We'd like to now move on to the Q&A.
This time, you announced the medium-term plan. Bob commented that it's ambitious and conservative. There are different views. My personal impression is that it's a little conservative, especially about top line. In the final year, it's 5%, but there's three, four, and five. The average of the MedTech company is the single digit, sorry, the middle of the single digit, and get closer to the latter half of the single digit. That's what the global MedTech companies aim for. It is lower than that. Maybe the medical device companies have a long development period. Probably one of the reasons is that the development is taking a little longer than expected. You talked about the various innovations that you're promoting.
As a result of these, in the longer term, for example, in five years, is it possible to go beyond 5% growth?
Thank you for the question. For the characterization of the plan, you're right that the markets that we exist in are mid-single-digit markets, and it is our full intention to grow at or above those markets. We want to do it in a way that earns our credibility and shows results. We're excited, though, about our pipeline, as you mentioned, both organic pipeline as well as our opportunities for partnerships and joint ventures like you saw us do previously. Look, I'm optimistic about the future of Olympus, very optimistic. I think the mid-year plan that we've outlined here steps us into that. Believe me, where there's more growth to go get, we'll go get it. We won't stop.
Thank you. Just one follow-up question. Olympus history, especially in the past three to five years, the R&D has slowed down in relation to the FDA. In order to accelerate that, what Bob wants to do, specifically, if you can talk about potential measures that you can take.
Thank you for your second question. To accelerate R&D, our new Chief Technology Officer, Syed Naveed, we've introduced a new model of innovation inside of Olympus, number one. Two, we're focusing very specifically on the technology that is most impactful to our strategic plan, which meant stopping some programs that were taking up resources that were not going to contribute in the short term. The businesses, both GIS and SI, are very clear on the organic technology. You start to see some momentum of those launches even here in Q2. I talked about the EDOF scopes and these other ones we talked about. We're going to continue to sharpen our focus in terms of what we innovate and how we innovate it.
I would encourage you to think about innovation, which you saw us do this past quarter as well with MacroLux, the distribution agreement with the Gore Biliary Stent, that we will continue to look for external relationships that can inflect growth as well. That is our focus. We are changing the way we think about R&D. We are changing what we do and how we do it, and making sure that we are spending our time and energy on those innovations that matter most. Thank you for your time.
Thank you very much.
I would like to ask about the management strategy, the assumptions behind that. This time, if you look at the numbers, 3% is the starting point, and then 4% and 5%, there will be a gradual increase. That is the assumption. In the next fiscal year, you are starting from a lower base with a growth rate. Ideally, U.S. and China, EDOF scope and EVIS X1. There is also product cycle, first half. Also, there could be a recovery in China as well because of the production. It is not necessarily the case that in the first half, the growth rate will be lower. Can we expect upside there? You are going to proceed with M&As, that's what you said. The opportunities for business development have not been incorporated in your forecast, like revenue growth rate target.
Have you incorporated that, or just organic growth?
Thank you for the question. Then I'll actually ask Frank and Seiji to comment on the innovations within each of their businesses, because you're right that the first strategic pillar is innovation-driven growth. That is all about our innovation. We are very focused on those launches that you talked about, but also you are correct to point out that we expect strength in the regional markets as well. I am not anticipating a quick recovery in China, but I am anticipating a recovery in China. We know the market has changed in China, certainly with the Buy China policy, which is why you saw us take steps to localize in China. We have also changed our commercial model in China. We are seeing good things. It is not just local products.
Just this past week, we got approval, an NMPA approval for the EU-ME3, which is one of our products coming into China. We see China as an important market, but I'm tempered because it is taking us a long time to get there. Before I turn it over to Frank and Seiji, no, we don't put inorganic opportunities into our forecast. We would look at that to accelerate it. We would look at that. As you know, M&A, and I'd also just comment, you know, when I think about M&A, it's not just buying a company, as you know, it can be a distribution deal. It can be a joint venture like we saw with Swan EndoSurgical. It could be taking an equity stake in a startup as well. All of those broadly business development.
Frank, why don't we start with you and then go to Seiji and talk about the innovation, that, that's driving our sense of our ability to compete and win in the marketplace.
Yes. Thanks for the question, Uedu-san. The biggest drivers, I think, will be in America for GI business, the completion of the X1 scope portfolio. You probably heard about the therapeutic scope that is desperately needed and also the completion of the endoscopic ultrasound scope portfolio. Those two things will happen within FY, so the next fiscal year. That's also why we are seeing a little bit of a continuous recovery to the middle single digit, but we do not see a quick jump. In China, it is a bit similar. We now are super proud and happy that we have managed to get not only the approval from the authorities to build actually in our factory, but we now also know how to get approvals for the individual products and the sales license, basically.
Nevertheless, before we will have the full portfolio available, it was a ramp-up phase. That is where these three, four, five messages are coming from. Finally, another growth driver for GI gastrointestinal endoscopy will be the single-use endoscopy. You have maybe seen on the slide, lots of information on there, obviously, but the single-use scope will be launched end of next calendar year. That is second half of the fiscal, and it was initially launched in Japan and the United States only. It means we are always having these staggered regulatory-induced launch phases. Therefore, we feel that with this and the exclusion of additional target use, especially for GIET, we are showing a very realistic growth ramp with our plan here.
Thanks, Frank. Seiji?
Yes. Thank you. No.
Yeah, Kuramoto from SIS. Thank you for your question. For the short term, as was said, there are new products, especially EVIS X1 and Bronchoscope. We are focusing on those, in launching new products, especially, Narrow EBUS, is, there is a good new product, so we can expect short-term growth from there. This year, this has finally been launched. The sales will be driven in next year or the year after next. In the midterm, this Bronchoscope and EVIS X1 EBUS and also Urethroscope and PHB, the, so we are looking at the system development. That is where we are growing. As for single use, this is one of the growth levers. The Macrolux collaboration is good to be started. As for single use, it is not just standalone products, but in the Urethroscope, you can combine with other solutions.
We can provide those to have integrated ones with higher values so that we can have midterm growth.
Thank you very much. Follow-up question. The sales growth that you talked about, how are they going to impact profits? What you explained, like 100 basis point improvement per year, has been mentioned. Global personal optimization and productivity improvement, I think this could contribute a lot in achieving that. New production, products, and innovation could further improve margin. Is that also the case?
Correct. That's the right way to frame it, which is we certainly are taking the restructuring actions that you just talked about. Of course, profit accretion comes from us launching new products as well and getting good prices for those new products. So those three or four elements come together to give us a margin accretion story as we build our way over the midterm plan.
Thank you very much. That's all the questions I have.
First question is in emerging markets, the strategy of Endoscope. I'd like to know some details about the midterm plan. U.S. is the biggest market, I understand. In the medium to long term, Asia-Pacific region, I think, would be very important. In the midterm plan, the low-end product portfolio, you are considering the options to provide them to the global market. Is it included in this three-year plan? Conventionally, you have an EVIS X1 model, high-end. With the other products, the number of components change and the efficiency of production change. From those perspectives, the strategy of the emerging markets from the revenue and the profit perspective, what is your plan in coming three years?
Yeah, thank you for the question. I'll have Frank talk specifically about some of the GI in the emerging markets. You're right to frame it that what's included in the plan I presented is not necessarily new products or different products. When I spoke about that, I think that's an opportunity for us to expand our portfolio and look at different product offerings, but that's not included in the plan. That would be additional to what we could do in the plan. We as a leadership team see growth in emerging markets as a fundamental growth driver. You saw us grow 20% here. It's been a consistent double-digit growth driver for us. It's those things I mentioned, right? It's doing smart things with the commercial model, smart things with physician training, smart things around the infrastructure.
But then I think your question also spoke to a little bit about the innovation. And, Frank, I think it would be great for you to reflect on, you know, the portfolio you see bringing into emerging markets for GIS.
Yes, with pleasure. Maybe first, a bit of nomenclature as well in terms of what we consider emerging markets. When we look at our regions and the growth rates you see from APEC, for example, are heavily influenced by, you mentioned Asia-Pacific area, and for example, India is growing heavily. We look at the 20% coming mainly from Latin America and the Middle East and Africa. We have created a dedicated team to look especially after those markets, which are typically distributor markets. As Bob just pointed out, we are mainly focusing on gastrointestinal training and education and support of procedural development there. We have in the past, offered, coming now to the product segmentation, we have offered two to three different price level layers of GI endoscopy, and we are still offering that in some of those markets.
We are actively considering at the moment the opportunities that might come from products that could help us also in the quickly growing Chinese low and mid-end segments. That goes a bit back to one of the earlier questions. To develop that ourselves and to bring them to all these emerging markets takes time. Again, that's why it's not immediately in here. We are looking also at other options to secure a lower and mid-end, still low-best quality level, GI portfolio. In the meantime, we are actively looking at the opportunity in those markets by playing with our existing portfolios and adjusting price levels accordingly to the needs of those segments.
Thanks, Frank.
Okay, thank you very much. A follow-up question. The development in relation to development, the page six of the medium-term plan, there is a lineup forecast. So EVIS X1, which is one of the major products in the new development plan up to March 29, it is not included. It will be later than this. It is, to, the next one. I would like to know the prospect of the system, of the development for the next one.
Frank, you want to take that?
Should I comment?
Yeah.
Yes. Okay. Sorry. There's always a slight delay in hearing you. Yeah, you are right. We are having the big R&D teams working on the innovation that we are planning to bring into the successor of the X1 platform. I think it will not be surprising to understand that a lot of the plans here are hinging around the intelligent ecosystem that Bob has explained in the earlier part of the session. We see a huge opportunity to incorporate elements of those intelligent and AI-based features into the core box, which today is primarily focused on imaging. We also have some groundbreaking ideas for the design of the new endoscope features and manipulation systems. All of that is at the moment not put into this three-year picture.
We are, as you know, only at the early stages of X1 rollout in America and in China. The scope portfolio is still coming out. It will take another few years before we will launch the next generation. All guns are blazing basically in R&D on that product generation already.
Thanks, Frank.
Understood. Thank you very much.
My question is for Bob. Let me just focus on 2027. The 3% growth next year and 1% margin expansion next year is, quite frankly, very surprising. With all the innovation in EVIS X1, Slim EBUS, EU-ME3 ultrasound launch in the U.S. and China, AutoSense, et cetera, I still do not quite understand. Like, I think you guys described what the innovation that is going on, but can you explain what is holding back the growth? Is it the possibility of launching lower price products and thereby lowering the growth rate? Is it the restriction that will hold back growth in the short term, like we saw with China this first half? And, you know, if you could just explain what is holding back the growth, because, you know, not many Japanese companies are forecasting 3% growth next year, constant currency.
If we're assuming just 1% margin expansion next year, are we no longer on track to getting rid of the JPY 10 billion and the other costs from the FDA remediation? Just first point, just on 2027.
Yeah. No, thank you for the question. And thank you for the characterization that you feel the proposed plan is a bit conservative. There's nothing holding us back other than putting together a track record of delivering consistent results. I think, you know, when we saw Q1, we were in a hole, we need to work our way out of that. You saw that, you saw us begin to do that in Q2. Hopefully you'll see that through the back half of the year. We just want, we want to deliver consistent, reliable results. We feel great about the opportunity ahead of us. As these product launches take traction, and you were right to call out a few, we think that presents us with upside to deliver, you know, more than the plan.
We wanted to give you a number that I said at the beginning, some would argue might be overly conservative, but it's one that as we reestablish our credibility in Olympus, we look forward to it. I take the challenge, the entire team takes the challenge, but there's nothing structurally that's holding us back, right? We feel good about the pipeline. We think we've de-risked China in terms of where it stands in it. Of course, we still are working through issues. I don't mean to say we're all the way through our issues, but I would say I take the comment on 2027, call it conservative, but we believe it's obviously achievable.
At least the JPY 10 billion and other costs from the FDA remediation, that's still on track to be, we could get rid of that next year. It's just not included in the forecast.
Yeah, I'll have Izumi-san talk specifically about kind of the quality. You know, as I mentioned during the remarks, we expect some of the FDA inspections to complete this calendar year. Of course, the full timing is up to the agency, so we don't know that. As I've committed to you previously, we know that we are spending twice the industry average in quality, but we're going to finish everything, right? We want to finish our quality remediation. And we're at a very important point with the agency as we come through these investigations. It's our plan to absolutely walk that down. Izumi-san, I'll let you comment specifically in terms of where it is in the financials.
Hi, CFO Izumi from. Let me make some additional comments from Izumi. Elevate cost, as you said, in total up to the second quarter, what will come out as SG&A is JPY 55 billion in total, JPY 10 billion. That is what Kawano talked about. The elevate program, as Bob said, will be completed in this fiscal year. It is not classified as the elevate category. JPY 10 billion under other expenses will be resolved in this fiscal year. QARA, the normal QARA, will incur the cost. That will be the normal MedTech average ratio against the sales. JPY 10 billion will be gone, but SG&A will be increased slightly, right? It is not the expense under elevate will be, this will be severe, but there is a cost of QARA, and that will absorb all the cost.
Just this final question is for anyone who understands the gastrointestinal space, what we should be laser focused on is endoluminal surgery.
Yeah.
What happened in the, for with Intuitive in the, you know, the general surgery, what's happened in MAKO in the, the orthopedic procedures is probably going to happen in endoscopy. To be honest, you're behind in the race. There are companies who are doing first in human trials or have done some. How, what's the timeline for the endoluminal surgery? When are we going to see robots doing ESD? That's my final question.
Yeah, thanks for the question. I would characterize it very differently than you characterize it though. While there certainly are other technologies in the marketplace, nobody's doing it at scale. What we've created with Swan EndoSurgical, as we've talked about, is absolutely a breakthrough technology that yes, we have to solve technical risks, clinical risks, and market risks. We're not giving a specific timeframe on Swan, but what I want the takeaway to be is that's not our only focus. We have multiple activities underway in endoluminal robotics because I share your view that this is a transformational opportunity. I would differ with you saying that I believe Olympus is going to lead this way here. We're going to lead it at scale.
We're excited about where we're at with Swan, the technology development, the team that's in place, but understand we're looking at the entire ecosystem and we'll continue to add to that, with other opportunities internally and externally.
Just as a clarification, you said Swan Endosurgical, but also there are other avenues.
Correct. And those that I'm not going to disclose publicly yet, but, you know, we view this ecosystem and the opportunity to add to that is also within our strategy remit.
Understood. Thank you. Thank you very much.
About margin, I have a question. This time, the three-year plan, 1% point to 100 basis point improvement per year, fiscal year 2026, starting with fiscal year 2026. Right now, the FY 2026, your plan adjusted OP is 16%. In three years, that would be 19%. That is your target. In the past, under Takeuchi-san, I think 20% was aimed and even higher than 20%. I think that was a target. In comparison, a target is now lower, it seems. During the time or the past, to have a lower target, are there any reasons for that? If so, I would appreciate if you can elaborate on them.
No, thanks for the question. We may have had a target in the past to get to 20%, but we never got there, right? As we step our way with 100 basis points improvement, we're not stopping at 20%. We're not stopping at 19%. We see opportunities to go past that. As I mentioned, our aspiration is to be at industry norms for both revenue growth, operating margin, et cetera, cost, et cetera. Look, I think what you're seeing here and what you're sensing is maybe the plan's too conservative. Maybe there's upside, but we're going to earn our way and deliver accretion in margin, and in a credible way that you can add to it. If we can do it faster, we'll certainly do it faster. We have plenty of opportunities to do that.
That is where the plan is today. Izumi-san, anything to comment on the margin, please.
Yes. So 20% in our view as our target, what to do about the 20%, is it achievable? Was discussed internally. As Bob said, we have to really be realistic. We have to make sure that we have a plan achievable. 20% within three years, that was not the commitment that we are willing to make now, but we have not yet given up. FY 2026, 2027, 2028, 2029, we'll gradually increase and then ultimately 20% or higher. We have not given up on that. Toward that, we'll be accumulating our industry, that we fully understand that it's not easy to increase the margin. We have been realistic in this plan, but of course that we have not yet given up on achieving 20%.
Thank you. Follow-up question. So 2,000 position reduction you mentioned. The one-time expenses, if it's likely to incur, what is the size of it and the timing of it?
Yes, I would like to respond. CFO speaking. As a one-time expense in relation to the 2,000 position reduction, direct cost probably would be about JPY 30 billion or so. Out of this, we have disclosed today that the forecast is JPY 12 billion for the other expenses that is included. In coming two years, JPY 30 billion is for coming two years. That is how you should look at it. March 26 in the guidance, you have not changed it. It is included or it was included already. Okay. About the reduction, it's not something that we decided all of a sudden. It was factored in.
That's something that we already included. No change.
Got it. Thank you very much. That's all.
I'd like to ask about the difference between plan and actual results in second quarter in more detail, especially in the U.S. and China and Japan. GIS situation is what I'd like to ask about.
Your question is about difference between plan and actual results. In what sense are you referring to that?
The market prices or especially in the U.S. and China and Japan, is there any difference from your initial assumption? From that perspective, of course, you haven't changed the plan. You are in line with the plan probably, but if you can give us more colors, if there is any difference that you saw from your assumption.
I thought you were asking a different question. No, when we looked at the plan in those key markets, we largely delivered what we thought we would do, which is what I said at the first quarter earnings call, right? There were some puts and takes, relative to launches of technology, but we saw strength where we thought we would see strength in those markets. Largely our internal plan, you know, what we worked our way through the quarter was how we anticipated it. There were not surprises that shocked us. We delivered our plan and based on what we thought we would do.
Thank you. What about China? Is that also in line with your assumption? No worsening situation there?
Yeah, you know, going forward, China is in a line. We, of course, do not disclose quarterly targets in China. What I look for is the leading indicators in China, which are, are we getting our manufacturing licenses? Are we producing locally made products? Are we getting approval for imported products like the EU-ME3, like I talked about, which we did see? Are we, is the commercial structure, which we altered, executing well? I look at the indicators of what we are doing in China and it is where I thought it would be, candidly. We continue to deal with everything that everybody else is dealing with in terms of the Buy China Policy. Again, I am optimistic about the long-term outlook for China.
Thank you very much. In the U.S., EDOF Scope launch will accelerate the revenue from the third quarter in particular. Is that correct understanding?
We saw an acceleration. Frank, I actually think it'd probably be good for you to talk about the market dynamics in the U.S. with EDOF, but we saw a nice order pipeline being established. We like where the order pipeline is. We're really pleased with the customer reception of the Scope. Frank, why don't you give a sense in terms of the back half of the year?
Yeah, I would also add maybe one or two sentences on your China question, because I think we started the year in both countries or regions, China and America, in Q2, with results that were below our expectations in China. I think it was partly the big commercial rebuild of our organization, but also the lack of any locally made products. We have now seen in China for the last two months that the numbers fit exactly to our predictions. We really see it very slow, but steady recovery also of the market demand. Therefore we are optimistic about the second half and the future there when we slowly bring in these locally manufactured products step by step.
Similar kind of delay where we, we kind of underestimated the time it took for the EDOF scopes to translate from demos to orders and revenue. Again, the last two months we have observed very carefully and especially October now, the first month of the current quarter has shown that America is delivering, as Bob said, according to the plans and expectations which we had. Now we are basically on track to recover the weak Q1, which we discussed last time around.
Thanks, Frank.
Thank you very much. A simple, follow-up question on the previous one. FDA re-inspection, will be complete in the, by the end of calendar year 2025. Is that what you said?
I thank you for the question. What I said is some of our inspections we would expect to be complete in calendar year, this calendar year. The full completion, we do not know yet. That is up to the agency, but we would expect some of those to be complete this year.
Okay. Thank you very much. That's all.
Thank you.
I would like to know about the organizational reform. It's a simple question. So 2,000 position reduction and JPY 24 billion cost reduction specifically, what kind of positions would be reduced? Is it front, middle, back? Of course, are there segments? Maybe it's in headquarters. Could you give us more details? The reason why I'm asking is that, for example, the SG&A ratio is historically high. Efforts to lower that have been done for a long time. Unfortunately, the results of the reduction of the SG&A have not been great. One of your strengths, of course, is that in different regions of the world, you have a maintenance, repair and maintenance network, and that's how you are improving, increasing the satisfaction of the customers. I think that it might be difficult for you to reduce.
2,000 position reduction was explained, but you did not manage to do something similar in the past. In coming two years, to what extent you can achieve that? If you can talk about your confidence level or anything about that.
Thank you for the question. Let me address it very specifically. The 2,000 headcount reduction is not just a standalone headcount reduction. It is part of a new Olympus operating model in which we changed our core of how we're structured. In moving to a division structure, what that identified was a number of redundancies in corporate, in region, in other functions. When you ask the question, where's it coming from? This is a complete across the board impact of Olympus. Every region, every function, every business is part of the restructuring. It's not limited to a specific business, which to the second part of your question, why does it give me confidence that we can execute these? It is because we've changed the operating model. We've fundamentally changed the operating model.
We're also introducing what we're calling the Olympus Management System, which is why I talked about accountability and simplicity as the two pillars of our strategic pillars. Simplicity being, we changed the model. Accountability means, well, how do you run it? Where we may have struggled in the past, this is very detailed, very precise, very execution oriented on the reduction. As Izumi-san said, I mean, you know, various countries take place at different times for obviously good reasons. While it begins this fiscal year, we'll contend it'll extend into FY 2027. The point, Watsonabi-san, I leave you with is this is not a one-time thing. We think about becoming more efficient every day inside of Olympus, right? We're going to continue to look for efficiencies and productivity gains as we move forward.
We took this big step because this fit with the change of the operating model, but we're going to continue to drive efficiencies throughout Olympus. It's just our new way of doing business. Hopefully that answers the question.
[Foreign language] Thank you. Follow-up. What you said, the business model, being changed. Today, in a series of explanations, the plan is conservative, but you're aiming for upside. By changing the business model, for example, sales opportunities might be as good as you expected. Is that the kind of risk?
No, I actually don't see, thanks for the question, by the way. I don't see sales opportunities as a risk. I, not at all. I really think this lean division-led operating model allows us to focus very acutely on sales and making sure we have the right people focused on the right opportunities because the division's now driving the P&L. The prior structure may have served Olympus well, but we had a lot of people in a lot of different places and we're streamlining that. The focus, the customer centricity, I think is enhanced in this model. I don't view sales execution as a risk in the model.
Great. Thank you very much for the clarification. Thank you.
Thanks for taking my question. I wanted to ask about your market share in GI Endo scopes. The growth scenario you've presented today implies a decline in market share, at least in the short term. Bob, I was wondering if you could share, please share with us your diagnosis of the underlying problem. Is it, for example, a function of you having lost your technological edge or are there other reasons? Looking ahead, do you see a path back to at least stabilizing your market share? If so, could you share that with us, please?
Yeah, thanks, Steven. A very good question. Look, we have been a shared donor in certain segments of the marketplace and in certain geographies. You know, we're absolutely focused on fixing that. That's what you see. That's driven first through our innovation-driven growth pillar of our strat plan, which is why we're very focused on specific fill-the-gap portfolios in GI, of course also in SIS, but then augmenting that externally as well with technology partnerships, other innovation opportunities to get us back because it's not our intent. In fact, we're fully committed to get back to being on par or leading the marketplace. The cause is, or was, as you suggested, that, you know, our innovation had slowed down. That's where our focus, first strategic pillar, is getting back on our innovation. Thanks for the question.
I have a question to Bob. Today, many questions were on the business, midterm plan and the strategies. At the same time, until now, the short-term, quarterly, performance delivery have been unstable. Based on that, the second half, Q3, Q4 delivery, to do this in line with the plan is going to be very important. At the same time, U.S., China, Q2 recovered from Q1, but implied assumption for the second half probably is a little bit high. Market expectation is low. I think Bob understands that. Maybe, this number is set intentionally. Visibility, where is, is the visibility come from? What are the reasons?
Thank you for the question. I believe you framed your question correctly about the second half of the year, given we saw some progress in Q2, but our guidance implies continued progress in Q3 and Q4. You are absolutely correct. Our confidence in that is built on our new product launches that we have begun to see in these key markets that we have talked about, our commercial execution as well. What we do is we look at our leading indicators. What is the sales pipeline? What is the conversion of that pipeline? What is the release of new products into each of those markets? That is what gives us confidence about the second half of the year. You are right. I mean, that is what we are focused on.
The growth will need to accelerate, but it's growth that we believe is based on fundamentals of products, of execution, of approval, and underlying market recovery. We're not anticipating a huge recovery, as Frank said, in China, but we're expecting a recovery in China. We expect strength in the United States. We expect strength in Europe, and we expect continued strength in APAC. I think we're well positioned.
Thank you very much. Q3, because of the seasonality, it could be weaker than Q2, historically speaking. This seasonality trend, this we believe, should we prepare, this would be about the same?
I wouldn't say so. I know we could look at every year and say there's seasonality in every year, but the dynamics, I think, of each year is set up differently because you think about the dynamics of when products come to the US or these other markets, you know, we start to see new products enter other markets. Certainly we look at seasonality all the time, but I also then step back and say, what are the leading indicators that we should feel? Like I said, I believe in our plan for the back half of the year and what it implies.
Thank you. One more thing. In July, Bob, I did a group call and what you said then, market choice is important, you said. This time in this strategy, the business portfolio, if necessary, you might be reshuffling, but you did not mention that today. At this moment, although you did not mention it in the strategy, are there any businesses that, or the product categories that, you have some concerns about? I would like to know. If it is difficult for you to say specifically, if you can say that there are any, anything or not. Thank you.
Shibano-san, thanks, thanks for the answer. Let me frame, or thanks for the question. The answer is really clear. Every single business in Olympus gets reviewed for its fit in the portfolio, its revenue growth, its profitability, its pathway to leadership, which is why we are now much more disciplined in terms of capital allocation, in terms of who gets invested and what does not. I am not prepared to announce anything, but know that we constantly look at our portfolio and see do we have a pathway to leadership with a specific business and what is its role in the portfolio. You would expect us to continue to do that.
Thank you very much.