Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, and a rather warm welcome from Vienna. It is my pleasure presenting to you the Q1 2022 result of Semperit Group today, which in fact, is the first quarter I have been nearly fully in charge as the new CEO of the company. With me in the call is our CFO, Petra Preining, who will take you through the financials in a few minutes. Afterwards, both Petra and I are at your disposal for any question you might have. Before I take you through the headline numbers and the operational update, however, let me first express my regret that the war over Ukraine is now entering its third month. Our employees have shown great solidarity with the victims in recent weeks by participating in the fundraising campaigns launched by Semperit, and also setting up their own initiatives.
During our presentation today, we will frequently come back to the scope of disruption and the economic impact that this war has on current business sentiment. Starting at slide three, with the highlights of the quarter. I'm very proud to present strong results against the backdrop of exogenous economic shocks caused by high inflation, rising costs of raw materials, energy and transport, and supply chain constraints. My special gratitude goes to everybody at Semperit Group for all the resilience and endurance you have shown in recent weeks. The industrial sector is the core of our growth strategy, is on a solid foundation with a strong order book and sales growth despite headwinds from higher input costs. The latter has been addressed through what we call the Magic Square of close and extraordinarily successful cooperation of supply chain management, procurement, R&D, and production.
In turn, the medical sector moves rapidly towards a normalization after the COVID-related exceptional cycle over the last two years, evidenced in a further price decline of protective medical gloves. I will come back to that business in a few minutes, but suffice to say here that prices are still above pre-corona levels while margins in the markets have started to stabilize. Thanks to the ongoing efficiency improvements, Semperit is in a much better position today than before COVID, which is why our margins have been higher so far. When we spoke last time in March, we mentioned our proactive pricing policy, which is also visible in the results of the industrial sector, has hugely paid off given the high-cost environment.
The timing and scope of the price adjustments of course depend on how close the specific products are to a product type which could be seen as a not so high technical characteristics. The closer they are, the more challenging it gets. At the same time, our strong balance sheet continues to support our organic and inorganic growth aspirations, which remains the key focus in our strategy. The two developments worth mentioning since our full year 2021 result publication, especially with regards to our focus on our geographical footprint, is that we suspended sales to Russia and Belarus on 18th of March. At the same time, working to strengthen our position in North America. Turning to the headline numbers of the industrial sector at slide five.
I'm very pleased to report a strong 31.4% revenue growth and EBITDA also up by 28.1% year-on-year. This resilient response to growing cost pressure was based on a combination of proactive price increases, strict cost control, and efficiency gains from our previous restructuring efforts. Petra will provide more details on the price-volume effect and various other moving parts to explain the EBITDA bridge later. From a more high-level perspective, the important observation here is that revenue were up by 20.9% between pre-corona quarter one 2019 and quarter one 2022, while EBITDA improved in absolute numbers by 7.8% over that same period. Despite seasonal effects and margin pressure, we see strong improvement over the last three years. What has arguably been a pretty difficult time.
Before I start with the operational update for each segment, let me just briefly remind you about the main headwinds we currently face and what countermeasures we have taken. While cost inflation and limited availability of raw materials as well as congested logistics had been an issue for some time, the Russian war in Ukraine has aggravated energy costs with the added risk of potential gas supply disruption in Europe. In addition, shortage of qualified labor and wage pressure has now become entrenched here in Europe as well. In terms of high energy cost and potential shortages, we have implemented strict measures to reduce energy consumption as part of our drive to enhance operational efficiency supported by selective pre-contracting.
As already mentioned, we are also having a strong and flexible cooperation between our supply chain management, procurement, R&D, and production that grants us a high flexibility in responding to given challenges.
Having taken proactive price increases at an early stage, we also focus strongly on ongoing efficiency improvement, global multiple sourcing of raw materials, increased service quality, and strong customer centricity. Last but not least, the war in Ukraine, on the one hand, justifies our efforts to focus on the energy transition, which is why we have started to put even more emphasis on installation of, as example, photovoltaic systems. On the other hand, as a preventive measure at locations such as Wimpassing in Austria and Odry in Czech Republic, we have engineered and started to convert our gas burners to dual burners, means we can use gas or oil. In case gas is stopped, we can further operate our steam production with oil.
Of course, we are fully aware that this is not the best solution in terms of sustainability, but it gives us the flexibility to counter the gas shortage that is likely to come on the short end. You can call this measure, if you like, our insurance of friction-free production. To come back to the comparison between 2019 and today, all in all, you can see the wide range of our countermeasures. Given all these headwinds, the visible pressure on the margin, despite the absolute growth in the revenue and EBITDA figures, is comprehensible. Over the page, we start with Semperflex, which was again our top performer among the industry segments.
Revenue grew by an impressive 45.9% year-on-year, and EBITDA by as much as 58.9%, mainly due to a strong order book, proactive pricing adjustment, and excellent operational performance. The margin of 24.5% not only exceeds that of Q1 2021, but also Q1 2019. High revenue growth and margin were additionally supported by high capacity utilization at our site in Odry, Czech Republic, and a strong U.S. order book and sales. On the next slide, we show a top line and margin improvement for Sempertrans against the backdrop of a recovery of the mining industry due to higher prices for mining products, which in turn stimulated new investment and maintenance. We clearly see positive signs here after a lean period, as expected.
Sempertrans achieved positive margin development despite headwinds from congested logistics impacting global ports that have consequently partially pushed sales volume from quarter one into quarter two. We continue to pay the highest management attention to the segment. This is already reflected in the first successes, such as doubling of the order book year-on-year. On slide eight, Semperseal is a bit of a mixed bag, as we managed to increase revenue by 27.5% year-on-year. EBITDA declined by 43.8%, with margins falling from 14.7% in quarter one 2021 to 6.5% in quarter one 2022. Despite the strong order intake, the segment was struggling to pass on prices in a timely manner, facing a very hesitant general market environment.
The products of the segments are having the most commodity-alike properties compared with the other industrial segments, which is reflected here. On the positive side, I should mention the ramp-up of our new production site in Union, Georgia in the U.S., which is going to help to further strengthen our position in the U.S. market. Turning the page, Semperform benefited from a strong order intake and a shift in product mix, with the high margin special applications business unit benefiting from the recovery of ski tourism towards the end of the quarter. Also worth mentioning is the strong sales in the engineered solution business unit. This led to a more than 30% revenue increase year-on-year, but kept margins under pressure, with a decline to 12.2% in quarter one 2022, from 15.4% in the previous year period.
Finally, Sempermed on slide 10, with a chart on the upper part nicely illustrating the current normalization following the corona-induced special cycle over the previous two years. Although the order book as well as price are still above pre-corona level. There are two observations I would make in this context. While market dynamics were driven previously by suppliers, this has now changed to customer preferences and demand, freeing up more capacity. Second, the margin in the broader market have started to stabilize. We were still able to manage and keep Sempermed's margin above pre-corona levels, partly to our prior restructuring efforts. On the positive side, I should mention the ramp-up of our new.
The ramp-up of our P7+ plant in Malaysia has now been completed, both in time and on budget, providing us not only with a state-of-the-art production facility, but further enhancing operational efficiency in this highly competitive market. With this, I've come now to the end of the operational description. Let me now hand over to Petra to take us through the financials.
Thank you very much, and good afternoon now from my side too. Let me first share Karl's dismay on the ongoing war in the Ukraine. In many ways, this has aggravated previous economic shocks such as high inflation, supply chain disruption, and availability of raw materials. With rising energy costs and the strong US dollar being the most pressing issues from a CFO perspective in recent weeks. In this context, as the war drags on, I'm most concerned about the competitive edge of the European companies, notably because of the risk of gas supply disruption and related consequences. Let me start with a few highlights on our financials in the first quarter of 2022 at slide 12. As outlined in the previous quarter, the story of two tales continues, with the industrial sector being very strong despite all the headwinds of high inflation and supply constraints.
The performance of the industrial sector in an environment no longer marked by the pandemic confirms the focus here. In contrast, given the rapid fading of earlier COVID-related special effects, the medical sector is moving rapidly towards normalization, although prices are still above pre-COVID levels. Given all the exogenous economic shocks, there are a huge number of focus areas on my agenda as the Semperit CFO. Firstly, proactive working capital management has become an important tool in trying to smooth supply chain disruption and the availability of raw materials and components. In the wake of the Russian war in Ukraine and continuing price increases, we have built up our inventory to avoid disruption in production processes. Secondly, efficiency and cost measures remain as important as ever, and no doubt our previous restructuring effort has laid the foundation for a more agile and diligent organization.
As Karl has outlined before, it is not only about passing prices on in a timely manner, but looking for further operational and financial efficiency gains at a time of considerable margin pressure. In this respect, I would like to highlight our close collaboration of supply chain management, procurement, R&D, and production, the so-called Magic Square, which has evolved towards a strong competitive advantage. Let me add to that a third focus point as the CFO, which is investment in future growth together with new forms of energy efficiency. These include our photovoltaic projects. At our Wimpassing site, we have earmarked about EUR 1.8 million for this by the end of 2023, and a thorough IT upgrade, including cybersecurity, for which almost EUR 6 million is budgeted in 2022.
Finally, I'm still pleased to be able to present a very strong balance sheet and high liquidity with the Q1 2022 results, which support our aspiration for future organic and inorganic growth. With the latest development of the Russian war in Ukraine, we maintain our previous year-end 2022 EBITDA guidance to be expected significantly below the average market consensus of EUR 100 million-EUR 120 million as of early March 2022. Even though we are now presenting a very strong first quarter, we expect, especially in the second half of the year, which by the way is always the weaker one seasonally, further challenges, especially due to the uncertain gas supply in Europe and general constraints in the availability of raw materials. Over the page, we present the segmental building blocks for top-line development, where we are particularly pleased about the industrial sector.
Each industrial segment, except Sempertrans, has achieved a double-digit revenue growth, and this is arguably against partially tough comparables from the previous year. In total, 31.4% aggregated revenue improvement by the industrial sector supports not only our strategic transformation, but help to somewhat offset the steep top-line decline of the medical sector, which Karl has explained in detail before. From my perspective, the aggregated revenue contribution of EUR 171 million from the industrial sector significantly exceeds the EUR 106.1 million from the medical sector and shows that we're heading into the right direction. Similarly, on slide 14, when we apply the same analysis for EBITDA, the industrial sector contributed a combined EUR 26.4 million euro EBITDA, which was twice as large as that of the medical sector in Q1 2022.
The latter declined by almost EUR 92 million year-over-year for all the reasons we have discussed before. At a time of high inflation and severe supply chain disruption, what was particularly pleasing for the industrial sector is that all segments achieved a positive EBITDA contribution and a formidable margin, notably 24.5% for Semperflex, but also double digits for Semperform. This is a clear sign of resilience at a time of major disruption and economic shocks. The next slide is from your perspective, presumably one of the most important ones, and we have tried to provide as much detail in this EBITDA bridge as possible. The major moving parts are price and volume effects on sales, but increasingly also energy, cost of materials, inventories, logistics, and personnel.
In terms of prices, our proactive pricing policy in the industrial sector contributed an additional EUR 36.5 million, but on a group level, faced a drag from the medical sector of EUR 97.1 million. In terms of volume effects for the medical sector, logistical issues had somewhat eased, which helped to increase volumes by an additional EUR 10.3 million. In addition, the industrial sector contributed EUR 4.4 million in volume. Rising costs for energy and materials are now having a more tangible impact, as have costs for logistics and personnel. The war in Ukraine has no doubt accelerated the search for alternative energy sources. Please note that Semperit is US dollar long, especially now after the repayment of our US dollar Schuldschein loan last year's Q4.
Therefore, a strengthening US dollar is expected to have a positive impact on our P&L. If the US dollar/euro exchange rate had been at parity in Q1 2022, this would have increased our financial result by approximately EUR 3 million. Turning the page on slide 16, we have extended our summary of key financial KPIs over the four-year period so that we can compare the pre-corona Q1 2019 with Q1 2022. With the normalization of the special cycle from the pandemic in our medical sector having set in, the key observation is that we can still present a much stronger operating result. With Q1 2022 EBITDA being more than twice that of Q1 2019, and EBIT more than 3x .
More encouragingly, earnings after tax came in at a strong EUR 15.1 million, which may imply a steep decline compared to Q1 2021, but still be much better than in previous years. Free cash flow and CapEx, I will discuss in more detail over the next two slides. Starting with CapEx on slide 17, you see a strong development of CapEx. The step-by-step improvement is partially also due to the shift from 2020 and 2021, resulting from the catch-up effects from COVID and delays of supply chain. The level you see now supports our organic growth strategy, as we have increased both maintenance and growth CapEx consistently over the last few quarters, with ramp-up at Semperflex and the new production site of Semperseal in the U.S. accounting for a larger proportion in the industrial sector.
Similarly, the ramp-up of P7+ plant in Malaysia explains the larger share of CapEx at the medical sector, which will subside going forward. Overall, in 2022, we are planning to spend a similar amount of CapEx as we did in 2021, or maybe even slightly more, but with an increasing focus on growth CapEx in the industrial sector. Over the page, given the normalization of COVID-related special effects in the medical sector, it is perhaps no surprise that the operating cash flow has declined year-over-year. At the same time, our proactive inventory build-up in the wake of the supply chain constraints has also impacted the operating cash flow. On the back of our stronger investment in future growth, there is a step-up in investment cash flow, which resulted in a free cash flow of around 0.
Active working capital management is a very important part of our daily finance operations, and slide 19 reflects the complexity and challenges of the current economic situation. We already mentioned our proactive inventory build-up to smooth supply chain disruption since, in addition to the well-known problems in China and in the U.S., logistics congestion has now also arrived to European ports, and the war in the Ukraine aggravated raw materials availability. Please note that the significant price increases are part of the explanation for higher trade receivables and trade payables, although we are still well in our target of working capital below 22% of last 12 months revenue. Going forward, this will remain one of the main focus points for my team at the finance resource.
On my final slide 20, there is not much to add from what I had outlined in previous quarters. Continuing with thhttps://editor.inflexiontranscribe.com/static/media/icon-stop.c66f93825c3f48c23a40e2e9d93da074.svge strong liquidity position and unused credit facilities at a time of growing borrowing rates. We remain cash positive despite all the exogenous economic shocks, and maintain an equity ratio of 56.2%. Importantly for our shareholders, we have paid a dividend of EUR 1.5 per share after the annual general meeting on 27th of April, which applies a yield of 5.1%. With this, I've come to an end of my presentation and hand back to Karl for the outlook.
Thank you very much, Petra, and let me now complete our presentation with an outline of the management agenda and expectations for the rest of the year. You are familiar with the structure of slide 22 from our previous result presentation in March, and I would just like to add a few observations how things have evolved since then. We took the starting baseline in January 2022, with a clear focus on our growth strategy in the industrial sector, and highlighted what has been accelerated after the war in Ukraine started on 24th of February. At the same time, new strict lockdowns were imposed on various regional clusters in China, with the most severe impact on additional global supply chain disruption coming from lockdown in the Shanghai area.
Against this backdrop of new disruption and exogenous economic shocks, Semperit management adopted specific countermeasures and took a strong focus on cost inflation, foreign currency impact, as well as proactive working capital management. When summarizing our expectation for 2022, we would state first that the geopolitical crisis has gained a new dimension, as it implies now the risk for gas supply disruption in Europe, especially in the second half of the year, and worsened the availability of raw materials. Still, I would like to highlight at this point once more, that this is why we have actively decided to build up inventories, and also that our countermeasures for raw material headwinds are in place and have proven to be very efficient. Secondly, the latest regional lockdowns in China heightened the global logistical challenges, with congestion now spreading over the European ports like Hamburg and Rotterdam.
Thirdly, we see clear trends for cost inflation accelerating and growth slowing down. As a result of which we maintain our outlook for 2022 EBITDA expected to be significantly below the market consensus of EUR 100- EUR 120 million as of early March this year. In response, we will further mobilize our internal management capabilities. Essentially, what is in our control and where we can make a clear difference. With a clear focus on cost control, energy transition, operational efficiency, supply chain management, and working capital management. In this context, I am also encouraged by the strong sales growth of the industrial sector in the U.S. as we pursue further strategic and regional diversification. With this, we have come to the end of our presentation, and Petra and I are now available for any question you might have.
Ladies and gentlemen, at this time, we will begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star followed by one on their touch tone telephone. You wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star followed by two. If you're using speaker equipment today, please lift the handset before making your selections. Anyone who has a question may press star followed by one at this time. One moment for the first question, please. First question is from the line of Markus Remis from RBI. Please go ahead.
Yeah, good afternoon. Thanks for taking my questions. I'd first like to get a bit more granularity on the price increases. I mean, can you shed some light which or in which segments you've been particularly successful? Maybe you can give us also some idea of how much or the percentage of price increases that have become effective already as of the first quarter and how pricing momentum is going to build up over the coming quarters. I mean, it's arguably very different from segment to segment, but especially on the Semperflex side, that would be my priority segment, so to say.
Thank you very much for the question. Indeed, you, as you said, in the different segments, we have different dynamics on the prices. You said Semperflex. Flex was the most dynamic and most stringent price increases. Time over time, a sequence of price increases we did, and we see stable prices on a high plateau, the next couple of months. In Semperseal, as example, we have a little bit of delay in price increases according to the nature of the product, which is not so technical, let's say like a Semperflex, and therefore, we have a little bit of delay to bring the prices through.
In Semperform, we have nice price increases as well and therefore our input cost prices, energy, labor, we could forward to the customer base. In Sempermed, as explained already a couple of times, the average sales price went down, but it's still above our Corona level. Therefore, this segment has a little bit of a pressure on the market because there's an oversupply in the market. Overall, a quite dynamic environment. You have seen in the price and in the result, quite good effects overall.
All right. When we make our estimates, say for the second quarter, third quarter and so on, I mean, should we expect that there is kind of still a lagging effect coming from price increases that, say, have been implemented early in the year but not kind of taking some time until it's filtering through to all customers? The question is: Is momentum still kind of rising in Q2 and then into Q3?
We were quite stringent and early enough to increase the price in every segment. As I said already in Semperseal, we have a little bit of delay. There will come some small on top in quarter two, and we observed in the market in the input costs very carefully, and if necessary, we do a next step.
All right. Okay. On your AGM resolutions, on the topic of share buybacks, you've had that on the agenda 10% buyback. I mean, I recall conference calls where in the capital allocation policy, share buybacks were actually ruled out. Did that change? Related to that, how advanced are your M&A talks and also the divestment process for Sempermed? If you can provide us with a status quo update. Thank you.
Okay. Thank you very much. This is all in one question. Let me start with the share buyback. As also announced earlier or even last year, we are interested and we give preference to long-term value enhancement for all our shareholders. On the back of what we have announced or communicated already in the last quarters, that we are working on organic and inorganic possibilities for Semperit. This is currently our main focus. In case this changes, we definitely have to inform you in accordance with the capital market regulations. On the second question, on the M&A side, we are focusing on several targets. We're screening the market over here.
I know it's. I've asked for your patience already last quarter, but I would kindly ask you to bear with us some more time. We again over here will inform you according to the capital market guidance. This is it actually, right? There were the two
Yeah. I mean, on the M&A.
On the AGM. Yes. The other question. This is actually one of the top three asked regularly on the minutes. As the latest approval has been issued and expired, we have renewed that to keep all options on the table. Again, as I said, as things stand currently, we will focus on the M&A side to give the highest long-term value enhancement to all our shareholders and to the best for Semperit.
Since we last talked, did you get a sense that, I don't know, there are kind of new targets on the market? Did you get, I don't know, deeper into the diligence process? Any flavor you can give us? I'm not talking about kind of names you're looking at, but just anything that would make us better understand where you stand in this M&A process.
As you know, we cannot disclose any processes, nor names, nor statuses. The situation, as you are very well aware, it's quite challenging. When screening the market, there are very high multiples currently traded, or those targets are traded at very high multiples in general. We of course have to keep our own situation plus the situation of the targets in mind. There are certain leads we are following up. As said, I'm very sorry, we cannot disclose anything right now. As soon as possible and as soon as the market communication allows, we will definitely inform you.
Sure. Yeah. I was not asking about details, just to get a bit of a flavor. Can you disclose the net long position you have in the dollar?
No, we unfortunately do not disclose this information. I gave you a bit of a flavor how the Q1 2022 would have looked like at an exchange rate of parity euro/dollar. This is all what we want to disclose at that point.
Right. Then just on the guidance, a final question, please. I mean, have you considered like rephrasing it, instead of referring to a consensus figure that is two and a half months old, kind of to give a broad bracket, whatsoever, I don't know, 70%-90%, or what made you stick to the early March consensus significant decline phrase?
No, as you know, we tried to describe it also in our presentation. There are still a lot of balls in the air, and the visibility is very difficult to see what's going on. We have the situation at the harbors, not only in the U.S. and China, but now also in Europe. We have the situation in Ukraine, Russia. We have very high inflation. We are basically coming on the back of a difficult or challenging situation when it comes to raw material scarcity in general. All of this, we're very pleased with Q1.
As things stand currently, we keep the guidance as we have announced it and published it on ninth of March.
All right. Okay. Thank you. I'll get back in the line.
As a reminder, if you'd like to ask a question, please press star followed by one on your touch tone telephone. Next question is from the line of Roland Könen from Value- Holdings. Please go ahead.
Yes, good afternoon from my side. Thanks for taking my questions. I would like to do them also one by one. Maybe firstly, an add-on question on the guidance question of my first speaker. Could you explain what do you really mean with significantly? Is this -10%? Is this -20% below the average consensus or at a minimum, what is the meaning of significantly?
Okay. Based on capital market rules, anything above 10% is significantly.
Okay, great. Thanks a lot. Second question would be also more or less on the pricing side. How would you describe the evolution of the gap between the increasing raw materials and energy costs, et cetera, on the one hand, and on the other hand, your rising selling prices? Will this gap narrow in the next quarters or will this gap even wider?
So far, we're working that the gap gets smaller, closed. As you have seen in the result, we were quite successful to, let's say, pass on the prices. As we see, gas is stabilizing now on around EUR 96 million or EUR 90 million, and so from that point of view, certain plateaus are reached. From that point of view, we feel quite comfortable.
Okay, thanks. Next question would be on Russia, Belarus, et cetera. Would there be any direct effects on your balance sheet and P&L from impairment or other things with regard to this area? As I guess, as I know, you have roughly 3% of sales in this area in 2021. Maybe you could elaborate or a bit on this effects on your balance sheet and P&L.
A pleasure. To your first direct question, is there any impairment risk? No. Why is that? Firstly, we have also ceased the business with Russia. Secondly, as it applies to the vast majority of our accounts receivables, those are insured. On the sourcing side, we have had very early in the days, meaning last year and even before, changed to multiple sourcing and have also reduced the potential impact on that end as well. To your concrete question, is there any risk or is any trigger on impairment? No, there's none.
Okay, thanks. Next question is on the Sempermed side. You're saying that the margin level is stabilizing. What will be the normalized EBIT margin? We saw a huge effect in the last year, of course. We saw some depressed margins in years 2018, 2019, 2020. If I look more years back, for example, 2011 to 2014, we have range between 7.2% and 9.2% on the EBIT level. What could be a normalized margin level at Sempermed going forward?
Thank you for this question. We are not communicating margin levels here, but we need to say it's difficult to compare our Sempermed business from today with some years ago. We had some quite significant operational improvement, and therefore, this has paid off the last two years and this year as well. Therefore, Sempermed is in a different shape than compared three, four years ago.
The margin levels of the former years, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014 of 7%-9% is more or less out of reach or?
No, it's actually the other way around. Maybe just allow me to jump in. Sempermed, as well as Semperit in general, has gone through a significant transformation when it comes to cost, and Sempermed has been through a restructuring phase. What you can see right now, the Sempermed of today is not comparable with the Sempermed of 2019. That's just to stress or to get that straight. Besides that, please understand we do not give guidance on margins on segments.
Okay. Fair enough. My very last question, more or less housekeeping question on the depreciation. It was roughly EUR 30 million in the first quarter. Is this a new quarterly run rate for the next quarters, or will this be a step-by-step increase because of your CapEx programs of the last year and this and the end of this year? Will the depreciation go up from the EUR 30 million of the first quarter?
Yes, as you perfectly rightly have summarized, we have had some nice growth investments done. To name one, the P7+ , or to name another one, the plants in the US. As they go on stream now, that will obviously add the depreciation, or will increase the depreciation. Then on top of it, all the growth projects we are planning to do, that will also add to that amount.
Okay, great. Thanks a lot for answering my questions, and all the best.
Next question is from the line of Emanuel von Spee from Rothorn Partners. Please go ahead.
Hello. Thank you very much for taking my question. I just want to communicate my disappointment about your communication with Sempermed. It gets really slowly a little bit tiring to hear since two years the same kind of explanation. You say screening. I do every day something screening in my work. Leads to follow-up. What does that mean? That means investment bankers write you some emails, "I have an idea." Then you say, "What? Wait for update." It gives the impression that there's something going on, but it looks like there is not no project. Nothing is going on. Why you're not just communicating and saying, "There's nothing going on. We are not advancing." Because it's every time the same thing that it's not clear what you're communicating. It gets really, really upsetting for me. Thank you very much.
Thank you very much for your question and I fully appreciate, also the way you put it, let's put it this way. As you do know, we cannot comment on any processes in general. Firstly, let me summarize, and I know that you know already, but just let me summarize. We have a decision which we have communicated in January 2020, and this has not been revoked yet, or has not been revoked in general. I think we have proven as the management that to continue with the operation with Sempermed has been proven very fruitful for Semperit, for all the shareholders and the future well-being of Semperit.
That much, we can say for now. In case things change, we definitely will communicate to you in line with the capital market communication. We do understand that this has been repeated several times already.
Okay. Thank you.
There are no further questions at this time, and I would like to hand back to Karl Haider for closing comments. Please go ahead.
Thank you very much for all your questions and having a strong interest in our Semperit performance. The management team and the executive board is looking really forward to achieve a very good result in quarter two and ongoing as well. You as analyst and shareholder can observe us very carefully, and you will be proud of your investment. Thank you very much, and have a nice day.