Good morning, everybody. I welcome you to our digital Austrian Select Conference. Today, you will have the chance to digitally meet 11 interesting companies from Austria from all different sectors and all different market cap segment. The format is the same for each company, and the ones that have attended our conferences before are quite used to it. 30-minute slots, 20 minutes presentation, 10 minutes Q&A. As always, in the Q&A, please feel free to enter questions in your chat box on the lower right-hand corner, and we will address them during our Q&A. Please also note that we will record the sessions, and we'll post them later on on Research Hub for your convenience. Now let's get started with the first company, which is Bajaj Mobility, and the company will not be presented by the CFO but by the CEO this time, Gottfried Neumeister.
I'm very happy to have you with us, and let's get the show on the road.
Good morning, everybody. This is Gottfried Neumeister. I'm really happy to be able to speak to you. It's only our second conference, which we're participating. We have waited really a very long time up until we went out and said we are now ready to communicate really success and milestones. And tell about the progress we're seeing, and this is what I would like to start. I will lead you through an presentation we put together, which summarizes the most important achievements of the last 18 months. Yeah, then we will have a Q&A sessio. Where I'm super happy to answer any of your questions you might have. In summary, just a little recap on the timeline. In November. I just only joined the company in September 2024. After a couple of weeks, we had to file for insolvency.
It was insolvency with self-administration, so we kept in control. And yeah, managed to go through that insolvency process in Austria, which ended in a restructuring plan. Yeah, several milestones as to say, most importantly, we have survived. We have resumed production, fought against all those odds of really reviving a company which was in a standstill for, yeah, nine months at the end. There was the change of control with Bajaj, which brought back really the confidence, that really also in the long run, there is enough attention and also funds to really turn around that company. We had another major milestone, which you were able to read through the ad hoc statements that we were able to refinance ourselves, really for substantially improved terms, incredible terms. I will touch upon those later. That's just a little bit the journey, how the company has developed.
The majority of those issues we will talk about over the next slides. The headline of the restructuring was always simplification and focus. You see it here in four bullet points. Most importantly, KTM had a homegrown problem. It was not a market problem that the market was all of a sudden shrinking, or that the costs were all of a sudden too high, or products were not well-received. There were four incidents, let's say, which led to that insolvency. Number one, we invested into bicycle business, which cost us more than EUR 400 million. We invested in MV Agusta, an Italian motorcycle brand. The total investment also was more than EUR 220 million in liquidity, both together more than EUR 600 million. This led to the situation the company was in.
Thirdly, we unfortunately for a couple of years ignored the retail development and simply pushed out more wholesales into the market and therefore built up high inventories. As said, I will touch upon those in detail, but those were the major points which led to that crisis. The fourth point was that it was a very unstable financing structure at the end, with EUR 600 million drawn in only working capital lines, which were until further notice. Those were uncommitted lines and as said at the end, the only way out was to file for an insolvency. Coming back to those bullet points and really the achievements over the last 18 months. First of all, refocus. We managed to really focus ourselves back to our roots, which is motorcycle business. We got rid of the bicycle business, which I said cost us roughly EUR 400 million.
The bicycle business itself was diverse. It was our own assembly. We had also brands like Raymon and Felt, so we were able to sell those. We sold the last bicycles already at the end of the year. We managed to get rid of X-Bow. X-Bow, for those of you who don't know it, was the car, an incredible super technical product, but we were only selling 36 of them, and this did not help to drive motorcycle sales, and therefore we said we need to focus. MV Agusta, I mentioned the Italian brand, produced 2,500 motorcycles a year compared to 300,000 when I arrived. I said, where are the synergies? What sense does it make to combine it? There was no possibility to combine it in production and drive synergies.
If we Austrians would have told the Italians how to do the design, it would have not been a good idea, so also not possible. Most importantly, even in sales, in MV Agusta, sales were 40,000 on a marble floor next to La Scala in Milan. Yeah, even in sales, there were no synergies with our dirt bikes or other vehicles. Therefore we said, no, we need to focus on our core business and our own brands. CFMOTO, just to be precise, we do have a very good and productive joint venture in China to produce motorcycles there. We had taken over the responsibility to distribute them in Europe, and this is something which we deliberately stopped, also amicably with CFMOTO, because we said we need to focus on our own three brands.
That's just in a nutshell, some bullet points when it comes to refocus, when we talk about reducing complexity. On one hand, just to also give you some examples, we had more than 80 entities, or we had 86 entities. It's always easy to open up a new company. It's more difficult to close it, to merge it, or to liquidate it. But we are now also working to really streamline our corporate structure to make it leaner, and really a faster organization. You see what we have already achieved in 2026. I think we can at least cut down another 10 companies- 15 companies. We will, yeah, also in the future, update you on that progress.
Reduce complexity also in terms of our product portfolio is a very important topic because the complexity of the product portfolio was driving, especially also the R&D expenses. Which in 2024 reached the absolute peak, the summit of EUR 250 million, and we were amongst the 500 companies of the world with the highest R&D spend globally. This included all pharmaceutical companies, all oil companies, and whatsoever. We unfortunately managed to get into that ranking. This R&D spend we had was also caused by an incredibly large portfolio, and I'm just giving you an example. Only in the off-road, we had 177 different models, and you might argue, Gottfried, 98 is still a lot, but those 98 are broken down over three brands, and we have displacements which others don't offer.
Most of our competitors, like Kawasaki and Yamaha, would only have 250 cc and 450 cc, but the USP of KTM is really that from 250 cc- 300 cc, to a 350 cc- 400 cc, 450 cc and 500 cc, all those displacements are covered. Nevertheless, we had to streamline our SKUs, so we cut out models which were not selling more than 400 pieces or units a year, got rid of championship editions. This was also an important exercise, even within our portfolio, to streamline the portfolio without sacrificing future growth and without cannibalizing the market itself. Also, complexity reduction in terms of our corporate structure. When I arrived, there were seven Board members. We are today three Board members.
I'm super happy that I managed to convince Petra Preining to join me already last September, coming from AT&S. So she's highly experienced, had an exposure both with entrepreneurs, both on the capital market, was managing a company which had a leverage of seven. Managed to get EUR 1.2 billion of additional financing, and ever since she joined, really, it was a big relief. Before, for 12 months, I was literally alone, trying to manage it. She's really the best wingman which I could have anticipated, and yeah, since September, we have given a further push. I'm equally happy also, Steven Rabe, who just joined on 1st of April. He's coming from BMW. You get a feeling that we are really building up an independent team.
This is maybe also one of the questions, but Charles very clearly said. Very happy as a shareholder to be on a Supervisory board, but KTM and Bajaj Mobility should be independent and also have an independent management team. Therefore, I'm super happy to bring on expertise from different areas, and especially also Steven Rabe coming from BMW Motorrad, and bringing also additional expertise. That's just in terms of the management team. Unfortunately, I just realized when I'm jumping over, there was also a slide which showed our corporate structure and our pyramid, just to tell you. I really always wanted to start from top and lead by example. We had a leading span of 1- 2.4 in the company. Therefore, there was this announcement at the beginning of the year that we have to lay off another 500 people.
Some press were writing KTM is in a crisis. This was really a necessary step to streamline the organization and to increase the ratio from 1- 2.4 to now 1- 6, which is somewhat healthy. Again, we started from top. We had 44 Vice Presidents in the company, and we have now cut down the 44 to 22. Getting a lot leaner, a lot faster. This is also important when we talk about reducing the complexity overall. You see here how the company has developed over the last, I would say, two years. From end of 2023, 6,100 or 6,200 people came down to 3,800 end of 2025. We have now started another reduction at the beginning of 2026. Where I would say 98% is already done and dusted, which should bring a EUR 50 million saving per year.
We're, because we still have notice periods, we'll see roughly, I would say, a little bit less than half this year already effective, but a full annualized saving of EUR 50 million next year to come. This is just the topic of reducing complexity. As said, summarized both the legal entities, our model reduction, and our overall corporate structure. Inventory reduction was a very important topic. How do you manage to reduce it? First of all, I would like to show you the curve which we have built up. This is not to be the smart guy afterwards, because I think everyone here on the call or in the table would have decided the same in 2020. Just to draw your attention, there's the yellow bar and the orange bar. The yellow bar reflects the retails on the market. The orange bar is our wholesale.
In 2020, because of Corona, people wanted to put on a helmet and enjoy the freedom. First time the retail was higher than the wholesale. Of course, anticipating that maybe the retail will continue to grow, the orange bar was increased in 2021 to reflect this higher demand. As said, I think this is a very reasonable and perfect decision to do so. What you see is that in 2021, we sold more wholesales than retails, and we continued to do so in 2022 and 2023. This led really to a high wave of inventory, which you will see hopefully then also on the next slide. All- in- all, more than 120 units were built up. Yeah, here you can see it. Peak times, there were close to 290,000 vehicles on stock, more than one year of demand.
The gray shows our internal stock. The orange is the dealer and importer stock. Both combined added up to, as said, 290,000 vehicles. You saw on the previous slide that when I arrived in 2024, the last quarter, I tried to still jump on both brakes and say we need to stop making sales with 360 days payment terms. This was one of the main reasons also for that insolvency. The working capital had expanded like a chewing gum but never went back because in the pursuit in achieving higher and higher sales, at the end, we gave, as said, 360 days payment terms, and filled up the channel with an incredible amount. The good news for you today. We managed to reduce 100,000 units last year. There was this compromise. How can you cure such a problem?
You cannot stop the production for a full year because you will lose all the skilled people. There is also only a certain group of people who will, or customers, who would like to buy a motorcycle because of a discount. Yes, you can incentivize them and say, this model year, I give you 20% discount. There is a group who want to have the newest, best performing motorcycles, and therefore, it was essential to keep production alive, to find a balance. On one hand, allow the market to come down and to be brave enough not to sell in. There were some people who said, why did you not make more sales? I said it was intentionally. We had to be able to breathe and allow the market to recover.
I said, on the other hand, we had to bring new motorcycles that our dealers, which is one of our most important assets, are also able to survive, are also able to tell new stories. Yeah, I think we have found that balance and most importantly for you, the whole problem, I would say, in Q2 this year, at least the inventory issue should be completely solved. We will certainly drop below 100,000 vehicles with dealers and importers, which is the lowest since six years. Then the stock should be, as said, as low as even before the crisis, and we should be able to go back to normal. Last point, cost is a very important one, because I can tell you once I arrived, we had EUR 44 million of overheads, and I'm only talking about overheads, per month.
If you multiply it with 12, this adds up to a number higher than EUR 500 million. We had our record year in 2023 with EUR 2.6 billion of revenues. Even with EUR 2.6 billion of revenues and the ambition maybe to grow to EUR 3 billion, more than EUR 500 million in overheads is really too much. And therefore, the focus was to dramatically reduce the overheads. You see already the big achievement of 2025 to bring it down by more than EUR 100 million. Most importantly, this is what we now see with great confidence is how much we are now driving it down also in 2026 and going forward 2027. We're really touching every stone and bringing this down and the key thing is therefore it's intentionally, we're not guiding at the moment. This is what I really would like to also mention.
Maybe we will get there. There is one important change also for you in terms of transparency. We will now, compared to the past where we only published twice a year, change to a quarterly announcement. Therefore, I also need to be a little bit careful how much I can tell you. I would love to tell you even more, but on the 13th of May, we will publish our first quarter results and quarterly statement. Then you can see also the progress both of overhead reduction, but also the progress in sales, which is the most important one. We had mentioned in the last ad hoc statement that we sold twice as many motorcycles than in the comparable quarter of the previous year. Really I need to knock on wood. We really have a very loyal customer base who are sticking to KTM.
Most importantly, this is just a reflection of what are our products, which are not only, and we will touch upon it in a second also in motorsport, some products which were good in the past and where you have some romantic and historic feelings. All the motorcycles which we have launched over the last six months after the insolvency were well received on the market. Our RC 990, which you see on the left and right, won the test against the Panigale, against the Yamaha R9. So products are well received. The dealers are really happy that we are now, because of the reduced amounts with which we are pushing into the market, that they are selling without discounts for the first time since a very long time. This brings also the dealer confidence back that they have a sustainable business model also with our motorcycles.
The cycle is really working well. I just mentioned the motorsport, because you have to imagine, despite all the difficulties we had to face last year, we had the most successful season in the history of the group. We won 29 championship titles. Therefore, I just mentioned it's not that KTM was good and was competitive and we have some feelings. No, we are best in class in all those fields, and most importantly, even also the 2026 season, you could argue, okay, maybe this was from the past. Yeah. That is what the run rate from 2024, 2023, but I can tell you that only MotoGP from November to March, we had to improve the speed by half a second. Otherwise, if there is a standstill, nothing is happening. Therefore, it is really equally proud to our team, what they're achieving.
We managed to win Dakar. We won Dakar also in 2025, where people didn't even have the money to pay the fuel, and they used their own credit cards to participate. Incredible stories how this company, and the people of this company stood together in that crisis. It's really amazing to see how this success continues. There is not a question mark that there is a justification for that brand on the market. That's in a nutshell, a little bit about the business. This is usually where Petra Preining would have stepped in, touching the financials. Because of the short, limited time, I said I will cover all of them. Again, this is just a summary of that financial turnaround. First of all, we had to overcome that insolvency. We had to restart production with all the odds.
You have to imagine, we started with 100% prepayment with our suppliers because they were, of course, uncertain whether this would continue. I'm not blaming them, but it was really a big headache for Petra to manage at the beginning to really work on this total different working capital needs. If you start with full prepayment, not even Google could, I think, finance their whole supply chain. We had to really balance out, and of course, the secret, even before Petra arrived, was to sell off the old inventory, convert it into cash, and then restart. We had to establish our. Last June, we didn't even have factory lines. Those are also part of the financial successes that we were able to not only refinance ourselves now but also establish factory lines, working capital lines, and really resizing the whole company.
What you see here, and you will see the numbers in detail anyway then on the yearly statements and quarterly, but how revenues have peaked and have come down in 2024 and 2025. How the overheads had corresponded in the other way and, of course, the negative effect on our result, which was, I said, a reflection of it. Now, most importantly, if we look to how the first half year of 2025 has developed and the second half year, we saw an increase in the second half year compared to H1, so 50% higher sales. Most importantly, and therefore, I try to be quick, we managed to achieve a positive free cash flow, albeit only by EUR 4 million, but we saw in the second.
I'm sorry, Gottfried, if I have to step in, but we're running out of time.
Am I already over time?
Unfortunately, we have to end in about 30 seconds.
Okay.
I do apologize for this.
I will try to capture any of those questions, what I was about to tell you anyway in the Q&A session. Let's start with it, and I'm happy to receive your questions and answer them.
We do have a few questions which I will forward to you in the aftermath because the 30-minute slot is unfortunately approaching its end quite quickly. I think the important thing, and as they say, time flies when you're having fun, and you seem to be putting in a lot of hard work, but you seem to enjoy what you're doing, and I guess that came across really well, and the good job you have done in restructuring the company and refocusing the company. I will be happy to forward the questions to you. Of course, I'm very excited to say if there are any questions from the auditorium in the aftermath, please feel free to contact the company directly. They will be more than happy to entertain your thoughts and your question. We are continuing with the next company, which is SBO.
I just posted the link to that next event in the chat.
Okay.
I wish you all a great continuing conference. Thank you so much. Gottfried, if you have one second, I'll just stay on the line. That would be super.
Yeah.
Thank you so much, everybody.
Good. Thank you.