Let's change that now, and thank you very much, everyone, for joining this. Participating from NIBE today is CEO Gerteric Lindquist, CFO Hans Backman, and the Head of Corporate Communication and IR, Fredrik Erlandsson . My name is Johan Sjöberg, and I'm the NIBE analyst at Kepler Cheuvreux. The format of the call is a short introduction by Mr. Lindquist, followed by the opportunity for all of us to ask questions. If you have a question, please raise your hand or write it directly in the chat. If you have a question that you want to be read anonymously, please send me that question to the same email address as you used when you signed up for this call. Before we start, I want to thank NIBE also for hosting these quarterly calls.
Also, this certainly increased transparency in the market and definitely a good way for us to sort of get our head around this. With those words, I leave the floor open to you, Gerteric. Please go ahead.
Thank you very much. I will start by reiterating a few things from the conference call we had like two and a half weeks ago. As we said, we see some signs of recovery in the market that is still cautious. I am sure that is pretty much what everyone sees because the world is not so certain anymore. Of course, we have the currency that is a little bit of an uphill battle for the Swedish companies, particularly, but by foremost, the political uncertainties are increasing by the week, I would say. We just have to combat that. That is more common than of the overall situation. On the other hand, we believe that for our products, the underlying demand is cautiously, you know, increasing. That goes for all of our three business segments. However, we are now in a situation where you have a more distinct seasonality.
We have to go back almost five years before we really can compare what's happening now compared to what happened then. Ever since we were launched in the stock market, there's been a fairly pronounced seasonality. When the COVID came about, and after that, the Russian invasion of Ukraine, of course, the market was a little bit distorted in a way. In a good way, you can say, sadly enough. The market also went down very rapidly, 2024. We see now when the inventories are coming back to more acceptable levels, that the demand from the end users out there, they are more represented at the manufacturers' levels.
There's been a little bit of a hide-and-seek situation for five or six quarters where there's been a diminishing amount of products, of course, out in the distribution chain, whereas the manufacturers haven't really felt that due to the overstocking. As the weeks and months go by, we feel that we have returned to a more, if we call it acceptable or normal situation. On top of that, of course, we activated an action program last year that we now see the benefits from. It was a painful and also sort of surprising event in our world that the market would go down so quickly. Nevertheless, we have experience to do that in a civilized way, as we usually call it. That was also come to an end, or that did come to an end at the end of last year.
Now we have the full benefits of the program. We've also been asking for lower interest rates. It's beyond our control, but we believe that consumers, disregarding what kind of consumers we talk about, they're waiting for lower interest rates. I guess we were spoiled to a point during a number of years. Now when you hear interest rates of 5% or 6%, like they were a year, year and a half ago, people got a little bit scared. They have come down, and we hope that they will continue to come down a little bit further. There are many guesses in the market regarding that. We feel, however, that to bring it down a little bit further would enhance demand among customers, not only in Sweden, but all over Europe.
We also are bold enough to say that we believe that the volume will go up, our revenues will go up, not dramatically. That is a reason why we also state that we will try to, or have an ambition to come back to operating margins within the historical levels for each respective business area. We understand that is a question mark in someone's minds, perhaps, that will that be for a quarter only, will that be for the full year? Of course, that is for the full year. It does not make the task easier, but I think that is a target we have internally. Ever since we set the budget, we have to come back within that interval. It is not an easy task, but we are very transparent with that.
I think that's pretty much a summary of what we conveyed two and a half weeks ago, Hans and I. If I missed anything, Hans, you can feel free to fill in.
Thank you, Erik. I think you gave a good picture of the situation and what we said back then. I am open for questions.
All right.
Okay, thank you very much. Yeah, we start to shoot. And I would like to sort of, I'm sure that there will be a lot of questions on the near term. Could I please ask everyone to mute, please? Okay, good. Perfect. I'm sure that will be a lot of questions about the Q2 or 2025 outlook. I would like to step, you know, take a step back here and look a little bit upon sort of the underlying business dynamics for NIBE. And obviously, I mean, we're now past two years with very turbulent up and down. I'm just looking at your own target of growing organically by 10% over business cycle annually. And you have had that target for quite some time.
My question for you, Gerteric, is that do you see any reasons, you know, or do you see anything during over these past two years, which sort of would make it more hard to achieve this growth or vice versa? Could you talk a little bit how you look at that? Has it changed your mentality here?
I mean, to answer that, I'm going to take a few minutes. Very briefly then, we certainly believe that if you start with Europe, definitely going to change from fossil fuels over to other means of heating and climatizing. That's inevitable. Of course, you have set downs, like you always have when you're on a path for a different target. You know, we've been through this in this country for some 20 years, between 1980 and 2000. Of course, we had setbacks. The target was always there. We firmly believe that it's going to be very old-fashioned and out of date to heat and climatize your home with gas and oil. When the prices are down, of course, if there aren't other stimulus, you might be tempted to buy another one. I talk about the oil burning boiler or gas burning boiler.
We are very convinced that it's here to change, just like the automotive industry is here to change over. That won't take two or three years. There will be a period of a number of years before we are through. We see all signs, and we just also know the difficulties, of course, for European companies keeping up competitiveness. That doesn't mean that we shouldn't be in that market. That's exactly how we feel. Electricity, talking about heating element, of course, it's hard to beat. That's a projection given 75 years ago. It is very difficult to beat electricity as a form of heating or measuring, what have you. In that sense, we haven't changed our target whatsoever.
On the stove side, it becomes even more important to have a secondary source when you become more dependent on electricity because you have an outage every once in a while. Of course, that also comes with a big portion of pressure. As a matter of fact, actually, yesterday, we had a power outage in Markaryd, not long enough to light a fire. We were out of electricity for two hours when a thunderstorm came in. If that answers your question, I do not know, Johan, but that was an attempt anyway.
Yeah, no, that's fine. I understand it's a complicated question. You mentioned Europe, and of course, we also need to look over the Atlantic and look at the U.S. market also and talk a little bit about that, especially given the new politicians in the White House here. You've had experience from it for years. What happened during those four years, would you say? Could you talk a little bit about what you foresee over the next four? I understand it's a very, very difficult question to answer, but what is sort of your base case scenario for the U.S. Climate Solutions business?
I mean, there have been two issues ever since the administration was changed, as customs, of course, and also the IRA program, whether that will continue or not. When it comes to the manufacturing itself, the majority of our manufacturing on the Climate Solutions side, that is done in the U.S. In that sense, we totally meet the requirements that are up for grabs now. When it comes to the subsidies that were put in position by Mr. Obama already in 2008, and then they were discontinued for a year when Mr. Trump came in, and then they were negotiated back retrospectively.
In 2016 and 2020, they were still in existence.
Do I hear something else, or?
No, I just muted someone. You should be fine.
Okay. Now there's, of course, a discussion again that the subsidies will be terminated. That's again up for discussion, just like it was before. I think that there are very, should I say, active negotiations going on right now, how to preserve or continue the program, because there's always a political balance. Just like the previous period between 2016 and 2020, of course, the utilities were very supportive of changing over. We foresee that even if the federal assistance would be diminished or totally taken away, there'll be other, should I say, assistance from, again, the states themselves or the grid providers. I mean, we just have to wait and see what's going to happen because it's so difficult to predict from day to day and from week to week. We have to one bridge at a time.
I don't think we can be more precise than that.
No, I mean, that's fine. Before we take questions, and please raise your hand if you have one, I would like to just hear your thoughts on, because I get a lot of questions regarding overcapacity, especially in Europe. Your own program, investment program, is coming to an end. If I go back a few years and look at press releases from all different sort of producer manufacturers, there were, you know, it was swamped basically with press releases saying that we're going to double capacity and triple capacity. What is your feeling in terms of capacity? How much has actually come to the European market? What impact has this had, would you say? Ultimately, the question has to do with around prices. You've been very firm that you have not lowered your prices. What about competitors?
Have they lowered prices and you yourself, i.e., lost volumes? Or could you talk a little bit about that, please?
It is very difficult to look into what other manufacturers have done or colleagues or competitors, whatever you call it. The only thing we can say is that what we promised in 2020, we have accomplished. We have actually taken a lot of actions and steps towards a bigger capacity. How much all the others have done, we do not really know. I think one comment to make is that we were all embarrassed that the industry as such was very embarrassed when we could not deliver properly. Now I am talking about 2021, 2022, and partly at the beginning of 2023. It was like two or two and a half years where the demand was far or by far exceeding the possibilities to deliver. I am a little bit suspicious about us as an industry.
I thought we wanted to promise the market that, don't you worry, we'll help you. We know demand is there. We're going to invest. Don't think for a second that we will be left behind. Everyone is investing, and we are doing the same. I think it was a little bit a race saying that we are also in that race. That's as far as I can answer that question because I don't know the others' fulfillments. When it comes to pricing, again, we like to reiterate, of course, that we have different specifications of our product. You know, we have what we call the top range, and we also have one or two lower specified ranges. When the consumers have a tighter situation with money, of course, they tend to buy lesser expensive products.
That is the same thing with heat pumps or the same thing with stoves. Of course, when you buy a fully loaded stove, that is one price. When you buy an insert in an already existing open fireplace, it is a totally different price. We see that when times are tougher, like when the rates are up or interest rates are up, there is a trend that you buy lesser or less expensive products. When it comes to new construction, there is a little bit of a different story. There you invest for something that has to meet specifications like building codes and things like that. We are stubborn, you can say, that we, well, you cannot really reduce a price on a highly specified product. You have to have a product that is lesser specified.
I mean, anyone that's looking for a product with our brands, of course, they know that we have different categories of products. I don't know whether I answered your question, but I try.
Yeah, absolutely. What I'm trying to sort of get a feeling for is if you compare your own prices with your competitors' prices, have you heard anything from the distributor channels that you see other producers lowering their prices, or are they also maintaining your sort of strict underlying price stability, you can say?
I think that now, again, I'm reasoning rather than interviewing one of our competitors. I think that let's assume that we all have invested to a large extent or fully. Of course, we all sit there with, you say, a capacity that's higher than today's demand with depreciation and all that. I think that to lower prices, particularly on high-value assortment, that would not rhyme so well with having a decent payback. From that perspective, I think it's better that if everyone had invested fully, because I think that then they would try to defend that little fan as good as I possibly could. Now I'm theorizing. I mean, I don't really know. Of course, we are not living in a bubble.
Of course, we're out there every day in all the different countries sensing, trying our utmost to convince customers with what we have, just like the other ones are doing. I mean, that's a very competitive and free market.
If I just may add here, because you've already said it, I would just like to reiterate that we have a number of entry-level products, so to speak, in the assortment. Sometimes I get the feeling that some perceive us as being at the very, very top range of the machines out there, so to speak. We do supply the market with high-quality products, that's for sure. We also have entry-level models, not that they are cheaper and use less quality products, so to speak, but they have a lower spec, which makes it possible for people to enter into the market with our heat pumps at different levels.
It's interesting that you mention that, Hans, because just before we had this call here, something flashed up on my telephone regarding automotive sales, if it was in Europe or Sweden, perhaps it was here. I saw there that the, I'm not so familiar with the models, but something X60 of Volvo went down 5% versus the X40, some other letters as well. I'm not so familiar. They went up some 25% or 30%. I think that's an illustration of consumers being more cautious, still needing a car, but not necessarily buying a car that is as expensive as that '60 model that they refer to. I think that our model should be viewed the same thing. Thank you, Hans, for assisting me there. I think that was just an example brought to our attention an hour ago here.
We got one question here from Sebastian, who writes on the chat here. He was referring to your earlier comment about market returning to normal with that also normal seasonality. His question is, what is the visibility yet to get to a second quarter volumes in second quarter above Q1 and also the visibility for this also into Q3, that underlying in Q3 should be above Q2 then?
The delivery performance now from manufacturers has been pretty good the last quarters. Of course, the visibility is very, very short. It is a few weeks. It is not like customers or wholesalers are putting in orders months and months ahead because everyone knows that we are capable as an industry to deliver. The only industry really that projects on the longer term is the prefab house industry. They, of course, have to have very accurate deliveries since they know pretty much that the number of houses they produce are already sold, and they have to have the proper equipment up on their assembly lines. Visibility is very, very low, if I call it that, or it is not that many weeks. When we talk about seasonality, it is more a traditional pattern that we have seen, as you have seen over the years. That is the one we are returning to.
It is funny, or funny strange rather, that even though we have acquired so many companies in so many different countries, in even different continents, it seems like that seasonality still sticks. Somehow it is almost like buildings or refurbishments have to be ready before the winter kicks in. That is one theory why the second half is typically stronger than the first half. It might sound like a very primitive theory, but that is one that we come up with anyway.
This visibility that we see now, if I just may add, that's also back to how it used to be. It's not that it's extra short right now. It has always been rather short when things have been more normal than they were during these very special years, so 2022, 2023, and so forth.
I know you don't comment upon order intake or order backlog, but would you say that given the order sort of order intake in Q1 and order backlog, whatever you want to call it here, has that been supported so far this year? That means that start of Q1 is on a weaker level than the exit of Q1?
That's a good question, Johan. You're a good interviewer.
Oh, thank you.
In general, we can say that when delivery times are very short, sales pretty much represent order intake. That's the visibility. If there's a change between January 2nd and March 31st, I think that we leave that, as you know. I appreciate the question, but we saw that coming.
Yep, cool. I remind you, if you have any questions, please raise your hand. Yeah, we have one question here.
Yeah, hi. It's Maxim from [DNB]. Thanks for your time, Erik, today. I have just two questions, if I may. The first one is regarding North America and the potential end of subsidies that could affect mainly your geothermal heat pumps, and it's good for your mix. Could you just give us a breakdown of your sales in Climate Solutions in North America between geothermal, air to water, and heat pumps? The second question I have is related to Europe and the overcapacity is more from a technological point of view. What makes a heat pump of NIBE stronger than an Asian one? If you could give us some insights on that. Thank you very much.
I think that the second one, perhaps Hans should take the first one, the North American subsidy deal. On the second one, I think that all products, I mean, there are not any faulty products delivered. I think that we can offer a variety of solutions and also the fact that we are used to hydronic systems and be developed by controllers based on those parameters that typically give a European manufacturer a pretty good hold of the market. We have the greatest respect for Asians coming in, and I think that they got a foothold when we could not deliver. Now it is a question that we are going to combat that when all the manufacturers on this continent are capable of producing and delivering.
I think that also the installers themselves, they like to work with a brand that's well recognized because they know that their reputation in the market is pretty much their future bread and butter. You have to demonstrate also that you have a service and backup. It's one thing selling a product. That, in a way, is the easy part. To back up your product when eventually service comes in and to have the parts and to have a stable organization behind that, that's the whole trick. I think that goes for the whole European heat pump industry. That was my immediate answer to your second question. Would you like to kick in on the North American ones, Hans, perhaps?
Yeah, sure. Sure, I can do that. I mean, we can give you some, I guess, rough numbers here since we do not spell this out in any detail in our annual report. It is so that through our Climate Solutions companies in the U.S., the majority of sales, roughly two-thirds even, goes to the commercial sector. Obviously, the remaining portion is for the residential part. Following on there to your question, if these tax credits would be taken away, what would the impact be, so to speak? It is in a way true that the majority of the sales to the residential sector benefits from these tax credits.
At the same time, what has been passed so far is only a bill in the House of Representatives, which combines wind, solar, and heat pumps because they've all been benefiting from the same tax credit, so to speak. Nothing has been passed in the House of Senate, and that will be done earliest in several weeks. That is where all the discussions are ongoing now to find a solution that is best for the industry. The heat pump industry that we're talking about is very U.S.-based as opposed to wind and PV panels. That's mostly from China these days. We have fairly high hopes that a sensible solution will be possible to land in this case. Secondly, also, there are very many local state initiatives driving this forward.
Erik mentioned it in the beginning, and also that from utility providers, heat pumps are of interest. Hopefully, the impact will be limited for us. Yeah.
Thank you. We have one question from Axel also, please.
Yeah, can you hear me?
Yes.
We hear you.
Great. Thank you very much for taking my questions. Good morning, everyone. I have three, if I may. The first question was about the stove division. When you read the Q1, I would say, presentation, you said that you delivered negative organic growth due to the low levels of new construction activity, but expect seasonality to pick up in the second half of the year. I just want to ask you this question because which trends are you currently looking at that gives you this comfort of going to the second half? Is it the construction indicators that you might look at, or is it discussions with installers? I know you mentioned seasonality, but is there something more, I would say, in terms of figures that we can track to have a bit more of a sense on this pickup in H2? That's my first question. Thank you.
I think that the construction will not, I mean, have a tremendous development other than a slight improvement if the interest will continue to come down. There is also a lag, of course, before you install a heat pump and, for that matter, stove. That is at the very last moment. Here we talk very much about the contacts with our installers and outlets. Here we have a very direct contact with the market. Of course, as always, an estimate. There is no in-between wholesalers or, I should not say filters, but we communicate directly with all those installers or outlets all over Europe. Of course, our sales fleet, they have a very good contact. That is their assumption that, of course, there was an overconsumption in 2021, 2022, and even 2020 when COVID kicked in.
There was emptying of inventories, and now we're back to a more seasonal pattern. Our dealers, they're fairly optimistic about the possibilities that we're going to return to a decent second half. Not saying that they're going to be a tremendously buoyant one, but what we've been seeing in 2024 was, of course, very, very weak. I don't know whether that answers your question.
Yes, yes, yes, it does. Okay, cool. Thank you very much. My second question was actually related to the one that was previously asked by, I think, Maxim, about the commercial exposure in Climate Solutions. You mentioned two-thirds of North America is actually exposed to commercial, which is quite good to know. Can we have a sense of what this number is for the entire group in Climate Solutions? Maybe a follow-up on this. How should we think about the margin profile of a commercial product versus a residential product? I think if we see a trend towards more commercial, maybe that would be good to have a good idea on what the profitability is versus, I would say, a more traditional residential product. Thank you.
We try, as a rule, to have the same margin disregarding what kind of products we're selling. We're coming back to the residential issue that we talked about, the price pressure and everything, and people buying or consumers leaning more towards less expensive products. It's very important that you have a price structure that still gives you a margin that's decent, even if the end product is priced for a different segment. It's the same thing on the commercial side. To enter the commercial side just to get volume doesn't make sense. We look at those companies in this segment that really are profitable, so flexible enough to really meet the demand in the market. We have one Swedish company here in the vicinity that year after year after year continues to make an extraordinarily good margin because of their flexibility and because of their ingenuity.
We rather look at those as companies of that nature rather than the companies pumping out billions and not necessarily making that much money. Our tradition is to keep up decent margin within any category of product we launch in the market because we know that if something is switching from one side to the other, you can't stand there and say, "Okay, now we lost." You have to make certain that whatever you sell has a decent margin. I think that's the best way I can answer your question.
Okay, okay. That makes sense. Would you say, and sorry for this question, it's just me being less familiar with the commercial side, but would you say there is less competitive pressure in commercial versus residential, or am I mistaken here?
It goes from time to time. I mean, we are, of course, much more residential, as you well know, in Europe than we are in North America due to acquisitions and due to our platform here in Markaryd in Sweden, which is very much residential until recently. That answers part of the question. Of course, it also depends on if you're always in for bigger jobs, then you're bound to have somewhat lower margin, just like in the construction industry. We've built all these factories here where we sit, laboratories, and the big construction companies, they were not in. They did not even bid. I will not mention any names. Whereas the ones that were mid-size, they built, and they have very decent results. I think that if you only go for the big volume, there is a danger that you lose out because it is so tough price competition.
It might be, of course, prestigious to participate. I think you have to deal with that very intelligently so you do not just fall down in a black hole selling products that you do not make any money on. We believe that the combination of what we have, having the knowledge from the heat pump side and combining that with the commercial ventilation and chillers, that makes us pretty unique. We have to get paid for that uniqueness, but of course, specifying and selling it intelligently.
Okay. Thank you very much.
We had one question from Sebastian. Please go ahead, sir.
Hi, good afternoon. Just two questions in relation to margin. During Q1 call, you mentioned the ambition to get on a full-year basis to 13% EBIT margin. Simple question, yes and no, please. Is it a commitment for the full year? If no, what will be the kind of sales level required to get those 13% EBIT margin? Thank you.
I think that when we say something in a report, it is a commitment, of course, but still indicating an ambition is, of course, saying that ambitions are always naturally wrapped in some uncertainty. In that sense, okay, it's a promise wrapped in uncertainties, but it's not something we've written in a report just to please someone. It's very much the internal targets that we have. I mean, it would be very strange for our employees and the management of each respective business area to read something in a quarterly report saying, "This is what the management of NIBE Industrier believe." Okay, we don't necessarily agree. Of course, it's only logical that what we convey is very much built on fundamentals in each respective business area. Having said that, doesn't mean it's easy.
Because it's hard, as President Kennedy would have said when he launched the Apollo project, not because it's easy, but because it's hard, you have to strive for coming back to where you were before. That's what we are hired for as management. Of course, it was a tremendously positive, should I say, number of years when we could sell as much as we possibly could produce. The contraction came, and we just had to get out of that. If volume isn't totally on our side, then we have to be very frugal with costs. Perhaps that's a very elaborate answer. An ambition is always wrapped in uncertainties, but it's not said or written to just please someone. It's there as a very firm commitment if everything goes as we plan.
Of course, there are uncertainties in the world, and I think that everyone would appreciate that.
All right.
Thank you. We have the next question from Anders Roslund. Please go ahead, Anders.
Here, maybe. Yeah, I had a question regarding the cost structure. You made some quite heavy investments now in the Climate Solutions area, and you talked about higher depreciations. How about the cost level with this new structure? Will you see any changed cost levels after those investments?
Of course, depreciation, but the running cost, of course, direct labor will go down. When you rationalize, you also try to trim that direct material. Those are processes, of course, that are not so easy to demonstrate quarter by quarter. Of course, when you erect new factories like we have done, you do that with the aim of reducing direct labor, making you less vulnerable to costs in labor, naturally. Particularly investing in countries where you have fairly high labor cost levels, it is of utmost importance that you build factories that are rational, but also attractive to get people to work in the factories. Those days are gone when you could hire people, and they would come in, and it looks like a coal mine. The factories that we have are very automated, robotized, and very, very clean and efficient. That is the idea.
Of course, they have also cost a lot of money. We believe that that's the only way for the future to attract new employees, to treat people decently by having interesting jobs, by having decent workplaces, but never ever forgetting that you have to work hard. You eight hours working a [holy]. That goes for every factory, that goes for every employee within NIBE. It starts with Hans and myself and Fredrik. We set the standards. If we don't come in here and people see that we've put in our hours and well beyond that, the atmosphere is gone. Management set the standard.
To be attractive, you have to have those rational workplaces because you don't have to have an academic degree to understand that a workplace will not exist tomorrow if it isn't rational, modern, and attractive, and where you also produce products for the future. That's how we reason.
Okay. Final question about the cost structure. Have you made any changes between countries, moving products or simplifying products or making an exchange of products between countries, or is it quite country-specific production platforms?
Of course. I mean, if you talk about synergies, that's where you have the synergies. You cannot—there's also a borderline there. You have to continue being unique with the product. You can use components, and you can use, if you call it, modules in a product that's produced centrally, but you still have to maintain some kind of uniqueness in a product. The answer is yes. We are exchanging components. We are exchanging modules with one another without deteriorating the, if I may call it, personality of each product or each brand in the market.
Is that something that is more intense, this development now when you've had a little bit weaker volumes, or is it the same pace over the years? This is an ongoing process.
I think that it's more time to reason. The last three or four years before 2024 kicked in, no one really had the adequate time to look at that. I think when things are returning to a, if I may call it, more acceptable level again, or when you have growth but not 20% or 30%, which in itself is wonderful to have for a year or two, but that's intolerable in the long run to make good quality and all that. I think that's something that, of course, will be manicured more and more now. Also, when the factories are, if not 100% equal, but they have the same standards, then we can put one model here or one module, whatever you call it, and they are more and more exchangeable. It also depends on how the companies are structured.
If the question is whether we're always going to maintain one original product for one original market, that is not true. Of course, we try our utmost to combine without losing, again, the personality of the product.
Okay. Thank you very much. That's all questions for me.
Thank you.
Thank you. If you have any questions, please shout out or raise your hand. I would like to—I have one question that has come on the chat. It has to do with the M&A. Before I ask that, I would like to ask you a little bit upon your sort of flexibility when it comes to your gearing and how much ammunition you can say you have for M&A. I mean, net debt to EBITDA 3.1 after Q1. Obviously, with this scenario of normalizing market, the margins will hopefully improve. So the EBITDA will improve over the coming quarters. How far would you say are you from sort of stepping back into M&A and making—and I'm not talking about small acquisition, but maybe slightly bigger medium-sized companies?
Perhaps Hans should fill in, but if I start, we've never given up on larger mid-size acquisition. It's just that we're also reasoning around prices and how well they fit in. You can't just say, "No, we have an EBITDA ratio of two and a half or two. Now we can start." It's like, if I may say, meeting people or doing anything in life. You always have to be alert when it comes to that. Even if you feel that perhaps that piece of pie is a little bit big, you have to be in there if it would fit you. Somehow, you will organize the financing if you have a trustworthy sort of relationship with your financing banks and things like that, which we have a very transparent and open discussion with.
We have demonstrated in the past, and Hans, you come back in a little while here, that we bring it down. Of course, this time when we acquired a Dutch company, it went up to three and a half or whatever it was, and now we are on our way down, just like it has done when we have acquired larger chunks of companies or, yeah, companies you can say over the years. We always bring it down. Of course, you have to digest to a certain point. Here again, having a good relationship with the financial side, when the very right partner comes up, you have to be ready and go ahead, even if you are stressing your finances a little bit because the chance will never come back. You fill in there, Hans.
If I just, yeah, fill in a little. I mean, there's a reason for us never having had a finance policy saying that we should never be above 2.5 or something like that. I mean, the reason is, of course, that we want to have this flexibility to grab for something interesting that comes up. And over the years, we have done exactly that, which has been transformational for us, almost starting with acquiring the Schulthess Group back in 2011 when we were up to about 3.8, and then amortizing it down, but making us a truly international company or European company. And then WaterFurnace, for example, in the U.S. back in 2014, we were also at 3.5 and bringing Climate for Life on board, which also is a phenomenal acquisition for us, be it that the market just afterwards took a deep dive.
Of course, it's taken a little bit longer to bring down the leverage, but it is on its way down. If something really interesting comes up, we have this standing allowance, so to speak, from the AGM to pay with our own shares as an option, which actually makes it possible for us to grab for some very large candidates if both want to dance, so to speak.
When you look at sort of the M&A market today and given what we've been through over the last two years, is there many things up for sale? Could you also talk a little bit upon—I think you mentioned the commercial segment in Europe as being an area which would be of interest for you to get a bigger pie of, a piece of the pile?
I think we've all seen that a number of North American and Asian players have been very eager to acquire companies in the commercial sector, again, suggesting that once you have a platform, it's considered a little bit easier to attack a market rather than starting from the very green zero, just like we reason ourselves when we get established. Of course, you've all seen the Fleck Group, and you're all seeing the Fissmans and so forth being acquired. I think that the Fleck Group, that was more recent, and I think that's a signal that not the financial difficulties are over, but it's a signal that if buyers are interested enough and sellers are interested enough, there's always an atmosphere for cutting deals. I think that's exactly the way we reason. Of course, we have our favorite companies out there.
Hans just mentioned that Climate for Life has been on our radar screen for many, many years. There are, of course, other companies as well that we would like to possibly bring on board. That possibility to also pay partly with shares is more along the lines when you have a true industrial alliance. We believe that could be or would be fairly interesting for European companies, particularly. Perhaps it is a lesser interest if you are based on other continents because you do not follow the European continent so closely.
Thank you. We have eight minutes left of this meeting. Could I please ask you just to ask one question so everyone can ask a question here? Sebastian, you had a follow-up question. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Just to get back on the seasonality, and maybe that's a naive question. I'm just trying to understand two things that you're saying that are to me a bit contrary. On one side, you say the business is back to seasonality. That would imply H2 stronger than H1. At the same time, you say there is uncertainty and there is basically no visibility because we're back to a few weeks visibility. So naive question, how are you sure that we get back to H2 being above H1, meaning that back to seasonality to state your comment?
I am here. I think it is more statistical evidence than anything that there is a seasonal pattern. It would be very strange to see that all of a sudden a 37- or a 27-year-old pattern, even going beyond that, would all of a sudden be broken unless something very dramatic would happen. When deliveries are okay from the industry, there is this seasonal pattern. Of course, there can always be an exception, just like the English grammar. The exception proves the rule. Statistically, it is overwhelming how the second half is not tremendously strong. It is stronger than the first half. Of course, I cannot or we cannot have a crystal ball saying, "As of today, we underwrite that it is so." We are trying to convey our experience in the market.
Understood. Thanks. Yeah.
Thank you.
Axel, please go ahead.
Yes. I had a follow-up question. Thank you very much. Could you please maybe elaborate a bit more on the climate solution volume uptick that you observed in April and May? I know you're not going to give us any quantitative guidance or even just a response, but perhaps a sense when you speak to the installers. I think you have been on trade shows and you have discussed with installers as well. Do you think we will see an uptick from Q1 in terms of volumes in Climate Solutions, or do you think because of seasonality, we should see maybe a sequentially lower Q2 and then potentially a recovering issue? Thank you.
I appreciate that question, Axel, but I think that this is, of course, sort of a repetition of the Q1. I think it would be unfair not informing all shareholders of what we are saying here today. We are very strict when it comes to indicating things for the coming months after March. I appreciate the question, but I think there we have to revert to that question when we present our report in August if we are not naughty.
Okay. Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Do we have any more questions for the gentlemen? No, it doesn't seem like it. I would then sort of like to round up this meeting, and then I could maybe continue to ask you a little bit upon, given just looking at the NIBE performance over the last 20 years and just been increasing every year in terms of organic growth and M&A, and now we have had this turbulence over the last couple of years here. I would like to hear your thoughts a little bit upon sort of lessons learned and also sort of have you changed your own business model due to this that has happened and sort of have you been paying more attention to certain details? Maybe slightly just to hear your thoughts a bit upon if you have changed your set of running the business.
I think that, of course, you modify or you just allow your strategies every year or you fine-tune them. Really, we haven't changed that much. We've had three downturns, you can say, in the last 30-35 years. We had a financial crisis here in Scandinavia or in the Nordic market in 1992-1993 prior to being listed. Of course, we very consequently reduced costs, took away quite a bit of people, unfortunately. That was perhaps the toughest situation for us because we were so dependent on Sweden. Our margin at that time was, should I say, 5% operating margin. Then we started to climb again, and we launched our company on the stock exchange in 1997. It took until 2007 when Lehman Brothers came about. There we smelled the year before that something was going to happen.
We again put in an action program. The market at that time thought that we were doing something extraordinary. We had made a mistake. Whereas afterwards, 2008, perhaps we are applauding ourselves now. I apologize for that. Everyone came to their feet and said, "Okay, now we have to bring down costs." 2008 was a fairly decent year for us. 2007, we were just below the 10% operating margin level. Now, 2024 took us by surprise. Of course, we sensed it already in the fourth quarter, 2023, that something was not right. We took down the costs. That is our behavior. We believe as we started with this, or how we started this conversation, that the market will be there.
There certainly will be a change in the way we behave and the way we, should I say, heat and climatize our homes. That has become so obvious the last 15 years in Europe, where it has been so obvious here and where we live in Sweden for 40 years. I think that the automotive industry has helped us because until the electric vehicles or those combined petrol-driven or diesel-driven and electrically- driven hybrids came about, it was not so certain that that was going to happen. We believe that electricity is very hard to beat when it comes to form of energy and how you treat that, whether it is element, whether it is in a heat pump, and for pressure and backup stoves. I mean, perhaps we are not nonchalant at all. We are very observant.
At the same time, we are fairly, should I say, determined once we've set a strategy because to realize a strategy takes a long time. It's not something you change by changing your shirt.
Very good. Thank you very much for that. The time has expired. Gerteric , Hans, and Fredrik, thank you so much for taking time. If we do not speak before the summer, I wish all of you a happy summer and nice weather also. Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you.
Thank you very much, everyone.
Thank you.
Bye-bye.
Thank you, everyone.