Thank you. Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and thank you for joining us for our full year results, 2023, 2024 earnings conference call. Joining me today are Simon Michel, CEO, and Samuel Künzli, our new CFO. It's a very warm pleasure for me to welcome you. Our press release report and presentation discussing our financial year are also available in the media and investor section of our website. With that, I will turn the call to Simon. Simon, please.
Thank you, Thomas. Ladies and gentlemen, good morning, good afternoon here to our earnings call 2023-2024. As you have read this morning, it's about transforming self-care, it's about transforming Ypsomed. Before I start, I would like to give the word to Samuel. He joined the team a month ago. Samuel, would you like to introduce yourself before we dig into the figures and the story?
Thank you very much, Simon, and warm welcome also from my side. Very few words about my background. I started my professional career at KPMG, learned there the basic financial skills. Then I worked a little bit more than eight years for Stadler. That was quite the expansion and growth story at that time. And the position I had before joining Ypsomed was at Feintool. Some of you might know this company. It's a listed automotive supplier, headquartered in Switzerland. And I'm now very excited to join, to join Ypsomed, and to join Simon and the team. So glad to be here. Thank you.
Thank you very much, Samuel. With that, let me start, and Samuel will then lead you through the figure section of today's presentation. We'll roughly spend half an hour together, and then we'll have enough time for Q&A. Ypsomed, as you know, is all about making self-care simpler and easier. That's our mission. That's why we get up in the morning, and we have a lot of tailwind from global trends such as self-care, biologic, biosimilars, digitization. So global trends, that gives us a strategic rationale that supports our business.
And if you look at our potential, we have our growth drivers, as I just mentioned, that gives us tremendous, that give us tremendous opportunities in both business areas, both in delivery systems and diabetes care, and this is why we are continuing to invest in CapEx, in capabilities, in innovation and in employees, and this we will lead you through in today's presentation. I think most important announcement this morning is our Mercury program. We have decided to now move a step ahead, and this step ahead is, this step ahead is making us a pure player as Ypsomed, focusing on delivery systems, our device business, our injection business, our high-margin B2B business. And this transformational process is starting not just today. We have started with it roughly three years ago.
In 2022, we have decided to take the company apart in a sense of an organization. We have taken the matrix into business areas, into product areas. Some companies would call them divisions. We have given them a lot of capabilities, a lot of power, having speedboats here on the table in the two areas, both diabetes care and delivery systems. As a next step, we have divested Diaexpert, our mail order business in Germany. Good business, lower margin, no fit, good divestment now with Mediq. Now, this year, we have announced the divestment of our pen needle and BGM business. Low-margin business, in fact, negative over the past couple of years. We found a new home, MTD, great company. They understand the pen needle business. This is the company that will, in the future, also sell our pen needles. Transition phase has started.
Handover is taking place as we speak. We have also announced a couple of months ago that we are going to fade out our business with Sanofi, the contract manufacturing business, lower-margin business. For 12 years, we have manufactured over 1 billion devices for Sanofi. We're handing it back fall 2025, spring 2026. We have enough space then to move in vast volumes of auto injectors for Novo. And now, ladies and gentlemen, it's time for the next step. We are now going to move into a fascinating and interesting next 1.5 years, which we will do in two phases by separating both companies, diabetes care and delivery systems, and then review strategic options for our diabetes care business. So why are we doing that?
Because we believe that both areas, both businesses have unique elements, unique competences, and also unique offerings that must be described in a different way. What we want to achieve is two pure-play companies. Diabetes care, for instance, is a very emotional business here on the top right. It's emotions, it's specific capabilities, it's marketing, it's sales, it's customer care, it's patients, it's people. It's a very very clear and focused B2C business, whereas on delivery system side, it's all about capacity, lean manufacturing, volumes. It's about as few people as possible on the shop floor. It's cost of goods. It's B2B. It's very different cultures, and over the past year, we have seen that more and more, that both businesses can be better if they are in separate units.
So this is why we are building a pure-play B2B company, Ypsomed, and a new pure-play B2C company, Diabetes Care. This is what we are up to. This is what we are going to do, and this we are going to do in two phases. So Mercury Phase One is starting today as we speak. Today, we are going to start this process where, in fact, we are going to establish a company, we call it Ypsomed Diabetes Care AG. It will be situated in Switzerland, in Solothurn, and this company is the home for all colleagues working today in the business area, diabetes care. At the same time, we bring all assets, so machines, IP, activated projects. We bring all assets into the new company, as well as, of course, all subsidiaries.
So our 18 sales subsidiaries all over the place in Europe, also in Canada, in Australia, and the US. And those subsidiaries are moving over to diabetes care, as well as our software center. At the same time, we start the market sounding to understand what the potential value or potential interest is for this business. In November, we will decide in the board meeting to move ahead, to either divest or spin. From a pure Ypsomed perspective, we want to maximize the asset, so we have an interest to sell the company. We are going to review those options in November, and then start the process together with [Rothschild & Co] . So I think the process is quite clear with that. We are thrilled to finally go that first step.
We all understand in the team that it's a huge chance for both business areas, and now we shall dig into the figures and then give you a bit more flavor for both diabetes care and delivery systems. Samuel, over to you.
Thank you, Simon. In the next few minutes, I give you a short overview about the financial results 2023. I do start with the top line. We had a growth of roughly 10%, so Ypsomed reached a sales level of roughly CHF 550 million. Please have in mind that in the previous years, the period which we compare here, there is CHF 87 million of sales, the exit included. If you exclude those sales and you look only at the sales from the continuous business growth, which is more than CHF 100 million, so 25%, and if you adjust by the, by currency, even 26%. So you see huge top-line growth.
This resulted then also in higher utilization of our production facilities, so our profit margin grew by more than 600 basis points, from 28% to 34%-35%. You see the same in the EBIT. We reached a total EBIT of CHF 86.2 million. Also here, comparing with the roughly CHF 60 million from the previous period, you need to have in mind that in the year before, there is a substantial one-off effect from DiaExpert. I will show you now a little more in detail how this EBIT evolved. Starting point on the left side are those CHF 61 million from 2022, 2023. There is two one-off effects which we eliminate in this bridge, the CHF 21 million from DiaExpert.
17% of this CHF 21 million is the proceeds we got, so basically profit making, DiaExpert, and CHF 4 million is the EBIT from this business. And there was an additional one-off effect back in Italy. If you take this one effect as well, you normalized EBIT or an EBIT loss of CHF 42 million. And now we reached CHF 86 million, so we doubled that EBIT. So how did we come now to CHF 86 million? The biggest contribution came from the growth in the delivery systems. So from the additional sales in pen auto-injectors, roughly CHF 14 million in additional EBIT resulted. Then also from the growth in EBIT, roughly CHF 20 million additional EBIT came. And because we have also the sales force and the distribution channels, we also had to invest heavily in the sales and distribution network.
This resulted in higher SG&A for the YpsoPump business. Roughly CHF 14 million additional costs occurred there. That's how those CHF 86 million then came. Now, let's look at the cash flow. As Simon mentioned at the beginning, we have a lot of tailwind, we have a lot of drivers and mega trends, which actually will lead to a huge top-line growth. So we had to do a lot of growth CapEx. We realized the cash flow from operating activities of a little bit more than CHF 160 million. We spent roughly CHF 120 million for fixed assets. This is mainly investments into additional capacity for the UnoPen and also for the Ypsomed platforms, and those, of course, related to the infrastructure. As well, we invested in the innovation, in future platforms, all kind of intangible investments.
for the platforms, but as well for the Ypsopump and the ecosystem, for the apps, and also the FDA filing, roughly CHF 80 million. This resulted then in a negative free cash flow of roughly CHF 30 million. But the investments, they will go ahead, and let's now have a look, a little bit more detailed in the future investments into the fixed assets. As I mentioned, in the year 2023, 2024, we roughly invested CHF 120 million. Simon will later show in the details that we have to build up a capacity, a yearly capacity of roughly 100 billion devices. This is due to the success of our platforms, of our products, and to those mega trends.
To reach that capacity level, we will invest in the next five years roughly CHF 1.5 billion. Have in mind, roughly, one-fourth or 25% of it will be financed by contributions from our customers. But that means also that in 2022-2024, we again will heavily invest. We will invest roughly CHF 250 million. But Ypsomed has the balance sheet to do that. Our net debt EBITDA level is roughly 1%, so we can also do that additional. We can also finance that additional investment. But it's one thing to have the capacity, the infrastructure, the machinery ready. You also need the people.
Ypsomed already hired in the year 2023-2024, over 300 people, more than half of it in Switzerland, and also for the year 2024-2025, additional 400 jobs are created, 200 of them in Switzerland. And those people are, of course, crucial also to fulfill the growth mission. With that, I hand over to Simon for the deep dive into diabetes care.
Thank you very much, Samuel. Excellent. So let's, let's turn the page and start with diabetes care today. I mean, if you look at top line, we have a slight reduction, obviously, due to the sale of DiaExpert. So more important is probably page 23, where we see the actual growth from continuing business, which is 30%. And so we achieved a 69% growth on the Ypsopump system. That's the key figure. We've been a bit less, a bit below our expectations since we had some issues on one of the infusion set manufacturing lines in Schwerin. Overall, we could have done 3,500 patients per month. We were at 2,000-2,500 patients per month, and I will show you the figures in a minute.
Leaving that, we should have a look at the breakdown in YDC business, which is now, of course, changing a lot. So the light gray, CHF 57 million, is leaving us. DiaExpert, the pen needle, the CHF 52 million, now CHF 39 million, is leaving us, so we are ending up with the CHF 97 million in the future and CHF 15 million for project work. So we still have some project services in diabetes care. That's, for instance, for the patch pump program for TechMed, which is an external program that we are developing with in-house resources. When we look at the pen needle business, we have announced a couple of weeks ago that we are divesting it, so we have found a new home, a company called Medical Technology and Device in Italy. A great company. They understand pen needle business.
They understand, they understand, all lancet business. They have own manufacturing. So we're going to move, one after the other, our pen needle lines from, Solothurn to Poland, the new home. For that purpose, we are going to ramp up, do a lot of manufacturing in contract manufacturing, so we manufacture more devices, more pen needles for MTD in order to ensure a smooth transition. I believe that we will stop producing pen needles for MTD in mid-2025. But you see, you know, when you look at the figures, I mean, -CHF 12 million, it was really time for Ypsomed to sell it. It was no longer our focus. It was clearly time to move on and focus on our pump business. And we look at our pump business, most of you on the call, you know our system.
We have a system that is one of its kind. We are the only system that is available for all ages. We have newborns on the pump system. We have newborns on the loop. We have a pump that is available for women in pregnancy, and the only system which is available both for Libre 3 and Dexcom G6. We're working on G7, obviously, to also be compatible on that end. So very happy with the quality of the system. It's looking great, and we are investing more and more here, and of course, also extending the access. When we talk about the access, obviously, it's all about growth. We have reached the 50,000 patients, and now with the 50,000 patients, we have the basis to write the black zero.
We will write the black zero in Q4 2024, 2025, which is very important. Start earning money. That's of course a key element when we want to place this business into new hands, a new shareholder structure. We want to be able to sell a profitable business. At the same time, we have, we are in Canada under review. Canada is a great market, high reimbursements. We see here a starting of the business towards the end of the year. We have opened France, Norway, Spain, Italy, as you know. Now, America, it's clear that we are still in process. CamAPS FX app is under review. We see a filing here, a release from the authority in the coming months. Ypsopump is also fully on track. We have received questions. We have received 27 questions.
Nothing really worrying. We are now answering them within the 180 days. Then we should get the first approval in Q1 2025, then we will file again a special 510(k) in order to reach the four years. We are now on two years, we go to four years. We will add Libre 3, Freestyle Libre 3, so we have both options also for people in America, with a potential launch here in Q4 2025. Important for you on the call, that Ypsomed is investing still in this preparation work, obviously in the program, in the whole approval process. We're going to hire a small team, we're going to hire a local GM, but the main decision for launch will then be taken, obviously, under the new structure, under the new ownership.
So, pretty much on track here, a big delay on infusion sets, huge demand. Pretty positive that we can reach the 2,000-2,500 patients per month. So with 25,000 patients, we should reach 75,000 patients by end of the year. So slow, steady, clear growth is a great system here in Europe. With that, let me turn to delivery systems. Obviously, as Samuel introduced, enormous growth. We are one of the fastest growing MedTech companies in Europe. We have 38.9% more sales in our own devices, mainly on the auto injectors and Uno Pen. I'm going to show you a couple of graphs, which are quite interesting, in a minute, that show the differences of the two platforms.
Project revenue stable at roughly CHF 60 million, current manufacturing slightly above, and another 33 new deals as the year before. Then we look at the breakdown. The first time in history, we are actually achieving more sales, more revenue from the auto-injector platform. So our YpsoMate for the single-dose, fixed-dose applications. So they really take over on the pen side. It's simply, it's simpler. If you also look at the deals that we won, out of the 33 new deals, three-quarters of them are actually auto-injector deals. And interestingly, also, from where they come, about two-thirds come from existing clients. We are now working with all 30 big pharma companies, and of course, many, many smaller pharma biotech companies. And we are able to serve them, we are able to support them, and as you know, our space is pretty limited.
It's basically SHL left and Ypsomed. When we go into more detail and look at the indications. I know some people call me and tell me, "You know, Sam, I'm afraid, you know, you now got all those big obesity deals, and is it dangerous? You have this dependency again, as you had with Sanofi 15 years ago?" I say, "Yes, of course, there's a certain element to it," but if you look at the figures, and this is here looking 5 years into the future, both diabetes and all obesity deals we got, and we work with almost everybody out there, we will not be above 50%. Obviously, from a profit perspective, it's even lower because those large volume deals pay a bit lower than the smaller volume deals.
So it will be important, it will be huge, but it will not be a core risk to our company. Interestingly, also is the split between originators and biosimilars, with two-thirds in originator, which is, of course, very motivating as they pay better. And actually, and this is probably the more important question, if you move Thomas, to the next slide. If you really look at the new drugs that we introduced, many new applications, new drugs out there, Menopur at Genotropin, Pfizer in the space of fertility, for instance. Interesting new drug supporting, making the life easier from people with chronic disease. This is giving you a selection of Uno Pens. I think we launched nine.
If you go to the next page, YpsoMate, we launched also about nine Ypsomeds over the past twelve months. Couple of ideas here, maybe on the left, on the right top, Medac, Methotrexate, great drug. Old drug, basically, you know, BD offered device until last fall. We are now taking over step by step, so we were able to convince Medac to change from BD to Ypsomed. For this device, roughly 25-30 million units per year. Quite an interesting deal, and the drug that supports people with chronic conditions and early-stage cancer treatment. So really, really important steps towards patient health. Also, Xolair, an important drug, now just received U.S. approval. It's for asthma in the space of asthma in both applications, 1 and 2.25.
An important drug that really makes life easier for people with asthma. You see now we are offering solutions for more disease areas. On the pen side, for instance, it's a variable dose device for ATTR. It's a cells orphan drug for people with a terrible disease, you know, that dissolves your organs. We can stop with the support of our device, that disease. Or on the auto injector side, new products in the space of high cholesterol to support that. And of course, a disease that is going along with obesity and diabetes, often in multi-morbid situations, we see those many indications also served now in auto injectors, and you will see more and more disease areas coming.
As Samuel said before, I think that is one of the key points, and it's also one of the reasons why we are separating. Ypsomed needs to build factories, we need to build capacity. We are going to spend CHF 1.1 billion-CHF 1.5 billion over the next four to five years. Around 1 billion devices will be our capacity by end of the decade. We invest the money in Solothurn, that's our core site in Switzerland. We are expanding our current hall. I'll show you a couple of pictures in a minute. We are opening our plant in China in fall. We are planning now Schwerin 2, the doubling-tripling of the volume in Germany, and we are planning our site in North America. As Samuel said, a part of it is contributed by our pharma partners.
We need the money in order to be efficient and quick, and we also believe it makes sense that they contribute here.... So this gives you an idea of where those factories are. But as I suggested, we just move to the next page, 39. I give a couple of ideas what is actually happening in Solothurn, for instance. So Solothurn, we move in a third line of Uno pen, another 20 million. We have now roughly 60 million Uno pens in Switzerland, and roughly 60 million in Germany, and we are getting another line in Germany and the first line in China, for local Chinese volume. As I mentioned, we move out Sanofi business. We get in the auto injectors for Novo and Solothurn in two steps, 2025, 2026. Then we install a new tool shop.
That was one important reason also why we divested the pen needle business. We need the space. We are doubling the capacity on our molds, from 40 molds per year to roughly 80 molds per year. We want to lower our dependency from external tool manufacturers. This is what we do by installing a second shop. Then we do large photovoltaic system. I think on every roof now, by now, we have solar, and we are building a new conference center to host conferences and press releases. In Germany, that's a nice picture here on a sunny day up in the north, in Schwerin, roughly 1.5 hours east of Hamburg. As you remember, we have been able to acquire 20 hectares of land, 200,000 sq m.
We are going now to buy another 100,000, another 10 hectares, in the coming months, so we have enough space to grow, and this is going to open here, this Hall D, the extension, 4,000 sq m of space for Uno pens, mainly in fall. But the next big step is this very impressive graph here, that we are kicking off now, in Schwerin. It's basically tripling in the north here, you see the existing site. That's 200 m times 58 m, 50 m, 60 m. We're building now a new site, which is, 300 times 200 m. It's huge. You see a large white block there on the north. That's our fully automated, warehouse with 10 truck positions to get the products out of the factory.
This factory here will host over 250 plastic molding machine, 100 spring machines, 6-8 large volume lines for devices. Mainly auto-injectors, but we have a certain flexibility here, 50,000 square meter for roughly 500 million devices, and this project is starting now. We see it on the next graph. We have kicked it off. We have been able to find a great partner here that is able to build factory turnkey, because this site has to be up and running in mid-2026, so we have roughly two years to go. Then we hand it over to operations to fill it step by step with the lines. You see here also on the left side, there's a windmill. It's a 200 m high windmill.
Together with the solar power, we will have all over the roof, we will roughly generate 70% of the energy required at this site. Also a very important sign towards our clients, towards our employees, that we care for nature, that we are important in that important duty to lower the carbon emission. China is also a great story. I was impressed how fast we had topping-out ceremony a couple of weeks ago in Changzhou, a city that didn't exist 15 years ago. Now, we have 12,000 companies there, high tech. We build here on a LEED Gold standard, so highest building level, really sustainable as well. All solar, of course. They work in three shifts. They hand us over the factory in October.
We will move in with the first lines in November, December and January. We have basically 4 halls. We have filled them already. We should have built larger. We have to extend in China in about two years from now. Great journey here, great team, I'm very pleased with the progress and look forward that we can manufacture devices in China for China. Remember, this is business in China for local demand, we have to be local, geopolitics demand it, but also speed, time, carbon emissions, all makes sense that you are local and no longer all central out of Switzerland. Then the next big and exciting step for us is North America. Finally, we make the step, we get even closer to our large customers. We haven't decided yet whether it's Querétaro in Mexico or North Carolina.
The decision will be taken in the next few weeks. We have a road trip. I'm going to look at all the sites, so I'm pretty positive about the decision that we build up the site in North America. We have to be closer to our clients overseas. And with that, ladies and gentlemen, I would already like to come to the outlook and then open for questions. Thomas will lead us through the Q&A. As you have read this morning, most likely, we guide again sales growth from continued operation. So it's basically everything except the needle business of around 25%, and on EBIT level, an EBIT operating result of around CHF 140 million. Also, again, excluding one-off effects.
We have described in the annual report in financial sections that we will have a CHF 10 million goodwill effect, which has nothing to do. Maybe Samuel can extend a bit here on the pen needle as we have to as we sell it. With that, I would hand over to Thomas, and then we may deepen those topics when the questions come up. We are excited about our future. We are excited to start the Mercury program. We had the chance yesterday, this morning, to talk to our employees. People understand it. It makes sense. It makes a lot of sense that we do it both separately, very focused, and we look forward to that journey. So with that, Thomas, I hand over to the floor.
... So thanks, Simon. Thanks. Like always, short and sharp. So, we started with a short delay, but I think we catched up a lot. Maybe given all this information and the different developments we have now discussed the last 30 minutes, to wrap it up, what are the three main points looking back the last 12 months for you that are important and also considering for the future of Ypsomed?
So I think first of all, it's definitely achieving the operational tasks on the volumes we have been able to deliver at all times in the space of auto injectors and devices. That's our duty, that's our promise, and this is why customers pay the price. This has been achieved well, so very pleased with some operations, number one. Number two, we have reached the 50,000 patients on the pump. We are a bit delayed here, but we have achieved the 50,000 now in May. That's the basis for the Black Zero, so pleased with that. And then I believe it's really the decision. I mean, we have six intensive months behind us to come to that final decision of really separating the units. There's a lot of work behind. We are very convinced that it's the right.
We have selected the bank. We are starting the process next week, so I believe we have a good year. A company here also with a great culture, low fluctuation rate, and good spirit.
Excellent. Thanks, Simon. Thanks, Samuel. With this, I would like to open the lines for our Q&A, and I would like to start with Curtis. Curtis, we are very happy. Curtis initiated Ypsomed a couple of weeks ago, so we look forward to your questions. Curtis, please go ahead.
Hi, yes, thank you very much for taking my questions and for the presentation today. I just wanted to start off maybe on your outlook, for the 25% sales growth of continuing operations. Can you maybe just give us a little bit of color about what you expect for in the delivery systems versus the diabetes care segment for the year? Thank you.
On top line? On top line, too, so we don't specifically-
Yes, that's on top line.
I mean, just roughly, both areas will grow in that area. You know, we don't guide yet those individual businesses, but both will have a growth in a double-digit area, but it's not yet guided on a business area level.
Okay. That's helpful. And then maybe just to also come back down to that chart that you showed that was interesting about the midterm sales assumption split between diabetes and obesity, and then others. I was just curious, is it safe to assume that diabetes and obesity is mostly GLP-1, or would you expect a large portion of kind of insulin pens to be in there as well?
So, good question. If you look at those disease areas, we have roughly one-third that will actually remain on insulin. You remember, we still have all the Chinese insulin manufacturers. We have the 2 candidates that are launching in the U.S. with the glargines. We have Mexico, Turkey, Brazil, we have Russia. So a couple of biosimilar markets, obviously on the insulin. Now, this is five years looking ahead. If you look 2030, 2032, I would say 80% is obesity, so obviously the relationship will really go into GLP-1.
Okay, got it. That's very helpful. And then maybe if, if I could just squeeze in one last question here regarding the facilities that you mentioned, the new ones, that was the second one in Thun, and then also the new site in North America. You said they would be gradually ramped up in the second half of 2026 and then mid-2027, respectively. Can you give any kind of color on when you would expect them to be fully commercial, or is that too, too hard to tell?
So, I mean, this is always a bit frustrating if you stand into these huge halls and they are not operating yet. But obviously, it's a stepwise thing. You know, we will build in two phases in Schwerin as well. We will build in one phase in North America. But you can say we are roughly adding, but that's a rule of sum. We are roughly adding 100 million capacity per year, roughly per year. So if you think 2030, we're now 2024, we add 700 additional million. We are now at 300-ish capacity. We reached the 1 billion that we described, so roughly 100 million additional, so we don't really have to care about the building. You know, we amortize that over 40 years, so it doesn't really matter.
It's a bit tough if you look at those big, empty halls, but it gives you peace of mind. You can just move in with lines, and obviously, those halls are not warm yet. So roughly CHF 100 million additional at an average price of CHF 120-ish, CHF 130-ish, you know, obviously a bit lower, other drugs a bit higher. That gives a bit the rule of sum.
Great, that's helpful. Thank you very much. Appreciate it.
Yes, with this, I would like to ask Peter. Peter, are you so kind? We look forward to your question.
Hey, can you hear me fine?
Absolutely.
Yes, clear and loud.
Very good. Thank you. Now, thanks for the opportunity to ask questions. I just had two things. One, when looking at the growth opportunities in auto injector, obviously, there's a lot of focus on GLP-1, but your balance is still expecting extremely high development in the other parts of the auto injector. And I was wondering if you could give any kind of understanding or focus in some of the key projects that you see coming out, disease therapies which you think could drive that on that list, or there's other things that we should think about in terms of the growth of auto injector. And I have another question after that, please.
... So we talk about sales growth, not the innovation R&D?
Yes, sales growth. Sales growth, yes.
So, it's really a broad scheme of applications coming. We still have seven or eight adalimumabs coming. We have Enbrels coming. There is a new drugs in the space of polyarthritis, so it's quite broad. I mean, the first auto injectors for obesity, we are going to launch only in mid-2026. As you know, CagriSema is still under review, so development review. We expect the first delivery to start building up the volumes for market launch mid-2026. So the volumes that we see today, 2025, 2026, is known obesity business obviously. So we are still quite broad here. Does this help?
Yes, it does. Yes, I would assume, as you said, the next, you know, 18 months, two years are mostly be made up of other products. But, that's what I was trying to understand and obviously-
Well, Medac, I think-
Yeah.
I think Medac is obviously important, but if you look at current capacity, the current installed capacity of our two small lines in Switzerland, it's actually four small lines in Switzerland, one ML and 2.2 ML, with a total of roughly 50 million units. They are fully loaded. They are full, on full capacity limit, they run. Then we have two lines, 25 million each, another 50 million up and running, fully to the limit, running in Schwerin. Now we're getting the new 50-60 million unit lines. We are now at the 100 million, and then Medac does roughly one third of it, or maybe a quarter at the moment. So it's quite broad. We have the Teva product, we have migraine, asthma products.
We have the Cosentyx product for Novartis, so it's really broad for psoriasis, for instance.
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Okay, now, thank you. And then you mentioned on obesity, you work with all the players, and obviously we know about one that's pretty significant. But do you... If you give a sense on how you're positioned in the product development pipeline of the obesity market, which is gonna be substantially on auto injector, can you give some sort of sense as to, you know, how broad you are in that market? The extent to which there might be some constraints because of your strong relationship with your Danish partner, just to help understand the opportunities that's developing around that, please.
Oh, absolutely. So first of all, you are of course right that basically auto-injector is the product to go at the moment. But many of the new drugs in obesity will become liquid stable, and not only liquid stable, they will become stable in the sense that they can take more than one shot out of a container. So actually, there will be a revival of pens. If you look at tirzepatide, for instance, also Ozempic, it's actually also available in the FlexTouch pen from Novo or in the KwikPen from Lilly. So there is also a space for pens. Now, as you know, Lilly has both pens and auto-injector in-house, whereas Novo only has pens in-house. That's why Novo needed to reach out to Ypsomed and SHL.
SHL are now delivering for Ozempic, Ypsomed going to deliver for CagriSema. There are a couple of other companies out there, a German large company, a Swiss large company, that will go into the obesity space. There are three Chinese, and we basically are in relationship with all of those five companies. Now, with Lilly, we don't have a contractual relationship yet. We try. There's definitely space for us in certain areas. You could also think about durable device solution, et cetera, et cetera, but there are discussions ongoing. In the end of the day, we have a lot of work at the moment. If we can work with Lilly, we will love to work with Lilly. At the moment, we focus on our o...
On our Novo program, obviously, and the future projects obviously will come 2028, 2029 and 2030 only.
Okay. And if I could just ask a favor, the line was rather poor when you were going through the schedule for diabetes and the disposal process or partnering process of diabetes. Could you just repeat exactly what stage you're looking to be at in November, please?
Oh, in the process? Okay.
Yes.
Yes, of course. Oh, no, I'm happy to give a bit more flavor and describe what we are up to do now. So, our diabetes care business will reach a positive quarter in 2024, 2025, and that's important to reach that. Over the coming nine months, until end of March 2025, we are going to clean up, and we are going to put all assets and all employees and all elements which are diabetes care, including the subsidiaries, including the manufacturing for pump, including the software center in Barcelona. We are moving all those elements into a new Ypsomed Diabetes Care AG. This company is still fully owned by the holding, which is at the stock market, as a sister to the Ypsomed AG as we have it today.
In November, after a market sounding, understanding the interest and the value, potential options for potential buyers, we're going to decide whether we want to start the process or not. But we are most likely going to start the process, so in November, we start the process, formal process. Most likely, it's going to be a sales project, together with a bank, that will then hopefully end in spring-ish, we say signing. Does this help?
Yes, because so it's November 2024, you'll start the process. You'll have the company organized by spring of 2025. Is that right? I got the years right?
Yes, yes.
Okay.
I mean, this is of course, overlapping.
Yeah.
I mean, at the end of the day, you know, we wanna-
That's right
... we wanna have a clear structure, so the transition phase will be lean. We want to describe the asset and want to show a positive quarter. I think these elements are all important for me.
Very good. Appreciate that. Thank you.
Welcome, Peter....
Okay, thanks. Please, we had, we provided a lot of information, a lot of news today. I think there is a couple to digest. We are here very happy to answer your questions, to take your questions. Please, raise your hand, you know this function. Maybe in the meantime, we got one question in the chat, and I'm very happy to take this one, because it's one of the special topics for Simon. It's discussing the tax rate going forward. Yeah. Now, considering Swiss new and OECD law.
No, obviously, I mean, I'm so I'm now, as you know, a member of the Swiss Parliament, so we will most likely going to adapt here as Switzerland again, as the good school boy here, and that we will implement OECD law, OECD by 1st of January 2025. Which means that as of 2025 onwards, every company in Switzerland that has a revenue of EUR 750 million or higher is going to be taxed up to 15% minimum tax. Ypsomed, at the moment, if you look at our tax today, it's very low, it's 4%, but it's mainly due to special effects. If you look at the Swiss tax situation, we are now at 12%, 12.5%. That's a bit what we pay today in Switzerland, so we would be taxed up.
If I look at our midterm plan, if you look at our guidance, obviously we will not reach CHF 750 million yet in the coming business year. We'll be somewhere in the range of CHF 650 million, CHF 670-ish, when you calculate the 25% growth on top of the existing business, minus obviously the needle effect. Now, that being said, we could theoretically be taxed with 15% as of 2026, but because we divest diabetes care with CHF 200 million, we will get another one-year relief until we would enjoy the higher tax as of 2027. Obviously, 15% is a good level. You know, I was involved in that process in the state of Solothurn, and I can really stand behind the 15%. I think it's a fair level, it's a very attractive level.
If you look at Germany, where we tax 30%, we are obviously bringing the tax into Switzerland, as you know. I mean, all those sites in Germany, in the U.S., in China, they have one client, and this client is the house, the home in Switzerland, and this client pays not highest prices. So we actually tax in the sites in America, in Germany, in China, only roughly 7%-8% profit, and the rest profit we bring home and we tax at the lower percent. So I think we have quite a good transfer price system here in place, quite stable and robust. So we shouldn't care too much about the tax topic, but thanks for the question, indeed. I think it's an important topic that we watch.
Thanks, Simon. This was a very interesting discussion and conversation. Curtis, please.
Hi. Yeah, sorry, if you don't mind me jumping in with just a couple more super quick ones. You had discussed on the EBIT expectation for 2024, 2025, there could be a potential one-off for the pen needle business. I don't know, do you have any kind of idea what that might look like or when that might come for the time being?
Yes, Curtis, if I may answer. Simon mentioned, we have disclosed this also. So at the moment, we do actually the closing for the pen needle business. We will have to recycle a goodwill, and it is roughly CHF 10 million. As you know, we do Swiss GAAP FER , so our goodwill is offset in the equity. So at the moment, we divest this business, we have to recycle it through the P&L. It's a transaction which is not cash relevant, but it is one of will come. And also for the rest of the pen needle business, there will be still some sales level, not the level you saw now in the year 2023, 2024, which was still CHF 39 million. So it will, whatever, something between CHF 20 million and CHF 30 million.
Also the loss from this pen and needle business is much smaller than it was. What we showed here, this -CHF 12 million, it will be, if at all, a single-digit million negative amount. So those one-offs are not included in this CHF 90 million EBIT guidance.
Okay.
140.
Sorry, 140.
Okay, got it. Got it. And then just last one. You're talking about this big CapEx investment plan through 2030. I just wanted to double-check two questions here. Number one, can you discuss maybe the phasing? Is it gonna be kind of slow but steady through each year, or some years gonna be higher investment than others? And then secondly, is there a split that you can share between fixed assets and intangible assets? Thank you.
Doesn't talk, huh?
Yeah.
So, let's say on the fixed asset, so the CHF 1.5 million, Curtis, is a fixed asset alone. We have shown on the CapEx sheet that we have spent roughly CHF 70 million, CHF 69 million, CHF 70 million on R&D for intangible assets. And we see this investment in R&D in the magnitude of CHF 60 million also in the future. Now, with about the split of 50/50 between diabetes care and delivery systems, so if you move onwards, obviously the percentage of R&D will be at roughly 5% of the top line figure. So we really go from a double-digit R&D budget into a single-digit R&D budget. So to your first question on the CapEx for investments, it's roughly CHF 250 million-CHF 300 million CapEx for infrastructure, building lines, manufacturing capacity per year.
Sometimes difficult when we pay out, because sometimes we only pay the f—we try to move. Of course, we want to—we are asking our line manufacturers to play the bank, so we don't have to spend the money too early. But, you can have a rule of thumb, it's roughly CHF 250 million per year.
Got it. Thank you very much. Appreciate.
I'm very happy. It's a very lively discussion. I think this is one of the most successful earnings calls we ever had in our history so far, and I'm very happy that Peter also has a question. Peter, please go ahead.
Yeah, thank you, and thank you for having me back. Just two things, one on injection and the other on diabetes. On the injection system, when looking at the R&D part of it, I mean, when you were elaborating on who you're working with also in obesity, I was wondering whether you also have follow-on projects with Novo, whether it be single-chamber to support CagriSema long-term or other of the range of different products that they are also considering and moving through R&D?
Obviously now we are very close to Novo, so is SHL, obviously. But on the single syringe solution, we are pretty close. Obviously, it makes sense that CagriSema stays in the same device from a patient perspective now in the Gerresheimer syringe, in the future, maybe in a BD shot or again, Gerresheimer syringe for us. You're right, I mean, Novo is working on the liquid stable formulation of CagriSema, and we are very much involved in those follow-up programs. There are a couple of other indications or specific versions that are coming, but I cannot give you more details. I mean, you would like to... You need to ask Novo. I think it's a very strong partnership.
Obviously, we understand that this business is so big and important to Novo that they are also looking at options. What we have publicly announced is that also contract manufacturers are going to manufacture our YpsoMate, that only roughly 50% of the overall demand of the YpsoMate objects will actually be manufactured by Ypsomed itself. The other 50% will be manufactured by contract manufacturers. We will get a small license for those. That's a clear agreement, but we are in a strong partnership here.
Okay. No, thank you. And then the other question I had was on the diabetes care. If you look at the infusion set challenge, whether that is sorted out now, whether your ability to use contract manufacturing has come on at this stage, or whether that's later on, just to be able to understand, you know, how it frees you up and the extent to which you can then do more, for example, in France.
Yes. No, of course, it's very important, and we have prepared Convatec in Denmark already two years ago as a backup. We have our volumes in Querétaro with Molex, our contract manufacturing partner. It's basically our Orbit infusion set manufactured manually. We have roughly 250 people there in clean rooms, assembling our infusion sets. And then it's our manufacturing line in clean room one in Schwerin, which is only delivering roughly 3-4 million units per year instead of 6-8 million, and this made us a lot of trouble in the past six months. Now, the second 4 million in Mexico will be up and running in September, October. Together with the better results in Schwerin, we should be okay after summer again, but we really had to...
It was quite frustrating. We had to stop putting patients on the pump for the past three to four months, roughly. That's why we didn't reach the 50,000 in March already. Now we are almost through. We have a team now on the line. You know, this line, we are a bit in a difficult situation. This line was ordered from a contract manufacturer that was shut down. We had the new team on the line, and it was delivered, not finalized yet. This is where we are. I mean, I think we had to back up with bad luck. Everything came together. The demand was above our expectation. I think that's also important to mention. If you look at the demand, it could probably install 3,000-4,000 patients per month.
We now have to still restrict a bit until we have the volumes again, but we look now positive into the future, with our proposition.
That's great. Thank you very much for the help.
So excellent. More questions. So this is really a very exciting and thrilling earnings call. We have Felix. Felix, are you so kind? We look forward to your question now. Should appear. Felix, can you... sorry.
He not here. Yeah, he has to unmute, Felix, I think.
Felix, unmute on your end.
Yes, now?
Oh, yeah, now it's clear. Excellent.
Okay, very good. Happy to contribute to the lively discussion after unmuting. My question will be more on the balance sheet than how do you intend to finance this CapEx of CHF 1.5 billion, and to what extent do you need external financing, and how far would you go in net debt to EBITDA levels? You're around 4x now. Would you go further beyond that? Thank you.
Yeah, thank you, Felix, for that question. Yeah, as you mentioned, at the moment, this net debt EBITDA is around 1x. And have in mind, in that five years, we also will generate a lot of operating cash flow. Basically, also over these five years, it will be much more than CHF 1 billion, we will generate, but in those next few years, we will have a need for finance, but our balance sheet is solid enough that we can still take that on our balance sheet, those additional debt. And, with not even increasing our net debt EBITDA level significantly, it might go up to a level of 2x net debt EBITDA, but we are in a solid position to finance that. Simon, you add a few.
No, no, absolutely.
I think, I mean, those negative free cash flows don't really worry us. As Samuel mentioned, we are at a very healthy balance sheet, and we have a clear understanding in the board and the team that we are not going to do any capital increase or dilution. We are really working with our current model, and maybe try to optimize a bit with local currencies for China. But over that, we have a clear way forward, and then as Samuel said, I mean, the cash will pay back, and eventually diabetes care will actually support on that process as well. That might be proceeds.
Thank you.
So excellent. With this, we reached four o'clock local time. If there are no further questions, I would close this call. Thank you for your interest and your trust, and if you have any further questions, please feel free to reach out. We are happy to support you. So thanks a lot. Have a nice day. See you. Bye.