new regions in larger markets like the U.S., as an example. On top of this, as Anders mentioned, the PCB market is extremely fragmented, which also means that there are opportunities for us to drive consolidations through acquisitions.
Thank you very much, Peter and Anders. We are open for questions. Please.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, if you have a question for the speakers, please press zero, one on your telephone keypad now. Our first question comes from Robert Redin from Carnegie. Please go ahead. Your line is now open.
Yeah. Hi. Congrats on a good result. I have a couple of questions. Maybe first on that extremely strong order intake, and you've been clear that it's more stretched out in time, the order book, but my question will still be if you expect to deliver all of that before year end, the order intake you had in Q1?
Yes. I think the order intake we've seen in Q1, yes, we anticipate to deliver that during the year. That is correct.
Yeah, the order book build SEK 300 million-SEK 400 million in Q1. It will be delivered. Okay, cool. Could you say something about the orders trending into the second quarter? Is there a backlash on the strong Q1 order intake, or is it continuing at some kind of similar level?
I would say that overall, the Q1, we started to see an order intake in Q4 of last year, which sort of strengthened during the year. I think in Q1 it has sort of been very strong and here in Q2, we're just entering Q2, and I'd say it's still a strong market.
Okay, perfect. Maybe Nordics, the result was a bit more sort of muted. Is there a mix there with maybe medtech related demand being down or what's driving that? I presume that the general industrial trend with high PMIs and so on in Sweden should be relevant for some of your customer groups. What are you seeing there?
I think profit-wise it is a little bit mixture. I think we have seen stronger growth in Norway and Denmark than we have seen in Sweden, and we have generally a little bit lower margin in those markets than we have in the Swedish market. That's part of the profit reduction. I think also you can see, I don't know if Swedish customer, we do have some projects that have been transferred to some other areas, and we have now some probably moved into Europe, which can affect also a little bit of the growth. In general, I think you will see a little bit slower recovery at our customers in order compared to Europe. As you can see anyway, the order intake in first quarter was back to be a strong level for Nordic as well.
I think it was just sort of a, we saw the little bit slower order intake start in 2020, and of course that will affect the revenue the first quarter.
Okay, right. You expect some kind of a pickup then in Q2 with the order intake in Q1 in Nordics?
Yeah, probably.
Yes.
I think during last year, Nordics was the region that held up the numbers the longest in the pandemic, whereas Southern Europe dropped very quickly in last year in Q2, where Sweden or Nordic countries actually performed quite well in quarter two last year. I think there the comparables will be different this year.
Okay. Right. Finally from me on the M&A pipeline. You have this slide with the 30 or so companies in the shortlist. Could you say something about the average size of those? In the three most recent acquisitions, they've been fairly large at SEK 200 million, SEK 300 million in tech sales. I guess the longer term trend is more for acquisitions averaging at SEK 100 million or SEK 150 million. Could you say something about the size?
Yeah, you are correct. I think the ones we have done now has been on the larger side. There might be a few left in the size of SEK 200 million-SEK 250 million. I think most of the 30 companies in the pipeline are in the range between SEK 50 million and SEK 150 million in revenue. It would typically be smaller companies.
All right. Perfect. Very helpful. Thanks so much. That's all my questions. Thanks.
Thank you. As another reminder, if you do wish to ask a question, please press zero one on your telephone keypad now. Okay, there appear to be no further questions. I return the conference to the speaker. No, sorry. We do have a follow-up question from Robert Redin. Please go ahead. Your line is now open.
Hi again. Just another question. Last quarter we talked about pricing with the communicated price hikes in the market. With the order intake so strong, is that continuing or have there been more price hikes announced?
Yes. I think as we said, we started to see price increases coming in quarter four of last year. That was partly also boosting the order intake as we were helping customers place longer term orders to avoid some of the price increases. Price increases have come into effect in several steps and are continuing to be a topic in discussion with our customers. We also see that the order intake has been not just purely related to avoiding a price increase, but also to secure supply of product going forward. The price increases are something that has been sort of continuing throughout quarter one. You can see that we got a little boost in the order intake during fourth quarter or until end of January because then many customers placed order before the price increases.
After Chinese New Year, you can say that the price increases have been in full effect. The orders we have received in February, March are with the new higher prices. Of course, we will not see the effect on that on the gross profit or gross margin until probably Q3 this year because we will deliver orders placed before the price increases during second quarter. Of course, the prices will going forward also support the growth a little bit.
Right. Okay, perfect. Thanks so much. That's also very helpful. Thanks.
Thank you. As there appear to be no further questions, I'll return the conference to the speakers for any closing remarks.
Okay, thank you very much. I just want to remind you that our next quarterly report, a half year report, is due on the 22nd of July. Let's see and hear you again then. Thank you very much.
Thank you.