Welcome to a new try of presenting the second quarter of 2018 for Nolato Group. Sorry about the inconvenience the last time, let's try again. The summary for the group, we had a very strong quarter for all business areas. We reached the sales of SEK 2.3 billion, which was a healthy growth of 34% adjusted for currency. We saw strong growth across all business areas, but extremely high volumes within the Integrated Solutions business area, fueled by launch volumes and inventory buildup for the VHP segment. The profit rose to SEK 266 million in comparison to SEK 178 million during second quarter 2017, this gave a margin of 11.6%. During the quarter, we also had very strong cash flow after investments, which reached SEK 352 million.
We jump into the medical business area, we had an organic growth of 13%, adjusted for currency, it was a strong 10%. We saw increasing volumes both within the medical device and pharma packaging segment. The margin reached 13%, the total sales was SEK 562 million in the quarter. We see strong and high activity in the market. That was the medical business area in brief. We then jump into the Integrated Solution business area, during the second quarter, we had exceptionally strong growth of 66%. Very high launch volumes and inventory buildup for the VHP product area, particularly on the heating device. During the second half of 2018, the end customer demand is expected to account for the majority of the volumes, at a persistently high level, lower than in the second quarter and more in line with the Q4 and Q1.
We've seen continued relatively weak volumes for the mobile phone segment. The EBITA margin reached 11.8%, the high volumes have had a positive impact. It was a little bit lower than in the first quarter, that was due to more favorable and balanced capacity utilization during the first quarter. During the second half of this year, we will start production in Suzhou for moving some of the volumes from our Beijing area to that facility. The total sales in the quarter was SEK 1,186 million, very strong. That was the integrated solution business area. We then look into the Industrial Solution, we saw a strong growth in this business area as well. It was 13% increase of sales. We adjusted the currency, it was a very strong 12%, we saw all product areas performing well, particularly automotive and hygiene was stronger than the rest.
We have had high involvement in our development work and production equipment during the second quarter as well. The margin was 9.9% in Industrial Solution.
Okay, I will give some financial highlights, which is summarized on page 13. It was a quarter where we combined a strong growth of 34% with a margin improvement of one percentage. Of course, giving strong result improvements for all result lines. We had net sales of SEK 2.3 billion compared to almost SEK 1.7 billion the same quarter last year. The operating profit, EBITA, was SEK 266 million compared to SEK 178 million, and the EBITA margin went up from 10.6% to 11.6%. The earnings per share was on the rolling 12-month period, SEK 28.23. It was affected with a positive non-recurring item of SEK 0.91, giving SEK 27.32 for excluding non-recurring items. We had a strong cash flow during the quarter, although increasing CapEx investments. That was because of the positive result impact and also positive working capital development during the quarter.
We used supplier finance possibilities for a number of customers, which was positive. We ended up with a strong financial position. The cash situation went positive with SEK 62 million, even if we paid out dividends during Q2 with SEK 329 million to our shareholders. After the balance sheet date, we had one event. You can see that summarized on page 14. We sold a subsidiary, Nolato Hertila, on 5th of July. That company had production and sales of standard protective products, which was a bit unique in the group. The company had 25 employees and annual sales of SEK 40 million. It contributed with SEK 0.15 approximately to earnings per shares on a yearly basis. The purchase price was SEK 58 million enterprise value, and the transaction will be recognized in the third quarter. We expect a minor capital loss.
To comment a little bit on our current situation by the different business area, if we start with the Medical Solutions, we have a maintain growth strategy, focus on innovation, and we see a high activity on the market with good product activity. Within the Integrated Solutions area, we have successes with the new product areas. We have a continued strong position within EMC, and we work with our flexible production structure. Within the Industrial Solutions area, we are advancing our market positions. We have a continued positive development in automotive and hygiene sectors. Of course, we are in a strong economy. We will now unmute the phones in order to take questions, please, if you don't speak, put your phone on mute.
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Lead-Mark.
Are there any questions?
Lead- Mark, are there any questions?
Yes, Mikael Låsen here, Carnegie.
Hello?
Hi. I have a question regarding your outlook comments for the integrated solutions segment. Can you comment a bit more and elaborate on what you mean with your comments regarding the second half sales? Is this in line with the first half average or in line with what you delivered in Q1? A bit more clarity on that would be great. Thanks.
We think that the rest of the year will be more in line with Q4, Q1 within the integrated solutions.
Could we mute everyone else when you answer the question? It's really difficult to hear, please. Can you please mute the lines when we are asking the questions? For me, it is really difficult to hear, PM.
Yes.
Lead Mark. Lead-Mark .
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Yes. We got a question regarding the volumes and the sales and expectations for the integrated solutions business area. We believe that the rest of the year will be more in line with Q4, Q1 levels than the second quarter, which was then boosted by the pipe filling volumes and so on.
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Any more questions? Lead Mac, any more questions?
Should we try some more questions or?
If there are more questions?
Okay, I can. Hi, Johan from ABG.
Johan from ABG.
I haven't followed everything because there is.
It's hard. I haven't followed everything.
That was thing. Okay, I try.
Okay, I'll try. Yeah.
How about the cost situation?
Cost situation in terms of?
OpEx going forward, is there anything you can guide on that?
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Okay. I can comment on the OpEx situation going forward. We see a situation, and I think you can read about that in the papers, all of you every day, that the raw materials and also the situation with personnel cost is increasing, but we have lived with that for quite a long time. When it comes to raw materials, we have good possibilities to forward that according to contracts and agreements with our customers. We could see some delays in that work, but as said, we have had this situation for several quarters. When it comes to other operational costs, it is a challenging situation with the personnel right now, finding people in some of our operations. We have been able to handle it, and we expect that we can also going forward in the next coming quarters.