Due to technical failure from Financial Hearings side. We start the presentation over again. I'm now pleased to give the word over to CEO Patrick Höijer and CFO Annika Freij. Please go ahead.
Thank you, very sorry for the delay here and the issues we had in the presentation. But thanks for joining and staying on the call. We are here today to present, as stated, the financial report for the third quarter for Precise Biometrics. As stated, my name is Patrick Höijer. I'm the fairly new CEO of Precise since June this year. By my side here is Annika Freij, our CFO. Once again, before starting the presentation and running through the results and the operational progress, I think it's important to emphasize that we are growing. This is a result of our focus on building up recurring revenue in both our business units. This growth is achieved in a market where the global demand for mobile phones have weakened during the second half of the year.
Let's turn to the next page. The agenda today is looking like this. The idea is to walk through the quarterly highlights and then give you an operational and financial update and finally, explaining our clear strategic direction going forward. Let's start, so let's go to the next page. As we communicate the report, it has been a very eventful quarter for us. The revenue has increased to around SEK 19 million. It is driven by the acquisition of EastCoast last year and a stable development in our licensing fees in both of our business units. For the Algo business unit, where we focus on fingerprint recognition, the revenues were negatively impacted due to the volume-dependent royalty fees. This is explained by an overall weaker demand for mobile phones in the world.
In the Digital Identity business unit, where we focus on access and visitor management, the revenues are mainly up due to the EastCoast acquisition. This has, of course, significantly increased our recurring revenue base. Also, as we announced in August, we have carried out a directed share issue to our important customer and partner, Egis Technology. This issue was carried out during September and we got proceeds of around SEK 41 million. This, however, has been booked after the quarter, so you can't see it in this quarterly report. You will see it in the fourth quarter report. As stated, we are now acting in an increasingly uncertain macroeconomic environment. Precise has, for this quarter, shown a stable, strong revenue development despite this.
Because of this is mainly due to development in our digital identity business unit and a stable trend in our licensing fees in both of our business units. To best meet these uncertainties, we have increased our cost control and we have already taken some initiatives during the quarter to reduce our operating cost. This has been done in the way of reducing consultants and optimizing our R&D efforts. We can see that this effect will be greater, more broadly shown in 2023. This is also in line with our strategy, where we focus now more on commercialization of our solutions. During Q3, we also announced that we have adapted our organization to better reflect our business focus and our strategy.
By doing this, we appointed Fredrik Sjöholm to become the Executive Vice President and also the Chief Commercial Officer of our Algo business unit, while I assume the role as CCO or Chief Commercial Officer, for the Digital Identity business unit, besides my current role as a CEO, of course. This, we believe, will create much more focus on the different business opportunities in both of our areas. Let's go to the next slide. Before going through sort of the development from the business areas, I would like to start by explaining Precise a little bit more and also the trends that are underlying, which is helping our development. Precise has, of course, been around for many years and that's a strength that has helped us to establish a strong global footprint across the world.
We have offices and people in Europe, North America and Asia. We are organized today into two business units, through which we provide our solutions. In the Algo business unit, we offer software for fingerprint recognition and anti-spoof solutions, which is used in various applications such as mobile phones and laptops and door keys and so on. Within Algo, we have global customers and generates revenues from annual license fees and from volume-driven royalties. In the Digital Identity business units, we offer access solutions based on facial recognition, a solution called YOUNiQ and visitor management solutions, which we call EastCoast. In this area, we have our customers mainly in Sweden and in U.S. and we create recurring revenue by selling these solutions as software as a service, so a recurring revenue fee.
If we jump to the next page. If we look at the underlying trends in the market, our offering and strategic focus is a result of global trends, where we're seeing that we're seeing for biometric application. Biometrics is basically about measuring each person's unique physical characteristics, which can then be used to identify this individual. Fingerprint reading and facial recognition are, for example, different types of biometric technologies. If we look at the trends that our Algo business unit, our fingerprint business is benefiting from, we can first of all see that biometrics are entering new segments and use cases. We can, for example, see new authentication requirements in automotives and in laptops.
Additionally, as the security increases, we see more use cases also for valuable personal assets such as the payments, ID cards, driver's license, et cetera, which increase demand for our solutions. For the Digital Identity area, namely our access and visitor management area, there's a broad increase in demand for secure identification solutions. Traditional access control has been based on object-based access such as keys, ID card, tags and so on o r it has been based on information-based access such as pins or passwords. Common for both of these are that they can be stolen or they can be shared. Therefore, we see a global trend of increased security, which can be met by biometric-based access control, so by using fingerprint or facial recognition to grant access.
Biometric access is also very interesting if you combine it with a traditional object-based access, when you combine a card and a facial recognition as it creates a strong multi-factor authentication. These solutions based on biometrics brings higher security, convenience and less cost for the customer in the end. To summarize, there are strong global trends that Precise is well-placed to capitalize on over time. Let's go to the next page. Let's start looking at the segments. Within our Algo business unit, the revenue decreased to SEK 30 million in Q3 from just below SEK 70 million last year. As I already mentioned, the explanation for this is lower royalty fees arising from a high inventory environment among the mobile manufacturer, the so-called OEMs and a lower market demand for mobile phones.
Looking at our license fees, however, they develop at a stable level with a slight increase compared to the same period last year. We are also continuing to see good product launches, which includes our software, during the quarter, such as smartphones from Vivo and other launches like smart door locks by Aqara and TP-Link. This is an effect of Precise continuing to support key partners in Asia and in US, which is also part of the strategy within Algo going forward. In Algo, we have spent many years building up world-leading expertise in the development of algorithms for fingerprint recognition. This is a technology based on advanced expertise in image analysis. Customer feedback of our recently deployed software shows that we have world-leading performance of a biometric match and latency.
We have also been able to improve our anti-spoof solution, which shows very promising initial performance improvements. This part is also very important that there is an increasing requirement in security standard in our industry. Precise continues to show that we are really in the forefront of delivering solutions in this environment. Please turn to the next slide. For Digital Identity in Q3, we continue to grow the underlying recurring revenue by the recent acquisition of EastCoast. Revenue grows to nearly SEK 6 million, increasing from SEK 300,000 last year. It is reassuring also that the demand for our visitor management solution continues to be at the high level. Year to date, the sales order value for our visitor management solution was 50% higher than for its corresponding period last year.
Our focus in this area is especially to sell our future-proof cloud-based visitor management solution. This has also shown to be successful during the year as the sales order value have almost doubled in value versus last year. Some example of wins for the quarter is Smurfit Kappa and Atea. For YOUNiQ, our biometric access solution, we signed deals with, for example, Paras Bygg and new products with Algeco during the quarter. If we look at the operational part, we are operationally focusing on building commercial and technical partnerships with access and key installation partners in Sweden. This is very important as it's strengthening the go-to-market channels for our solutions in the Swedish market. That's our main focus right now.
On this topic, we have changed our R&D focus, where we're now focusing on scalability and simplicity to support the commercialization of our solution. Looking a little bit further ahead, we see opportunities in the U.S. market. U.S. is a really large market and combined with a more maturity when it comes to biometric solutions, it holds a great opportunity for us. It is therefore pleasing that we have YOUNiQ landed a win with the St. Lawrence Health. Lawrence Health in New York State, where we provide a secure access solution for the hospital and also for the pharmacy area. With these words, I think I hand over to you, Annika, to go through the financials.
Yes. Thank you and please go to slide eight. Thank you. We are happy to present another quarter with growth despite the turbulent world and a very challenging mobile phone industry affecting our royalty revenues in the Algo segment. In the Digital Identity segment, we can report a strong third quarter with increasing demand for our visitor management solution, EastCoast Solutions. We continue working on building up our sales channels for YOUNiQ, both in Sweden and in the U.S.. Please go to slide nine. Net sales during the quarter were SEK 18.8 million, versus SEK 16.9 million in Q3 previous year. Net sales were split between volume-dependent royalty revenues of SEK 1.9 million, versus SEK 6.8 million. License fees of SEK 14.8 million, versus SEK 9.7 million.
This includes, for example, fixed annual fees for Algo and recurring revenue, what we call system as a service revenue in Digital Identity, 2.1 million versus 3.0.3 million of other. The decline in royalty revenue is due to a sharp decline in demand in the mobile sector but the increase in license fee is primarily due to the acquisition of EastCoast Solutions, which was completed in November last year and this contributed a revenue of SEK 4.5 million in sales during the quarter. The gross margin in the quarter was 63.2%, versus 76.4% previous year. The downturn is due to changes in the product mix, as the Algo product segment has a higher margin than Digital Identity product segment.
Amortization of capitalized development expenses increased to SEK 3.9 million, compared to SEK 3 million last year, relating primarily due to Digital Identity, including EastCoast Solutions. Net sales for Algo was SEK 13 million, versus SEK 16.6 million and are reported under royalties in SEK 1.9 million, versus SEK 6.8 million. Licenses at SEK 9.9 million, versus SEK 9.5 million and other at SEK 1.2 million, versus SEK 0.3 million. Last year's component shortage was replaced by declining demand for mobile phones and this resulted in the low production volumes. License fees increased marginally compared to the third quarter last year. Gross margin in the quarter was 82.1% for Algo.
Net sales for Digital Identity was SEK 5.8 million, versus SEK 0.3 million last Q3 and this is reported under licenses of SEK 4.8 million, versus SEK 0.2 million and other at SEK 1 million, versus SEK 0 million last Q3. The increase in revenue in Digital Identity is due primarily to EastCoast Solutions and EastCoast Solutions contributed with the net sales of SEK 4.5 million during the quarter. The gross margin during the quarter was 20.8%. The gross margin in Digital Identity is lower than Algo. This is because it's partly hardware but it's also affected by amortizations of intangible assets relating to the acquisition of EastCoast Solutions. Please turn to page 10. The profit at EBITDA level was -SEK 1.8 million in Q3, versus SEK 1 million previous year.
The decline in EBITDA can be explained by lower royalty revenues in Algo with higher margins and also a higher cost level. Operating expenses for the quarter increased to SEK 19.2 million, versus SEK 15.9 million previous Q3. The increase in operating expenses is explained primarily by the added cost for EastCoast Solutions of SEK 3.6 million and a provision for bad debts of SEK 1.5 million. The underlying costs without acquisition and bad debt is lower than Q3 last year and we are currently working on a cost reduction plan and how to streamline the organization and we will see a bigger effect of that in the next year. Earnings per share for the quarter was minus zero point two million or SEK versus minus zero point one in quarter three last year.
The operating loss for the quarter was -SEK 7.3 million, versus -SEK 3 million previous year. Please turn to page 11. The cash flow from the quarter from operating activities was -SEK 7 million, compared to -SEK 2.4 million last Q3. Of this, -SEK 5.2 million, compared to -SEK 3.4 million last Q3, depended on changes in working capital, meaning reduced current receivables and increased current liabilities. It's worth highlighting that quarter three is normally a quarter with less invoicing of, for example, annual license fees to customers and this is affecting our working capital negatively in the quarter. The group invested SEK 0 million in property, plant and equipment during the quarter compared to SEK 0.5 million last Q3.
Total cash flow for the period was SEK -13.4 million, versus SEK -6.8 million previous year, partly due to cost for issuance of new shares of SEK 1.3 million and also due to higher investments in intangible assets. Development expenses of SEK 4.8 million were capitalized during the quarter compared to SEK 3.6 million in Q3 last year. Amortization of capitalized development expenses was SEK 3.9 million, versus SEK 3 million previous Q3. The increase is mainly due to EastCoast Solutions. Capitalized expenses are amortized over three years, both for Algo and Digital Identity. Cash and cash equivalents at the end of the period was SEK 41.3 million, compared to SEK 55.7 million last Q3. This excludes the share issues of SEK 41 million, which will affect the cash and cash equivalents during the fourth quarter.
Please continue to slide number 12. The summary of the period, quarter one to quarter three 2022. The net sales was SEK 71.7 million compared to SEK 55.9 million last period. Net sales was split between royalty revenues of SEK 19.2 million compared to SEK 24.8 million and license fees of SEK 45.9 million versus SEK 27.7 million and other of SEK 6.6 million compared to SEK 3.4 million. Last year's component shortage was replaced by lower demand for mobile phones, which resulted in low production volumes in the mobile market and therefore lower royalty revenues. The increase in license fees is primarily due to the acquisition of EastCoast Solutions and this contributes with the net sales of SEK 13 million.
We also have the two new customers in the automotive industry that have also contributed with the higher license fees. Gross margin during the interim period was 73.6% versus 75.7% last year and the decrease depend mainly on the shift to higher proportion of Digital Identity which have lower margins than Algo. The operating expenses for the period was sixty-five point seven million compared to fifty-three point seven million and this is primarily due to the added expenses of EastCoast Solutions, which was ten point five million for the period. We also have this provision of bad debt of one point five million. The profit at EBITDA level for the whole period was three point one million compared to zero point two million last year.
The cash flow for the interim period from operating activities was SEK 3.7 million versus SEK -4.6 million last year. Back to you, Patrick and I think we will go to slide number 13.
Thank you, Annika. As Annika stated, we have shown growth in our recurring revenue, the so-called software as a service revenues and our license revenues despite the challenging market for mobile phones. I think that's a strength that we're showing clearly during this quarter. Before I summarize the sort of key takeaways from the quarter, I would also like to walk you through the priorities and the growth strategies for Precise. Let's turn to the next page. We see solid opportunities across the market for our Digital Identity area, which we intend to capture. We will do this by focusing on building sales channels through commercial and technical integration with strategic access and installation partners in Sweden. This will really help us to build up strong go-to-market channels in the Swedish market.
This is a work that's already ongoing but where we emphasize more efforts into. Secondly, we will explore new geographies through local presence and partnership and especially here, the focus is on the U.S. market, where we see good signs, such as the recent deal with St. Lawrence Health Hospital in New York State. Thirdly, we will continue to develop and integrate solutions based on existing products to manage people flow. By this we combine our visitor management and our access solution service to build on the product strength we have in the different areas. On the Algo side, we intend to leverage our strong world-leading position in this area by focusing our strategy on strategic partners within the mobile segment to win new projects, which means that we will be included in new generations of smartphones.
We are also continuing to broaden our business to new verticals such as automotive, laptop, et cetera and to new sensor types. As we are world-leading in image analysis, we are also exploring for the future more use cases, even outside of fingerprint biometrics to broaden the addressable market and use our world-leading expertise in this area. Overall, the focus for both areas is on commercialization of the different opportunities that we see in these areas. Good. Let's turn to the next slide. Key takeaways. I am, as I started with, pleased to say that Precise is growing in digital identity according to the strategy, which in Q3 compensate for the decline in the demand for mobile phones in the world.
We have also increased our cost control to meet a certain macroeconomic environment and we are putting more efforts into commercialization of our products that we have going forward. We are also showing a strong proof of concept with increased order value sales of our visitor management solution during this year. I also think it's worth mentioning that I truly welcome our customer Egis as a strategic investor in Precise and I'm happy for the business opportunity and strategic support it will mean for Precise going forward. Finally, I'm also eager to deliver on our clear long-term growth strategy for our business units that I just went through with you. With that, let's turn to the next slide. To finalize the presentation, let me start by stating what Precise is all about. We focus our business around identification.
Identification of the user must, of course, be done in a secure way. To make sure that the solution is used by the end user of the trust chain, it must also be easy and convenient to use. This is why we develop our identification solution with a strong foundation in biometrics, always with an end user in mind. After my first full quarter as the CEO of Precise, it's clear to me that this company has built up a global excellence in biometrics over a very long time and a good ability to apply it in customer use cases. Taken together, I think this provides a strong platform to continue to commercialize in line with the strategy we presented.
Using our solution, she or he should know that no matter who you are, where you are and what you do, you are the key. With these words, I would like to thank you all for listening to the presentation. Let's conclude with that and go over to the Q&A session. Let's also turn slide. I can see that we have got in a few questions. One question is about when will you start receiving royalties from the automotive segment? We have previously stated that we will see or indicated that royalties revenues will start coming in by the end of 2022. We can now see a slight delay due to the component supply chain delay in the automotive industry and believe that this will be coming in in the first half of next year instead.
There is also questions around the U.S. and the hospital deal in the U.S. Can you tell me a bit more about the hospital deal in the U.S.? Is this what does this commercial contract means? I guess we're referring to the St. Lawrence Health hospital deal. I was myself visiting this customer in September this year. This is a deal where we're receiving in line with our unique deals, where we're receiving recurring revenue, selling this as a software service. This is also the first step in a larger deal in the future, as the hospital is considering expanding this to further places around the facilities in sort of the pharmaceutical areas beyond where they are today.
I also think this is a very important deal in the sense that is a strong proof point for our solution in the US market, as the market itself is very interesting to us due to the potential of the market, as well as the maturity around biometric solutions. We will continue to put in more sales efforts into the U.S. market to grow our business there.
We have a question also about our high operating expenses and if we're going to do something about that. As we said before, we are looking into streamlining the organization, reorganizations and we do have a quite high proportion of consultants and we are working on that at this point. As we said before as well, we will see a result of this next year.
I think it's also worth mentioning there Annika that we are focusing in our R&D resources, especially in the YOUNiQ area, more and more into commercialization, which will help us to optimize the costs in that area. Very good. That is, of course, a focus area for us, going forward for the end of this year and going into next year. Another question I had was around how should we look at M&A opportunities in the near future. We have earlier stated that we have been open for this kind of discussions and still are in the Digital Identity area. However, our focus is right now on physical access and visitor management in this area. We are opportunistically, of course, open for M&A opportunities but the main focus right now is on commercialization of the services that we have.
We also got a question around the negative EBITDA during Q3. As I said before, SEK 1.5 million is relating to provision for what we think is potentially a bad debt to an Asian customer. We have seen very low royalty revenues. We also have high margins on royalties. Even if we have a higher revenue as a total, the margins are lower on the Digital Identity side. That's the reason for the negative EBITDA result this quarter
There is another question here around the cooperation and progress around Egis. Any progress from the increased Egis cooperation? As stated, as we presented, the deal was closed in the end of Q3 and we received the payments here in the beginning of Q4. This, which of course has strengthened our financial position. Beyond this, we see that there are clear key rationales around the increased cooperation with Egis. With this investment, we can mutually develop or we can together develop our mutual offering to make that stronger with improved product development processes between us. We can also explore new verticals and sensor types together with Egis. Thirdly, we have a strong Asian partner where many of our customers are in the end.
We also have a owner who has great knowledge in hardware, which help us to further improve our software by understanding that. That can also help us in the digital identity area by helping us to get more cost-efficient hardware, for example, around our cameras in the access solutions and so on. This overall also will benefit. The cooperation with Egis will also benefit our other customers, as the improvements we're doing to our algorithms to our software is something that benefits all our customers. That's also the clear intention for the future. I think overall, it's also a strength for Precise to have a strong industrial owner, a long-term one as well, that also shows strength for us. Good. We have one question around the biometric bank cards business as well.
I think our answer is, in the same way as before, the biometric bank card business is close to our business. We are still closely monitoring the development in this area and will when the commercial volumes picks up, also ensure that we engage in this area. But today, the commercial launch is not fully there yet, as we see it. I think maybe with that, we conclude, if we don't have any more, Annika.
No, I think that was it for the questions.
Okay. With that, thank you everyone. Thanks for joining. You are the key. Remember that. Thank you very much. Have a great day. Forward to your Financial Hearings.